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Submitted by Steve Abramowicz of Heartland Journal –
In the aftermath of the assassination of John F Kennedy, in 1963, one of the first issues President Johnson sought to tackle was immigration reform. Johnson began working with Senator Ted Kennedy (D – MA), to help build support for a bill in Congress.
In his first State of the Union address, not two months after President Kennedy’s assassination, Johnson called on Congress to pass Kennedy’s immigration reform bill.
Seeking to end the country’s discriminatory immigration practices, Johnson began working with the fallen president’s brother, Senator Ted Kennedy, to help build support for a bill in Congress. Immigration was an important issue for the young senator, which he saw both as a civil rights issue and as a fundamental question of fairness.
Kennedy went on to co-sponsor Johnson’s immigration bill and managed it on the Senate floor. The bill expired with the close of the 88th Congress, but easily passed the following year after a compromise placing limits on Western Hemisphere immigration was reached. Johnson signed the historic 1965 Immigration and Nationality Act into law at the foot of the Statue of Liberty, ending the national-origins quota system.
Twenty three years later, in 1986, Ronald Reagan signed the Immigration and Border Control Act into law. In exchange for making 2.7 million illegal aliens citizens, the Democrats promised they would build a wall at the southern border.
Suffice it to say the wall was never built. Most of those 2.7 million illegals had settled in the following states: CA, TX, NY, IL, NJ, NV, CO, WA, OR. In 1992, California, Illinois and Massachusetts and other immigrant heavy states turned blue for the first time since 1964 and have never turned back.
But Democrats always think five steps ahead, and they realized early on that in order for them to retain power, they would need to get illegals to vote.
In 1993 Democrats, along with Bill Clinton, passed the 1993 Motor Voter Act. This allowed the federal government to register all voters that went on government assistance, and any voters that got drivers licenses.
And from there, Democrats realized that in order to cement a permanent victory, they would need to give illegals drivers licenses because that way they could register voters directly at the department of motor vehicles.
That same year Washington became the first state to offer illegals a drivers license. Now 19 states offer that: CA, CO, CT, DE, HI, IL, MD, MA, MN, NV, NJ, NM, NY, OR, RI, UT, VT, VA, WA, DC.
Since the 1986 Immigration and Border Control Act was passed, besides Utah, Nevada, and Virginia, none of those states have ever voted for a Republican since 1984. Nevada voted for Republican, for Donald Trump in 2016. Virginia voted for a Republican, George Bush in 2004. Utah is the only state that has actually voted consistently for Republicans.
But that’s it, all those other states never voted Republican again. So as we can all see the open border and illegals voting might be the only reason democrats won after the 1984 election.
About the Author: Steven M. Abramowicz is CEO and Editor of Heartland Journal.com and host of the Heartland Journal podcast.