Paul Krugman used to say that Democrats were ambivalent about immigration, while the GOP was schizophrenic. What he meant by that was that virtually all Democrats were torn between showing compassion for unauthorized immigrants and maintaining political and financial support for the welfare state, while Republicans were split between businessmen, who strongly supported high levels of immigration, and reactionaries, who thought unauthorized immigrants were the source of most of America’s evils. Is this still true?
No– thanks largely to Trump and Abbott, the situation has flip-flopped. On the GOP side, the reactionaries are now firmly in charge, and business interests have been told to shut up; whatever influence they have is currently exercised behind closed doors. The Democrats are now split between passionate advocates of open borders for humanitarian reasons and centrists who worry about the costs–both financial and political–of accommodating huge numbers of immigrants in blue states. They are now the schizophrenic side.
It is a change that bodes ill for the blue team.