Ingraham melts Snow in immigration smack

Ingraham melts Snow
in immigration smack
Talk-show host relentlessly quizzes
White House spokesman over border

White House spokesman Tony Snow ran into a little more than he perhaps was expecting when he appeared on The Laura Ingraham show, as she relentlessly asked the American public's No. 1 question: What is the U.S. government doing to stop the invasion from Mexico?

"Sixty-nine percent of Americans, 85 percent of the GOP, 55 percent of the Democrats want the border enforced," said Ingraham. "Does that affect you guys, or do you guys just blow it off?"

Snow repeated, several times, the Bush administration's talking points on the issue – how the failed comprehensive immigration reform bill, which fell far short on its last test in the U.S. Senate, would secure the borders, require illegal aliens to pay a fine and require them to "keep their noses clean," and learn English.

But Ingraham, who worked as a speechwriter for two years in the Reagan administration and later served as a law clerk to Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas before launching "The Laura Ingraham Show" in 2001, wasn't letting him off the hook.

"Eight-five of the GOP doesn't like what the White House is doing on this," she said. "You're talking the base of this party."

Ingraham, after graduating from Dartmouth, also worked at the Department of Transportation and the Department of Education before serving as notes editor for Law Review. She also worked as a white-collar criminal defense attorney, and is an author, columnist and commentator.

Her latest book, "Shut Up & Sing: How the Elites in Hollywood, Politics … and the U.N. are Subverting America," is a best-seller.

She pointed out, when Snow noted that illegals probably are not creating a huge impact on job availability, that following a recent raid on a Del Monte plant in Oregon to arrest illegal aliens employed there, the plant was flooded with applicants seeking the jobs.

"Tony, why don't people believe you?" she asked. "The majority of your party, people who voted for President Bush … They see the conservative coalition dissolving before their eyes."

Snow noted that another $4.4 billion is being tossed on the table to try and win back some of the support. According to reports, the money is to be used to beef up border security and add some new efforts, such as unmanned aerial vehicles to monitor the border.

Those efforts, he said, would demonstrate a commitment to securing the border.

"You keep repeating that, but nobody believes you," she said. "Nobody buys that this administration is serious about the border."

As WND has reported, Bush already has asked the Senate to resurrect the failed immigration bill – and soon.

The plan would allow millions of illegal aliens now within U.S. borders to pay a fine and become legal. But opponents like Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C., say the legislation "still unfairly burdens taxpayers, doesn't ensure secure borders and guarantees amnesty" for illegal aliens.

It had floundered in its second Senate vote, a procedural move that would have accelerated the Senate's handling of the White House-backed plan. The divided Senate refused by a wide margin to limit debate on the plan. The 45-50 vote was 15 short of the 60 votes needed to move the legislation along.

Democrats then set the bill aside and took up other proposed legislation.