The Republican Party and Immigration Politics: From Proposition 187 to George W. Bush

This book tells the story of the Republican Party’s flirtation with immigration politics over the last two decades. In the 1990s the party was closely associated with an anti-immigration discourse and especially Proposition 187, a high-profile California initiative to bar illegal immigrants from public services. The selection of George W. Bush as the party’s presidential nominee, however, represented a new direction as leading strategists sought to appeal to the increasingly influential Latino electorate by pushing pro-immigration policies, including the legalization of over ten million illegal immigrants. That Bush’s liberal reform agenda was ultimately dashed by conservative Republican hardliners demonstrates the party has not yet resolved the ideological and political tensions wrought by this most contentious of issues.