title: independents tilt decisively to trump
text: how the nevertrumpers sunk themselves november   
  bruce thornton is a shillman journalism fellow at the david horowitz freedom center 
  the chorus of nevertrumpers is wailing ever louder as election day and hillarys supposed victory approach after more than a year of complaining about trump crashing their political soiree the republicans attacking trump still dont seem to get how their own behavior contributed to the perception that they are outoftouch elites disdainful of the republican masses 
  a recent example comes from premier nevertrumper bret stephens of the wall street journal  in his column stephens bids farewell to a republican party stupid enough to nominate trump contrasting it with his imagined golden age of republican policy excellence that trump and his followers have destroyed one policy in particular immigration reveals the distance between the political and pundit elite and the voting masses that helped make trump the nominee 
  at a  republican primary debate in houston candidates george hw bush and ronald reagan were asked whether the children of illegal immigrants should be allowed to attend public schools for free mr bush said they should were creating a whole society of really honorable decent familyloving people that are in violation of the law he lamented 
  reagan agreed instead of putting up a fence he asked why dont we    make it possible for them to come here legally with a work permit and then while theyre working and earning here they pay taxes here for good measure reagan suggested we should open the border both ways 
  where in the populist fervor to build a wall with mexico and deport millions of human beings is that republican party today 
  take bush seniors statement first it repeats basically the same clichés that the bipartisan gang of eight recycled in  during their push for comprehensive immigration reform another euphemism for amnesty all those hardworking familyvalues illegal immigrants are embryonic conservatives we were told who just need legal status and social recognition so they can come out of the shadows as john mccain said and start voting republican the political apple doesnt fall far from the tree son jeb ended his presidential ambitions by calling illegal immigration an act of love 
  this stance on illegal immigration by republican politicos and pundits is obviously lightyears from the experience and position of many ordinary people take mccains oftrepeated trope of living in the shadows seriously illegal alien young people openly protest on live television knowing they are not going to be deported millions visit emergency rooms for free and wrangle food stamps welfare transfers school lunches and all sorts of largess all the while they live protected by sanctuary cities and living in the shadows doesnt deter them from committing felonies given that even if caught convicted and deported theyll soon be back remember juan francisco lopezsanchez the illegal alien deported five times who murdered kate steinle or angel gilberto garciaavalos another fivetime deportee who just this month started a  million fire in sequoia national park he had just been released from the kern county jail but could not be deported because of californias lunatic sanctuary city law which prohibits a sheriff from contacting federal agents 
  simply repeating the hardworking family values religious mantra doesnt address the problems of illegal immigration there are such illegal immigrants as i know from over sixty years of personal experience living in the san joaquin valley one of the largest concentrations of illegal aliens in the country i grew up with mexicanamericans theyre members of my immediate family theyre my friends students and colleagues theyre also the victims of the crimes and disorder caused by our porous border 
  some illegals do transition into these sort of immigrants but many do not a rigorous vetting process might sort out the wheat from the chaff but bush mccain and stephens have not proposed a workable rigorous mechanism for determining who should stay and who should go that means with any form of amnesty citizenship will likely be granted indiscriminately with only the most egregious felons sifted out if any are stupid enough to apply for citizenship rather than continuing to live in the shadows but all those guilty of duis hitandruns or defrauding the welfare system with fake ids will stayand then bring their extended families under the provisions of the disastrous  immigration act which enshrined family reunification with no limits on relatives of us citizens 
  equally tonedeaf is stephenss bringing up ronald reagans open the border both ways thats exactly what he did in  when he signed the simpsonmazzoli act which granted amnesty to millions of illegal immigrants with promises of border enforcement that never materialized stephens doesnt mention that as a result the number of illegal immigrants increased from about  million to  million creating todays crisis the obvious lesson is secure the border first then figure out what to do with the  million it would be governmental malfeasance to repeat reagans mistake 
  the problem with politicians and pundits like stephens is they dont live with the consequences of indiscriminately letting in people from very different cultures and mores people like stephens dont live daily with the disorder and crime that results theyre not aware of the extensive damage to quality of life the illegal immigration version of broken windows such as dogs without rabies shots running free health and safety codes ignored building codes shrugged off garbage and refuse dumped everywhere copper wire stolen from pumps and street lights and chronic petty theftand thats on top of stolen cars hitandruns driving without insurance gangbanging and dealing drugs 
  and if mr stephens thinks im just a nativist or xenophobe or racist i dare him to visit the san joaquin valley better yet let him bring his wife and children to live there for a month come and tour a hospital emergency room a social security disability office a public school a county jail and then wax lyrical about these honorable decent familyloving people it would take just a week for mr stephens to develop a fervor for a fivefoot high wall around his house and buy four or five pit bulls and a shotgun then again he wouldnt last that long within a day hed scurry back to his nice white secure tony neighborhood where he doesnt have to pay the cost of his moral preening 
  and that hypocrisy is where trump came from in the perception of millions of votersperceptions nevertrumpers have fed so incessantly that they look a lot like realitythe conservative politicians and pundits care more about their privileged status and purity of principle than they do about the welfare and interests of their partys voters and so they would rather see a venal perjurious corrupt mediocrity become obama  and continue the progressive destruction of the constitutional order than see elected the nominee of their own party what sort of principle is that