House Speaker: If the House flips to a GOP majority, current Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) will have to turn over her title to current Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio). Handing the reins to Boehner could be a huge blow to the odds of comprehensive immigration reform, or any bill that would allow some of the undocumented immigrants in the country to earn legal status. Boehner expressed doubt earlier this year that Democrats could pass immigration reform — he was right — and said he favors a border security-first approach. The GOP’s Pledge to America, which was unveiled in September, has few details on immigration-related issues, but mostly focused on enforcement and border issues rather than changes to the legal immigration system.

Immigration subcommittee: The House immigration subcommittee would be chaired by Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) instead of Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.) if Republicans took control of the House. On immigration, it would be hard for any two House members’ positions to be more different: King favors a number of anti-illegal immigration crackdowns and interrogation of immigration enforcement officials, while Lofgren focused her efforts on reform to make legal immigration more efficient. If King heads the subcommittee, he has promised to try to pass a birthright citizenship repeal bill, a bill punishing employers of illegal immigrants, a crackdown on so-called “sanctuary cities” and legislation that would assert states have the right to create immigration laws like Arizona’s SB 1070.

Other immigration-related races: More broadly, the election could see a number of advocates of comprehensive immigration reform replaced by immigration hardliner opponents. In Colorado, Rep. John Salazar (D) is trailing Republican Scott Tipton in the polls. Salazar supports enhanced border security measures as part of a comprehensive immigration reform bill, but voted against building a fence along the U.S.-Mexico border. Tipton opposes “amnesty,” the general Republican term for paths to legalization for illegal immigrants already in the country.

Four of Arizona’s five incumbent Democratic representatives could lose their seats to Republicans, which would make a splash because of the state’s importance on immigration and border issue. Rep. Raul Grijalva (D-Ariz.), who easily won previous elections in his heavily Democratic district, faces strong competition from Republican Ruth McClung. Grijalva is a strong supporter of immigration reform and Latino and immigrant rights. He drew fire for his staunch opposition to SB 1070 after he called for a boycott on his state — which he has since said was a misstep.

Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) is facing Republican Jesse Kellly, who has been criticized for accepting an endorsement from Americans for Legal Immigration PAC, or ALIPAC. Giffords is a supporter of border enforcement before other immigration reform, but Kelly is much further to the right: He says the government should construct a double-layer border fence, hire more Border Patrol agents and deploy 10,000 National Guard troops.

President Obama, addressing military families on Sunday at an Independence Day celebration, faces growing opposition to the Afghan war from within his own party. (epa/ZUMApress.com)

The war in Afghanistan has produced divisions among Democrats in Congress from the start, but a series of votes on Thursday night revealed a rising tide of Democratic discontentment that could alter the trajectory of the Obama administration’s approach to the conflict.

[Security1] A measure to fund the administration’s 30,000-troop surge with $33 billion narrowly passed late Thursday, by a 215-210 margin. But the inclusion of domestic spending projects in the overall package appeared to boost its support among some Democrats, while a number of votes on amendments signaled a growing desire for an exit strategy.

“The close vote shows the rising disagreements over war policy,” said Darrell M. West, director of governance studies at the Brookings Institution. “The war has never been popular among Democratic activists and now lawmakers are starting to express their own doubts.”

An amendment calling for a flexible withdrawal timetable — sponsored by Reps. David Obey (D-Wis.), Jim McGovern (D-Mass.) and Walter Jones (R-N.C.) — failed to pass the House, but it won 162 votes, including those of 153 Democrats, three-fifths of the Democratic caucus.

McGovern hailed it as an “important milestone” in a statement released Friday. “This vote should send a signal to the Administration that Congress is increasingly troubled by risking the lives of our troops and borrowing hundreds of billions of dollars for ‘nation-building’ in Afghanistan while we are facing a dire economic situation here at home,” he said. “I will continue to work to build bi-partisan support for a meaningful exit strategy from this war.”

An amendment introduced Thursday by Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.) proposed to restrict future war funding to troop redeployment and protecting soldiers presently in combat. It received 100 votes, including those of 93 Democrats. A third amendment to slash war funding entirely from the bill won the votes of 25 congressmen, including 22 Democrats, while an additional 22 Democrats chose not to oppose it and voted “present.”

“Obviously, a lot of people are understandably anxious. The sustainability of this war is in some doubt,” said Michael O’Hanlon, a foreign policy expert at Brookings.

Antiwar sympathies seemed notably stronger than during a previous effort in the House to implement a withdrawal timetable, a motion in March by Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) that failed 365-65. Prior attempts have likewise been overwhelmingly defeated.

