Unfortunately, this was a political inevitability.
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton on Wednesday came out against granting driver's licenses to illegal immigrants, after weeks of pressure in the presidential race to take a position on a now-failed ID plan from her home state governor. [...]"I support Governor Spitzer's decision today to withdraw his proposal," Clinton said in a statement. "As president, I will not support driver's licenses for undocumented people and will press for comprehensive immigration reform that deals with all of the issues around illegal immigration including border security and fixing our broken system."
Clinton's statement echoes that of Gov. Eliot Spitzer when he announced earlier today that he was withdrawing his plan to give driver's licenses to the undocumented:
...what I have learned here is that, while there are times when states should be laboratories, immigration is not one of them. It's too complex and too macro a challenge to be solved by a patchwork of state policies. But the reality of 14 million undocumented immigrants nationwide and one million in New York isn't going away. So my challenge to the federal government is this: fix it. Fix the problem so the states won't face the local impact.
And, as gladiatorstail reminds us in the diaries, it even echoes Senator Clinton's own words from the MSNBC debate:
So what Governor Spitzer is trying to do is to fill the vacuum. I believe we need to get back to comprehensive immigration reform because no state, no matter how well intentioned, can fill this gap. There needs to be federal action on immigration reform.
But with the fear-mongering from the right on immigration, a pro-drivers license for undocumented position is now politically untenable and this call for a sort of amorphous "comprehensive immigration reform" has become the Democrats' safe goto position. Spitzer, who prefers boldness to safety, calls for it after a brave if clumsy fight for real reform at the state level, which has already exacted a political cost to him. According to a new SurveyUSA poll, since issuing the executive order directing the state to grant undocumented immigrants driver's licenses in September, his approve/disapprove numbers have plummeted from 49/43 to 36/56 today, a 26% net drop in approval. Even his approval among Democrats has dropped into the red, to 41/49.
Clinton's action today was an effort to prevent any similar erosion of her own support that might result from outright support for such a measure (which she appeared on the verge of expressing a couple of times during and after the debate.) But there is some evidence that it may have already begun to take a small toll.
Since the now infamous debate during which Hillary Clinton was seen, at best, equivocating on the issue of whether the undocumented should be granted driver's licenses, we've seen her lead over Barack Obama in New Hampshire drop and there have been some signs, albeit inconclusive, that her national numbers may have softened. But while it's not clear whether these developments were due to the fact that she appeared to waffle on the issue or that she did not come right out and oppose the driver's license proposal or neither, the new Quinnipiac Ohio poll contains some warning signs for Senator Clinton in this crucial bellwether state. For one thing, since Quinnipiac's October Ohio poll, her support in the primary has dropped 5 points from 47 to 42, as has her lead over Rudy Giuliani, which has gone from 46-40 to 44-43; in addition, her approval/disapproval rating has gone from 49/42 to 44/44. Now, here again, the cause of this drop is inconclusive, but this result from the poll is telling:
If a Presidential candidate favors providing driver's licenses to illegal immigrants are you more likely to vote for that candidate, less likely to vote for that candidate, or doesn't it make a difference?More likely 3%
Less likely 55
Doesn't make diff 37
Now, while finally stating unequivocally that she opposes driver's licenses for undocumented immigrants is wise, Clinton is well aware that it is likely to be anything but painless. Barack Obama has already issued a statement calling her out and you know her rivals for the Democratic nomination are readying their barbs for tomorrow night's debate. But ultimately, as Marc Ambinder puts it:
From the standpoint of politics, Clinton has apparently decided that the lumps she'll take today -- that she massaged her position, changed her position -- a Chris Dodd spokesman called it "flipflopping cubed" -- are much less damaging the lumps she'd take in the general election if she did not set a marker of opposition.
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