Border Surge Brings In Conservative Support

By Alisa Barba
July 08, 2013

A conservative political advocacy group released a television ad today that turns immigration reform into Conservative Immigration reform.

The ad is aimed at Republican lawmakers in the House who will start haggling over the Senate measure this week. The Senate's immigration plan contains a controversial path to legalization for undocumented immigrants currently in this country, but the plan was signficiantly sweetened for conservatives with the last-minute addition of a "Border Surge" proposal.

The surge is a multi-billion dollar pork-laden border security boost that would add tens of thousands of new agents, new drones, and new fencing to the border.

The new ad is called "Surge" and trumpets the conservative credentials of the bill, saying is the kind of "tough border security America needs."

Supported by GOP darlings like Sen. Marco Rubio and Rep. Paul Ryan, the surge is the toughest border security plan ever passed by Congress, the ad proclaims. It features a patriotically colored binder entitled "Border Surge," and flips through the highlights of the plan supposedly "written with Border Patrol agents," (who are shown defiantly gazing off into the border distance).

The newly sexy surge, with nearly $50 billion thrown in, grants a new title to the legislation: it is now Conservative Immigration Reform. According to Politico, the ad is the work of the American Action Network, which has been pressuring Congress on immigration reform for months.

Surge