Far from border, immigration may decide 2 Congress seats

The banners at the meeting read “Somos America,” or “We are America.” Mexican and Asian immigrants there invoked the dignity of all immigrants, whether legal or not, and declared the current system for entering this country “broken.”

Outside, a small group of U.S. citizens held signs of their own: “Wake up and smell the invasion,” and “Honk if you want the borders secured.”

This showdown took place Oct. 22–not in El Paso, Texas, or Tucson, Ariz., but in the western suburb of Carol Stream. Nearly 1,500 miles from the Rio Grande, border security and illegal immigration have emerged as defining issues in two bitterly contested congressional races in the Chicago suburbs.

Consider: A recent Chicago Tribune/WGN-TV poll found that illegal immigration is the top concern for Republicans in the 6th and 8th Congressional Districts, a swath of suburbia that ranges from DuPage to Lake County.

The American Immigration Law Foundation released a study Tuesday that estimates 81,000 undocumented immigrants live in those districts, with the 8th District seeing a 43 percent increase since 2000.

This is the new suburban political landscape, where immigrants–legal and illegal–play a central role in the region’s economy but where many residents watch the influx with dismay, seeing these newcomers as economic drains.

Jonathan Collegio, a spokesman for the National Republican Congressional Committee, said the party is running immigration ads in most of the three dozen contested suburban House districts nationwide.”In most suburban districts, like the Illinois 6th, the two issues that tend to move votes the most are taxes and then immigration,” Collegio said.

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Far from border, immigration may decide 2 Congress seats
Chicago Tribune