Conservative ire with Perry runs deep, reflects racial politics

Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s clashes with conservative activists are nothing new: A bitter battle over racial preferences and liberal judges has raged in the tight-knit world of Lone Star politics since 2001.

In the days following George W. Bush’s election to the presidency, the newly minted Gov. Perry had a chance to prove his mettle by nominating justices to fill two Texas Supreme Court vacancies.

Following Ronald Reagan’s unsuccessful 1987 nomination of Robert Bork to the U.S. Supreme Court, conservative activists had been awakened to a new kind of politics — the politics of judicial nominations — and Perry’s selection of Xavier Rodriguez in Texas only made them angrier.

Born in San Antonio, Rodriguez was educated at Harvard before returning to earn his law degree in his home state and practice law with Fulbright & Jaworski, where he became a partner. Though described by one opponent as “a decent lawyer and a decent guy,” the young attorney’s nomination forced his experience and beliefs onto Texas conservatives’ collective radar.

And when conservative lawyer Steven Wayne Smith picked up his newspaper and read that Rodriguez named the reliably liberal Supreme Court Justice David Souter as his judicial role model, any ideas Gov. Perry may have had of an uneventful appointment went out the window.

A half-decade saga began that day which, by its conclusion, was a Texas tale of racial politicking, an underage abortion ruling and an executive vendetta.

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0811/61076.html

“Perry opposed Arizona’s tough anti-illegal immigration law SB 1070. “I have concerns,” he explained, “with portions of the law passed in Arizona and believe it would not be the right direction for Texas.”

He spoke out last year against using E-Verify to prevent illegal immigrants from getting jobs as state employees, who get their paychecks from the taxpayers. He insisted it “would not make a hill of beans’ difference.”

Numbers USA, a group that supports immigration control, gives Perry a “D-“ for his positions supporting amnesty, open borders, and opposing border security.”

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0811/61076_Page2.html

” Despite all his talk about sovereignty and states’ rights, Perry proposed the Trans-Texas Corridor. This toll road would go through Mexico, but be run together with the Mexican government in the middle of Texas.

While I was in Congress, I co-sponsored the H.C. Res. 487 to block the creation of this highway. Fortunately our efforts in Congress, along with the work of conservatives in the Texas legislature, derailed Perry’s sovereignty sacrificing scheme.

(SNIP)

Perry’s views here are at odds with the vast majority of Americans — and virtually all Republican voters. While he opposes E-Verify for even state employees, 82 percent of all voters, and 91 percent of Republicans, support E-Verify for all employees.

While Perry opposes the border fence, 68 percent of all voters, and 86 percent of Republicans, support the fence. While Perry opposes the Arizona law, SB 1070, voters want 1070 in their state by a 2-1 margin — including 86 percent of all Republicans.”

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