Haley had a good point about immigration — but no one wants to hear it right now | Opinion

If you’re looking for hopeful signs that the Republican presidential nomination fight isn’t over before it has started, here’s one: Donald Trump’s campaign is blasting Nikki Haley over one of GOP voters’ top issues, immigration.

A new television ad in New Hampshire accuses Haley of opposing Trump’s proposed (but never completed) border wall and ban on U.S. entry for those from certain countries, according to NBC News. Trump allies are also highlighting comments in 2015, when Haley was governor of South Carolina. She rebuked the use of the term “criminals” to describe immigrants, saying: “They want to come for a better life, too. … We don’t need to be disrespectful. We don’t need to talk about them as criminals.”

That was standard rhetoric for many leading Republicans at the time, even those who wanted to crack down on illegal immigration. But then and now, the party’s base voters want a much tougher stance, both in word and deed.

Haley has shifted her tone, too, and the episode shows the conflagratory potential of illegal immigration and border security in this year’s campaigns. Many people who still agree that migrants are largely after a better life and contribute to society don’t want to hear it anymore. The facts on the ground — felt every day in Texas and increasingly throughout the nation — simply crowd out that level of compassion. Even Democrats are proving it.

The numbers of migrants coming over the border stagger the imagination. Border officials processed more than 300,000 people attempting to enter illegally in December, yet another record.

It’s confounding to leftists, especially those in northern cities, for whom open borders were always easy to support as a matter of theory. Now, mayors in cities such as Denver and Chicago are declaring that unchecked migration cannot continue. Areas that have declared themselves “sanctuary cities” are trying to divert new arrivals seeking, um, sanctuary.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott is the author of some of this torment. When Abbott began offering migrants released by border officials voluntary transportation out of the state, it took just a fraction of the number flowing into Texas for New York Mayor Eric Adams to start sounding like Trump, warning of changes to the city’s character and its ultimate destruction.

Like so much of liberalism, sanctuary policy is a gesture separated from reality. Once migrants actually started showing up in New York and taking advantage of generous policies, Adams discovered the concept of borders, even crafting a policy that prompted diversion of migrants to New Jersey and other states. Now, he’s suing the transport companies contracted with Abbott, as if the busing business is suddenly, somehow illegal.

So, in this environment, attacking Haley for once defending immigration is politically useful. The thing is, she was mostly right.

The U.S. needs orderly migration. Population decline is a threat to Western prosperity, and an aging population demands an infusion of young workers to support the economy.

What we have now is anything but orderly, though. Migration is mostly a game of tag, with little regard to whether those who make it in match the country’s needs. It’s hard to argue for sensible migration when U.S. policy is to release so many people into the country with immigration court dates scheduled so far out they might as well be the subject of science fiction movies. Surely some people already here will travel to their hearings in 2035 in flying cars, right?

It’s politically smart for Trump to dredge up Haley’s old comments. She’s closing on him in New Hampshire polls, the first candidate in months to show any signs of giving him any competition for the GOP nomination. It’s one state and Trump’s advantages remain daunting, but his team is smart to take no chances.

Especially on the issue of immigration. It’s hard enough in our sclerotic discourse to have any high-level policy discussions. When voters are convinced that basic order is breaking down — and in the governance of our borders, they are not wrong — such discussions are impossible.

But Republicans would be better off with a nominee who understands that while, yes, controlling the chaos is the first priority, immigration reform will need a phase two — one that actually recognizes what the U.S. needs and pursues it.

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