Wealthy Left Bankroll Pro-Immigration Groups

It's a regular who's who of far-left groups helping fund and promote the disastrous amnesty bill, and a review of the donors listed in an online exclusive in the Washington Times today should send shivers down the backs of anyone interested in protecting this country from hordes of illegal invaders. Those interested in controlling immigration and the borders are relying on small donations from grassroots activists and are facing an uphill battle.

Wealthy philanthropic foundations are helping bankroll the pro-immigration movement, while groups advocating for tighter control of U.S. borders say they take a more grassroots approach to raising money.

The Ford Foundation, the Carnegie Corporation and Democratic activist George Soros, among other liberal funders, have donated millions of dollars to pro-immigration groups, as the Senate continues its debate on a contentious bill that would overhaul the nation's immigration policy.

Three of the nation's biggest and most influential pro-immigration groups -- the National Immigration Forum, the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, or MALDEF, and the National Council of La Raza, or NCLR -- collectively received more than $3.25 million from Ford Foundation since 2005.

The three advocacy groups generally support the proposed Senate bill -- with some modifications -- that would give the estimated 12 million to 20 million illegal aliens in the U.S. a path to citizenship. The bill also would allow aliens here to be bring close family members into the county.

But groups supporting stronger immigration policy and tighter border control say they rely more on small donations from individuals than large foundations.

Numbers USA, which says it has 366,000 members, saw its membership grow 50 percent since Jan. 1, and 18 percent in May, spokeswoman Caroline Espinosa said. Two-thirds of the group's financial support comes from private individuals, with the average donation being $40.

It's not as if the right isn't represented in funding, but the amounts are dwarfed by the other side.

The conservative Scaife Foundations of Pittsburgh gave FAIR -- one of the biggest immigration-control nonprofit groups -- $775,000 between 2003 and 2005. The foundations during the same time period also gave $420,000 to Center for Immigration Studies and $100,000 to the Numbers USA Education and Research Foundation -- groups also that advocate tighter border control and restricting the flow of immigrants.

Meanwhile, a group of Republicans today published this op-ed in the Dallas Morning News, which was met with appropriate derision by Ramesh Ponnuru at NRO.

The op-ed would also be more persuasive if it demonstrated any familiarity with the bill itself. "[T]he package is built around a set of enforcement benchmarks that must be met before a single guest worker is hired or illegal immigrant legalized." This is simply untrue, and the White House has been careful to avoid making that claim in its own recent releases. The bill gives illegal immigrants legal status before any of these "enforcement benchmarks" are met. That is a central critique of this bill, and the op-ed not only doesn't address it; it pretends the bill doesn't have this feature.

This amnesty bill is hugely unpopular and tonight during the Republican debate, it needs to be made clear which sides the candidates are on.

Are they with George Soros et al., or with the base of the party?

Elsewhere, Michelle Malkin has Shamnesty on the Senate floor.