Speaking out most forcefully for limits to the war were the 23 members of the “Out of Afghanistan Caucus,” established by Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich.) on May 18.

“It’s a fool’s errand,” said Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.), one of the members, during a press conference Thursday. “Every dollar we spend in Afghanistan, every life we waste there, is a waste. … What makes us think, what arrogance gives us the right to assume that we can succeed where the Moguls, the British, the Soviets, failed?”

Also on Thursday, Reps. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.), John Conyers (D-Mich.), Raul Grijalva (D-Ariz.) and Mike Honda (D-Calif.) took aim at President Obama for depicting the measure as urgent.

“It is disingenuous to say this is an ‘emergency’ supplemental,” they said in a joint statement. “The only emergency,” they said, is that “we are putting America further into debt” by “funding the longest war in history.” They added: “Last year, President Obama pledged to stop these off-budget gimmicks to hide the cost of war.”

West of Brookings noted that it’s historically unusual for presidents to face challenges over war policy from within their own party.

“Generally, members of your own party support your foreign policy,” he said. “It’s typical that you have to worry more about the opposition party than your own, and the fact that Democrats are expressing reservations should send a warning sign to the Obama administration.”

This deepening fissure could turn into a headache for the president and Democratic leaders.

“There’s been a schism in the Democratic Party over all wars since Vietnam. What matters is the intensity of it,” said Eric Alterman, of the liberal Center for American Progress. “[The antiwar coalition is] going to make it more difficult for [Obama] to continue the war, and they’re going to be a faction that has to be negotiated with.”

“But they’re not going to cut him off at the knees, they’re not to going to humiliate him, and they’re not going to destroy his presidency over it,” Alterman continued. “It’s not going to be the kind of thing that tears the party apart, as this issue has done in the past, because people have learned those lessons.”

O’Hanlon, a self-described Democrat and proponent of the Afghanistan occupation, cautioned that stripping funding now would cause Democrats to get “pilloried by Republicans” for “being weak on defense.” “It would be not only strategically unwise but politically suicidal,” he said.

And while skeptical Democrats could play an important role in determining the eventual outcome of the war, they may not wield much influence over the administration’s short-term strategy.

“This group has influence in the broader sense because obviously it has put a stake in the ground, and if things continue to go badly in Afghanistan, its influence will grow,” O’Hanlon said. “At some point it may be able to push the United States out of this conflict, but for now it’s not going to have any direct impact on strategy.”

Recent weeks and months have enhanced negative perceptions of the war, due to escalating violence, the ousting of Gen. Stanley McChrystal and charges of corruption by the government of Afghan President Hamid Karzai. Polls suggest Americans are growing increasingly dissatisfied with the war.

The Obama administration hasn’t flinched in its commitment to the effort, and has even begun to back away from its promise to begin winding America’s involvement in the war next July. “That absolutely has not been decided,” said Defense Secretary Robert Gates on June 20 on Fox News, nothing that withdrawal will be “conditions-based.” Obama said on June 28 that there’s “a lot of obsession” about the withdrawal date, which irritated some Democrats who perceived it as a snub.

It’s unclear whether Democrats will accept the president’s decision to extend it beyond then, if he chooses to.

“I think a year from now all bets are off if we haven’t seen major progress,” O’Hanlon said. “It’s possible to imagine a revolt within the party in a year.”

CNN reports:

“When you institutionalize a law like this one, you are targeting and discriminating at a wholesale level against a group of people,” Rep. Raul Grijalva, D-Arizona, told reporters…

Grijalva, whose district runs from the Mexican border to the outskirts of Phoenix, said the legislation “is not just mean-spirited, it is directed at a specific population.” And Gutierrez, D-Illinois, said the measure infringes on the federal government’s authority over immigration laws.

Gutierrez added in a statement (via a press release) after the conference: “The Governor should veto the bill and if she doesn’t, the President should assert the federal governments’ preeminent role in regulating and enforcing our nation’s immigration laws. … The lunacy of rounding up people because they look a certain way or are suspected of being in violation of immigration statutes can only lead to one thing: profiling. I am Puerto Rican, I was born in Chicago, and my family has been U.S. citizens for generations, but look at my face, listen to my voice: I could get picked up. Is this what we want in America?”

He has a formidable sales job ahead to accomplish this: 52 percent in this poll see the war in Afghanistan as not worth its costs and nearly as many trust the Republicans in Congress to deal with the war as trust Obama.

The lengthy debate that the administration has pursued on Afghanistan strategy has driven Obama’s numbers down on the issue, with a 48-percent plurality disapproving of his handling, although a 55-percent majority believe he’ll ultimately choose a workable strategy. But!

