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January 29, 2018
Edited by
Matthew Philips
Businessweek.comLOOK AHEAD ○ President Trump delivers his
State of the Union address to a joint
session of Congress on Jan. 30
○ Russia hosts a summit on Syria in
Sochi on Jan. 29-30○ The French government is set to
finalize details of a $47 billion project
to expand the Paris metro systemThe standoff over immigration in the U.S. Congress
that shut the government for three days looks
strange to a world that sees the U.S. as a nation of
immigrants fighting over immigration. “America
was a model for immigration, but that image has
collapsed,” says Hidenori Sakanaka, head of the
Japan Immigration Policy Institute, which pro-
motes more newcomers to insular Japan.
Americans with a sense of history find it
odd, too. That’s because the deep partisan split
over immigration is actually quite new. Anti-
immigration sentiment has waxed and waned
over the centuries, to be sure. But as recently as
2006, Democratic and Republican voters were
only 5 percentage points apart in their favorabil-
ity toward immigrants, according to Pew Research
Center. Back then—just a dozen years ago—
business advocates of more open borders found
a warmer welcome in the Republican Party. And
on the Democratic side, a first-term senator named
Barack Obama could write, “When I see Mexican
flags waved at pro-immigration demonstrations,
I sometimes feel a flush of patriotic resentment.”
Bipartisan consensus on immigration feels like
ancient history. Today, congressional Republicans
spurn the pro-immigration messages of power-
ful business groups such as the U.S. Chamber of
Commerce and the Business Roundtable. While
Democrats have gone all-in on liberalized immi-
gration, seeing themselves as a party of inclu-
sion, Republicans increasingly see themselves as
defending what it means to be an American.
By last July, Pew found that 84 percent of
Democrats and those leaning toward the○ The party divide over who gets
to come to the U.S. has never
been wider. Can it be bridged?
P O L I T I C S
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