Why Rubio Changed his Views on Immigration to Run for President

By Alex Gonzalez

Detailed research by the Super PAC linked to Marco Rubio’s Campaign made public this data on early-state primary voters – Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada, South Carolina and Florida.

By law, Super PACs cannot directly coordinate any political activities with any political candidates; by posting the research publicly, the group has made its findings available free of charge to Rubio or anyone else who might want to use it. Thus, the Super PAC used a proxy “non-profit” called Conservative Solutions Project Inc to conduct the research . As noted by many, Marco Rubio is attempting a systematic campaign with a “blue-print” to eventually move to the center in the general election, but he will have to show some “hard lines” on immigration in the primaries, as the research shows.

This extensive research indicates that Republican primary voters in all those states overwhelmingly opposed any type of Immigration reform. The data can be easily analyzed by age, gender, income, voter history (turnout), ethnicity, and party affiliation. This is research that was done over a year. this is an actual political research book.

I used some of data from Nevada to show voter history and views on immigration, but this is the same model for every early-primary state within the research. click on tables to enlarge.

Early Primary States – Nevada, Iowa, Florida and New Hampshire by Latinos Ready To Vote

This table, click on it to enlarge, shows the income and turnout differences among voters.

In table below, when Republicans are asked about Immigration, across the board, there is strong opposition to any sort of immigration reform among likely primary voters in Nevada. Only 19% say it will be Ok to allow “immigrant to be legal.” Thus, recently, Rubio has stated that he will be open to some type of legalization – after “securing the border” – but not citizenship for undocumented workers. This is a big leap from the Immigration bill Rubio co-authored in 2013 that offered a path to citizenship after 10 years for “illegal immigrants” already here.

The data clearly shows that in every early primary state, likely primary Republican voters opposed any form of immigration bill. As a result, Marco Rubio will have to move to right on immigration if he wants to make it to the general election where he can really attempt to build the foundation to become a “transformational candidate.”