Huckabee advocates pause in Muslim immigration—or does he?

Scott in Pennsylvania writes:

I just heard that Huckabee has gone further than anyone has yet in calling for restricting immigration from “countries that sponsor and harbor terrorists.” While not specific enough, this comes closest to the moratorium or ban on immigration from Muslim countries that we’ve called for. However, there are frustrations with this story; it states that he is backing off. He may be just floating a trial balloon, and it may be too late to make a difference. But such a movement has to start somewhere and it is encouraging nonetheless.

Here is the story Scott sent:

“ROCK HILL, S.C. (AP)—Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee called Tuesday for suspending immigration from countries that sponsor or harbor terrorists.

Hitting the campaign trail in South Carolina’s Jan. 19 primary, Huckabee sharpened his rhetoric on immigration and embraced a tougher measure than any of his rivals have so far.

“There’s a couple of things we’re going to do differently,” Huckabee told about 300 supporters in Rock Hill, shortly after arriving in the state from Michigan. “I say we ought to put a hiatus on people who come in here … if they come from countries that sponsor and harbor terrorists.”

[Scott adds: Although “hiatus” works, it’s an awkward choice. I think he meant to say “moratorium”, which works better. This reminds me of Huckabee using “apologies” where he meant to say “condolences.”]

“Let’s say, until you get your act in order, and we get our act in order, we’re not going to just let you keep coming and threaten the future and safety of America,” he said.

“Every one of the 19 hijackers on 9/11 came here legally. Our government welcomed them in,” Huckabee said.

Huckabee didn’t mention the proposal at his second stop, a rally of about 250 in Sumter. Afterward, his new senior adviser, Jim Pinkerton, backed away from the proposal, saying that Huckabee really meant that wants a “thorough review” of immigration policies.

LA writes:

My head’s spinning. James Pinkerton who during his days in the elder Bush administration seemed a kind of centrist conservative type, turned into a cultural nationalist in recent years, at least on Islam. In February 2006, as I reported, he said that Muslims are inherently incompatible with Western society and threaten Western countries with “national suicide.” (See my 1990 booklet, The Path to National Suicide.) He spoke of a complete cut-off of Muslim immigration and even of tourist visas.

Then a couple of weeks ago Pinkerton went to work for Mike Huckabee’s campaign as a senior policy advisor, which, given Huckabee’s record of support for accommodations to illegal aliens, was seen by us at VFR as a possible sign that Pinkerton was moving back to liberalism on culture and immigration issues. But then Huckabee, moving right, makes the most restrictionist proposal regarding Muslims ever made by a national politician in this country, while Pinkerton, reversing his previous restrictionism, retracts Huckabee’s statement!

I should add that there is not necessarily a contradiction between an exclusionary attitude toward Muslims and a welcoming attitude toward Hispanic illegal aliens. Some conservatives, particularly conservative Christians, may come to believe that Islam is a unique threat to our society, while they still feel that the continued mass immigration of Hispanics, who are nominally Christian, is just fine.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at January 16, 2008 01:57 AM | Send