Asked to choose between a larger influx of troops to fight al-Qaeda and the Taliban and train the Afghan military, and a smaller number of new U.S. forces more narrowly focused on training, Americans divide 46 percent for the bigger number, 45 percent for the smaller one.

Meanwhile, Derrick Crowe reports that the Congressional Progressive Caucus is requesting to meet with Obama when he returns from Asia to discuss “rethinking” Afghanistan. A letter signed by Reps. Michael Honda (D-Calif.), Raul Grijalva (D-Ariz.), Lynn Woolsey (D-Calif.), Barbara Lee (D-Calif.) and James McGovern (D-Wash.) expresses concern over the widespread corruption and political illegitimacy of the Hamid Karzai government, and reiterates a concern of some signatories for a “timeline for eventual troop withdrawal.”

In anticipation of President Obama’s major health care speech next Wednesday, pundits and officials are trying to predict the direction the address will take — and some liberals are scaling back their hopes for a full embrace of a strong public option. Administration officials told The New York Times not to expect much detail from the president, who seems desperate to strike a deal with Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) and other moderates. Other sources told Talking Points Memo that the administration is urging progressive groups not to waste their money on ads backing a public option. The Senate Democrats’ health care talking points aim to put the ball in the anti-reform legislators’ court by asking them “to either propose their own plan or explain why they think it is best to do nothing while premiums crush American families and thousands lose their coverage every day.”

Snowe is now the target of considerable pressure from both sides of the health care debate. Advocates of reform gave her more than 35,000 letters, postcards, emails and petitions, urging her to help pass a bill. But a watered-down bill designed to appeal to moderates could lose the support of some liberals in the House. Reps. Lynn Woolsey (D-Calif.) and Raul Grijalva (D-Ariz.), the co-chairs of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, just delivered a letter to the White House insisting that a bill without a public option would be “unacceptable.”

Although most health care town halls have been quietly supportive of reform, it’s the violent outbursts that get all the media attention, writes E. J. Dionne. Today’s big story on this front came out of Los Angeles and featured a scuffle in which a backer of reform bit off the tip of an anti-reform protester’s finger. Initial reports contained a juicy footnote — that the man’s finger was reattached thanks to his Medicare coverage — but it now appears that doctors were unable to reattach it. The biter is still on the loose.

Today, Arizona Democratic Rep. Raul Grijalva proves us wrong, re-introducing legislation to scrap the controversial border waivers and reinstate the protective laws that have been ignored for the past few years, including the Endangered Species Act, the Safe Drinking Water Act and the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act.

From Grijalva’s statement:

Current policy has driven crossing activity to remote isolated areas along the border which, in Southern Arizona, represent significant public and tribal lands. Many of these lands have suffered extensive environmental degradation as a result of unauthorized activity and border security efforts. This bill is the first step in preserving our unique natural heritage while we protect our borders.

The bill would also require the Department of Homeland Security to craft a comprehensive border strategy that examines both the effectiveness and costs of various approaches to protecting the border — all while weighing the community impacts and giving priority to non-barrier strategies like sensors, remote cameras and an increased number of boots on the ground.

From thousands of miles away, the issue is an abstract one. But imagine a 20-foot high concrete fence looming in your backyard and you’ll get a better sense of where Grijalva’s coming from.

Rep. Raul Grijalva (Wikimedia Commons)

Phoenix — The possibility that President-elect Barack Obama will select Rep. Raul Grijalva (D-Arizona) as his secretary of interior has environmentalists, Interior Dept. employees, Native Americans and Latino groups giddy.

If appointed and confirmed by the Senate, the three-term Democrat, who represents the state’s 7th Congressional District, is expected to launch widespread reforms at Interior, which has been riddled with scandal, plummeting employee morale and deteriorating conditions in the nation’s national parks.

Illustration by: Matt Mahurin

“He’s ramped up and ready to go,” said Travis Longcore, science director of the Los Angeles-based Urban Wildlands Group and co-author of a Dec. 1 letter signed by 60 prominent conservation biologists and environmental scientists urging Obama to appoint Grijalva.

Natalie Luna, Grijalva’s spokeswoman, said Monday that the Obama transition team “has been looking at him,” but she could not say whether a final decision was near. Grijalva’s name first surfaced as a contender for the job more than two weeks ago.

The 61-year-old son of a migrant Mexican farm worker has been sharply critical of the Bush administration’s management of the 500 million acres controlled by Interior. If appointed, Grijalva would become the third Arizonan to lead the department. Stewart Udall served as its secretary under President John F. Kennedy, and former Arizona Gov. Bruce Babbitt held the post under President Bill Clinton.

