Triumph of Party Politics Over Ideology

When it comes to toughness on immigration issues, Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-El Cajon) has few peers.

During his 6 1/2 terms in Congress, Hunter has tirelessly fought to gain control over the U.S.-Mexico border, the country’s superhighway for illegal immigration. With anti-immigrant feeling in California rising and his GOP-leaning 52nd District encompassing most of the state’s southern boundary, Hunter’s tough stance is a political no-brainer.

He has pushed for the construction of a 10-foot steel wall to replace the ragged chain-link fence long regarded as a mockery of border security.

He has sought improvements to border roads, giving U.S. agents better mobility to pursue the thousands of illegal immigrants who cross northward every year.

Along with a host of other House Republicans, he has demanded a tightening of immigration procedures and begged for some enforcement muscle to back up the dry rhetoric of federal laws.

And last year, in a notable success, he shepherded an appropriation through Congress aimed at hiring 600 new Border Patrol agents. It was a rare concrete accomplishment amid the swirl of emotional proposals over the immigration issue.

He quickly dubbed it the Hunter Amendment.

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So why then, during debate on the California earthquake aid bill last month, did Hunter vote for a budget-cutting amendment that would have slashed some of the very Border Patrol funds he fought so hard to get?

Because Hunter faced a dilemma: be true to his immigration views or to Republican fiscal values? Party loyalty won--and in this Congress it has been winning these contests as much as ever.

“I didn’t like the idea that there were some Border Patrol funds (cut) in the bill,” Hunter explained, “but I figured that what I was successful doing last year I could do again.”

Hunter’s optimism is founded on his amendment’s comfortable margin of victory. But to Democrats who have tracked Hunter’s Border Patrol votes, his shifting of positions is nothing more than political opportunism.

“This is wholly inconsistent,” said Rep. Neal Smith (D-Iowa), the Appropriations Committee “cardinal” who controls Border Patrol funding. “One year he votes to cut $78 million (from the Border Patrol), the next year he votes for adding $60 million, then he votes to delay the 600 agents (funded) in his own amendment. To me this is serious business, not political business.

We should figure out the number of agents needed and pay for them.”

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Smith’s yearning is woefully ill-timed. Congress has rarely been so partisan. Vote studies by Congressional Quarterly show that Democrats and Republicans in both chambers voted with the majority of their parties (and against the majority of the other party) more often in 1993 than in any year in the previous four decades.

Hunter is one of 11 Republicans who voted the party line 98% of the time. Only two others were more dutiful.

Several factors converge to explain the rampant partisanship, but all spring from Bill Clinton’s occupancy of the White House.

After 12 years of Republican presidents, Clinton’s embrace of controversial issues cleaved Congress into neat partisan camps. In order to keep the Clinton program moving ahead, Democrats blocked more Republican floor amendments, in turn yielding more procedural votes that naturally break along party lines.

The net effect is that any hope for bipartisan unity--on virtually any major piece of legislation--can be kissed goodby.

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The hard-headed Hunter, a member of the House GOP leadership who recoils at the idea of accommodation with Democrats, can be counted on to vote the GOP party line--even if it imperils his own prized legislative victories. Indeed, the ascension of party orthodoxy in the 103rd Congress seems to have energized Hunter, who likes nothing better than a good round of bruising political fisticuffs.

“You have to do what you think is right, (but sometimes) you don’t have a chance. These large spending bills are put in large blocks so the argument can be made that you have to vote for more spending because something you like in the bill will otherwise be denied. I reject that notion.”