U.S. Border Control

Romney, Giuliani squabble over their records on immigration

Two Republican presidential candidates turned the August GOP primary campaign into a nasty, week-long debate about illegal immigration, each accusing the other of supporting efforts to give undocumented residents sanctuary from federal immigration laws.

At campaign stops, in radio ads and with increasingly hostile statements by supporters, former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney and former New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani talked about little else as they positioned themselves on an issue critical to conservatives.

Romney started the fight, and his criticism reflected his campaign's strategy after the former governor's victory in the Iowa straw poll. Romney's advisers sought to narrow the GOP race as much as possible to a two-person contest with Giuliani, and tried to brand Romney as the true conservative in the race, in contrast to Giuliani.

At the heart of the Romney-Giuliani argument was the role of cities in the immigration crisis. Romney has said that New York, under Giuliani's leadership, became a magnet for illegal immigrants when city officials refused to strictly enforce federal deportation laws. Giuliani in return has accused Romney of looking the other way as cities and towns in Massachusetts declared themselves 'sanctuaries' for lawbreakers.

Rep. Peter T. King (R-N.Y.), writing on behalf of Giuliani, attacked Romney in an opinion piece in the Washington Times. King accused Romney of failing to act as governor against sanctuary cities in his state.

'Romney did not cut their funding. He recommended millions of dollars in state funding for them, and made no attempt to force these cities to change their policies,' King wrote. 'When the immigration issue came before him, he simply ignored it.'

Giuliani's former deputy mayor, Randy Mastro, went further in an interview. 'We have a word here in New York for what Mitt Romney is doing,' Mastro said. 'It's called chutzpah.'

Romney aides responded with an online column by Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Tex.), who called the immigration policies in New York 'troubling' and blamed them for the growth of the nation's population of illegal immigrants.

'Sanctuary policies create virtual amnesty zones for illegal immigrants. While amnesty was just defeated in the Congress, places like New York City offer a promise of amnesty to those who ignore our immigration laws,' Smith wrote. 'Furthermore, sanctuary city policies encourage illegal immigration and weaken our nation's ability to secure our borders.'

Romney focused on a New York executive order that Giuliani inherited -- and later supported -- that protects illegal immigrants from deportation. Romney aides point out that Giuliani once sued the federal government to keep the executive order in place.

Giuliani responded that his actions in New York -- which allowed children of illegal immigrants to go to school, and let such immigrants receive medical care and report crimes without facing deportation -- reduced crime and improved public health.

In a radio ad running in South Carolina, Giuliani said he was attempting to focus efforts on the true problem: criminals. 'As the mayor of New York, I wanted to see if I could get the immigration service to help me. Let's see if you could get rid of the drug dealers who are coming out of jail,' he says.

Romney opened his attacks during a campaign stop at the U.S.-Mexico border in San Ysidro, Calif., criticizing 'cities that call themselves a zone for protection,' using the phrase that Giuliani once used to describe New York. He said that as president, he would cut off federal funds to cities that offer sanctuary to illegal immigrants.