Grijalva, who was elected co-chairman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus last month, has a reputation for being politically combative. He has been extremely outspoken in his opposition to what he sees as the anti-labor and anti-immigration policies of congressional Republicans. He has taken shots at his own party, branding Democratic leaders “spineless” for failing to take on comprehensive immigration reform. And he’s called leaders of anti-amnesty groups “cockroaches.”

“The word extremist could get tossed around to describe Grijalva,” the Tucson Citizen noted in Nov. 28 commentary. “He compromises when he must but prefers conquest to consensus.”

Grijalva’s strident nature may cost him the Interior appointment. A Washington Post columnist wrote Tuesday that a source close to the Obama transition team said that Grijalva had fallen off the short list.

Grijalva’s claim to the Interior Dept. job rests in part on his aggressive attacks on the administration’s handling of the nation’s public lands and natural resources. In a 23-page summary of its policies released last month, he lambasted the administration for a “concerted strategy of reducing the protections for our public lands, parks and forests and opening up these lands for every type of private, commercial and extractive industry possible.”

Grijalva has also clashed with Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne on opening up more than 1 million acres adjacent to Grand Canyon National Park to uranium mining and considering a plan to reopen a massive coal strip mine on the Navajo and Hopi Indian reservations in northeast Arizona.

As chairman of the House subcommittee on national parks, forests and public lands, Grijalva has criticized Interior’s tendency to put politics above science. “Under Bush, dedicated career employees have been driven out because they refused to comply with unethical activities, science has been manipulated to enrich industry, and environmental laws and regulations have been subverted to push forward damaging activities,” Grijalva wrote in the preface to his report, “The Bush Administration Assaults on our National Parks, Forests and Public Land (A Partial List).”

The Interior Dept. has a $16-billion budget and oversees the National Park Service, the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, the Bureau of Reclamation, U.S. Geological Survey, the Minerals Management Service, the Office of Surface Mining and the Bureau of Indian Affairs. It raises $12 billion a year from the sale of natural resources, including oil, gas, minerals, timber, grazing leases and other federal land development.

Grijalva’s main competition for the job is Rep. Mike Thompson (D-Calif.), who is strongly backed by hunter and fishermen groups. What’s more, Obama told Field and Stream magazine before the election “that having a head of the Department of Interior who doesn’t understand hunting and fishing would be a problem” and that “whoever heads up” the agency “is probably going to be a sportsman or sportswoman.”

Scientists who support Grijalva are urging Obama to look beyond that narrow requirment to the broad array of environmental challenges that Interior must address, including implementing reforms to manage climate change.

“We believe [it] is far more important to have a secretary who understands ecosystem science and is committed to science-based decision making,” urges the Dec. 1 letter signed by scientists. Among the signers are Michael E. Soule, founder of the Society for Conservation Biology; Cole Crocker-Bedford, retired chief of natural resources and research at Grand Canyon National Park; and Philip Hedrick, professor of conservation biology at Arizona State University.

Grijalva also has the backing of more than 130 local and regional environmental groups across the country, including the Grand Canyon Trust, Southern Utah Wilderness Society and the Center for Biological Diversity. A letter of support signed by the groups’ leaders was released Monday by the Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, a Washington advocacy group dedicated to exposing political manipulation of science.

National environmental groups are reportedly lobbying on Grijalva’s behalf too, but most have not publicly endorsed a candidate for the top job at Interior. Grijalva has been endorsed by Friends of the Earth and the National Conservation and Parks Assn.

Daniel Patterson, southwest director for Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, said many Interior employees support Grijalva because he is seen as a leader who “will first and foremost restore the focus to serving the public interest and not just big industry.” He said employee morale at the department is extremely low in the wake of an oil-sex scandal that rocked the Mineral Managements Agency in September. “Many of the employees feel like they have completely lost their ability to serve the public interest,” Patterson said.

Latino groups, including the Mexican American Legal Defense Fund and the Southwest Voter Registration and Education Project, told Obama’s transition team leaders last week that Grijalva had their “100 percent support,” according to a Dec. 4 report in the Arizona Daily Star. And some Native American leaders, who work closely with the Bureau of Indian Affairs in managing tribal lands, have lined up behind Grijalva.

Vernon Masayesva, a former Hopi Tribal chairman and executive director of the Black Mesa Trust, a coalition opposed to coal mining on the Hopi and Navajo Indian reservations, said, “We are just praying that Grijalva will be the next secretary.”

Update: The original version of this story said that the 60 prominent conservation biologists and environmental scientists urging Obama to appoint Grijalva were all from the Interior Dept. They are not all Interior Dept. biologists. We regret the error.