Opponents Accuse Clinton of ‘Hypocrisy’ on Border Controls
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WASHINGTON – Senator Clinton brought together an unlikely coalition of opponents yesterday by lobbying against stricter controls along the Canadian border, as critics on both sides of the immigration and security debates denounced her “hypocrisy” on the issue and accused her of “pandering” as she tries to win both the White House in 2008 and re-election to the U.S. Senate from New York in 2006.
During a conference call yesterday, Mrs. Clinton recounted her meeting earlier in the day with the head of the Department of Homeland Security, Secretary Chertoff, in which she urged him to reconsider implementation of the Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative. The initiative – part of the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 – requires that individuals traveling between America and the Caribbean, Bermuda, Panama, Mexico, and Canada present a passport to enter America.
Mrs. Clinton said the new requirements would be “absolutely devastating to both Canada and the U.S.,” and said she had “asked Secretary Chertoff to very carefully consider those concerns,” in particular the effect on the retail and tourism industries in upstate New York cities like Buffalo.
Meanwhile, critics who recalled Mrs. Clinton’s advocacy for tighter controls along the Mexican border lambasted the senator for “pandering” on the issue of security and immigration.
Mrs. Clinton, largely expected to run for president in 2008, has in recent months tacked right on immigration, according to several observers.
Last year, according to the Washington Times, Mrs. Clinton said that she does not “think that we have protected our borders or our ports or provided our first responders with the resources they need, so we can do more and we can do better.” The senator also said she would advocate “at least a visa ID, some kind of entry-and-exit ID … even for citizens.”
Mrs. Clinton’s past rhetoric in favor of border controls, and her opposition to the passport requirements along the Canadian border yesterday, amounted to “hypocrisy,” the chairman of the Congressional Immigration Reform Caucus, Tom Tancredo, a Republican of Colorado, said. “I’m sure she’s following a well-thought-out campaign strategy,” Mr. Tancredo said. “She’s a wily politician.”
Mr. Tancredo said Mrs. Clinton was likely being lobbied by powerful New York business interests along the Canadian border, which “pressure politicians through campaign contributions … to stay as hypocritical as they can be.”
A vocal advocate of tighter border controls who hopes to unseat Mrs. Clinton in the 2006 Senate race, John Spencer, a former Republican mayor of Yonkers, said yesterday that his opponent was “absolutely pandering” by being inconsistent on the issue of border control and identification requirements.
“It’s typical Hillary trying to be all things to all people,” he said, “with an eye on her Senate race in New York and one position, and an eye on her presidential race with another position.”
As Mrs. Clinton was criticized yesterday by advocates of stricter border controls, she also came under fire from groups traditionally lobby for fewer immigration restrictions.
The president of the Mexican American Political Association, Nativo Lopez, said yesterday “Save me from the supposed liberals” Mrs. Clinton, he said, supported “the worst and nastiest immigration laws,” and said she held to a “double standard” regarding the Mexican and Canadian borders.
The senator, he added “will not win favor with the Latino community in her future presidential bid, because of this hypocritical, anti-immigrant posture.”