Huckabee’s reversal on illegal immigration

(Correction: what I say below about Huckabee’s amnesty position, which I based on a newspaper article, is not correct. His position, as explained at his website, is that he leaves no room for a possible amnesty. Going back to the native country is not a pathway to legalization.)

(See further follow-up to this post here.) So powerful is the Republican anti-illegal immigration consensus that even Mike Huckabee, a leading member of the “Every illegal alien is really Jesus” faction, has changed direction and come out with his own anti-illegal immigration plan. He says he would complete a border fence by 2010, punish employers who hire illegals, and require illegals to go back to their home country in order to get legalized in this country—and if they did not register within 120 and then leave the U.S., they would be deported and barred from the U.S. for ten years. Just ten days ago Huckabee was defending his awarding of merit scholarships to illegal alien children when he was governor of Arkansas.

We’ve been through all these twists and turns on the amnesty issue before. Whether or not the illegals are required to return home first before they get legalized is irrelevant. Amnesty in any way, shape, or form is out of the question. Fred Thompson understands that. Huckabee does not.

- end of initial entry -

Charles T. writes:

I saw Huckabee defending his scholarship plan for children of illegal aliens last weekend on a televised debate for Republican presidential candidates. His preening did not impress me. I wanted to ask him about the necessity of providing scholarships for deserving American children from the lower economic brackets. These are the people whose wages will be most injured by the economic effect of illegal alien labor.

So now he is saying that he was wrong and is reversing his stance on illegal aliens? I do not believe him. He was too passionate about defending his illegal alien scholarship plan during the televised debate.

I also do not believe him because of his philosophy that “Every illegal alien is really Jesus.” Let us not underestimate the power of this type of thinking. It is not easily abandoned by a true believer. There is a strong current of thinking in evangelical circles that assisting the poor, through any means, is proof that you have arrived at a mature level of Christianity. In other words, it is “THE LITMUS TEST” of Christian spirituality. This spirituality does not really care what one believes about the core Christian doctrines on the redemption, atonement, resurrection, respect for the biblical law, etc. No. These doctrines take a back seat to “real” ministry—which is helping the poor. When this happens in the Christian church, ministry to the poor takes on a political flavor rather than a spiritual one. If you are not helping the poor, then you are oppressing them. If you are not helping the poor, your are spiritually stagnant. The beat goes on.

Unfortunately, I have much personal contact, and conflict, with people in our churches who think this way. Helping the poor is commanded in scripture, but not at the expense of injuring other people and/or our laws; certainly not at the expense of helping illegal aliens while economically injuring your own citizens. However, this is exactly what Huckabee has been doing and/or proposing. His spirituality allows him to injure his own citizens—i.e., taxing them to pay for illegal alien scholarships—with a clear conscience. He would be violating his spiritual conscience if he did not do this. It does not injure his conscience that he was exercising his kindness by taxing the labor of his own citizens to further and fulfill his spirituality. This is the type of compassionate Christian that our churches have spawned in this modern age.

He is also a Southern Baptist preacher. This should serve as more of a warning than as an encouragement. Many Baptist preachers today are right-liberals and function more as CEOs within their churches than as a shepherd. Their messages to the congregations are more like scoldings—pray more, give more, help the poor more, you are not doing enough, give more, pray more, you are not doing enough, pray more, etc. ad nauseam. You can go to any Baptist church in this nation and hear a variant of this message. There is very little teaching on the core Christian doctrines in SBC churches—or any Baptist church for that matter. The core of Baptist teaching is based on subjective feeling and being actively engaged in some type of ministry. Hence the emphasis on helping the poor over and above anything else and at any cost to others who could be effected by such action. Do not let the Baptist label fool you. Huckabee is not a conservative.

Disregard this current Huckabee stance on immigration and illegal aliens. Pay attention to: 1) what he has said and done about illegal immigration/aliens in the past, and 2) his spiritual stance on helping the poor. This will give you a much clearer picture of what he would do on immigration/illegal aliens if he is elected to the presidency.

Terry Morris replies:

Yes; by and with the aid of a self-righteous demagogue Jacobin Congress is this particularly true. We must always consider the makeup of the Congress when determining who is best qualified to swing the executive arm of our government.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at December 08, 2007 01:44 PM | Send