It's important for Republicans to understand that 2026 was an exception. The immediate post-Minneapolis political opportunity structure and the polling this year on the administration's immigration enforcement posture were hazard
signs to be navigated, not reasons for a U-turn. But some Republicans will use them to argue for one.
The Republican Amnesty Caucus, joined by business interests that have long demanded access to foreign labor, is going to use the midterm results and the window of time immediately after it when many Americans tune out to focus on the holidays, to push for a broad amnesty for illegal aliens. The argument is familiar: the border has been secured, enforcement is too politically costly, and now it is time for a compromise.
The leaders of the Amnesty Caucus each have their proposals. Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar's Dignity Act would grant qualifying illegal aliens' renewable legal status and work authorization, a de facto status that in practice would never be reversed. Rep. Glenn Thompson's Securing Agriculture's Workforce Act would expand Big Ag's access to and create new protections for the cheap foreign labor force he wants here in the country.
Both proposals are backed by the American Business Immigration Coalition (ABIC), which is running a national campaign called, offensively, Secure America's Workforce. And less than two weeks ago, ABIC's Agricultural Council sent a letter to President Trump and congressional leaders urging them to grant work permits to long-term immigrant farmworkers, explicitly praising Thompson's legislation.
The next few months will matter, and the base will need to remain vigilant, once again, to defeat amnesty as it has at every step of the way.
Amnesty failed in 2007. It failed again in 2010. It failed in 2013, even after its supporters managed to pass a comprehensive immigration bill through the Senate. Versions of amnesty for DACA-grantee illegal aliens and farmworkers failed in 2019, and again in 2021. None of these efforts lacked powerful backers, business support, or Republican allies in Washington. They couldn't get it done then. And that was before the Republican base moved to where it is today.
That history alone should warn off most Republicans.
But this is only half the story, the one from the past. Here's what's happened since.
The Republican base has moved well beyond where it stood even a few years ago. It is hardening not only on deporting illegal aliens in the face of left-wing street obstruction, but it is moving now to embrace consequential limitations to legal immigration. And it's moving fast.
Consider the numbers. In 2017, 38 percent of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents supported a national effort to deport all illegal aliens. By April 2024, that number had reached 61 percent. In June 2025, it remained at 59 percent. Even in February 2026, a Reuters/Ipsos survey found that 92 percent of Republicans supported Trump's deportation goals, even as Americans expressed substantial concern about the administration's enforcement tactics.
These are not identical polling questions, but together they establish something important. Republican support for mass deportation is substantially greater than it was when Trump first entered office in his first term. The political argument has changed.
Nor is the argument limited to illegal immigration. An October 2026 survey found that 51 percent of Republicans wanted legal immigration reduced, compared with 17 percent who wanted it increased. Congressional proposals now include restrictions on H-1B visas, an end to Optional Practical Training, restriction of admittance from certain countries, and even broad immigration moratoriums.
The Republican base is no longer satisfied with securing the border. It wants the millions illegally here removed, and it is increasingly questioning how much legal immigration the country should allow. The ground is moving fast. Mass deportation is now settled as the core issue for the Base. The only question unanswered is how far the consensus on limiting legal immigration will shift between now and Fall 2028.
Not only was immigration key to the 2016 and, especially, 2024 victories, but consider where our politics have since gone. Housing, employment, wages, public services, and the authority of federal law are increasingly being contested through immigration. The question of who we are is now the fight.
Republican hopefuls in 2028, here's what it means:
Mass deportation is now your litmus test. Read that sentence again.
Even after the midterms? Yes. Read the sentence again: mass deportation is now your litmus test.
Not a purity test. But an examination of whether or not you understand the most basic fact at hand: the Republican and Democratic political projects are now competing over who we are and who decides. The Republican project rests on the American people's authority to determine who enters their country, who remains, and to enforce those decisions through federal law and mass deportation. The Democratic project rests on mass importation, attacking the very concept of citizenship, and resistance to the exercise of federal law on the subject.
Years ago, I ran in a congressional primary, and I was both surprised and annoyed at the efficiency with which advocacy groups would send me their surveys. Implicit was that the press release and social media posts were already pre-written, with a version for if you were in their corner or not. Non-responses were themselves a story too.
Republican hopefuls, it is time to be in the American people's corner, and the mass deportation question is the one you can't get wrong.
If you are seeking to run at the national level for the U.S. Senate, this is your litmus test.
If you are planning to run for a U.S. House seat, this is your litmus test.
If you are planning to run for Lieutenant Governor, state auditor, or agricultural commissioner, this is your litmus test.
Yes, you, Republican running for a county sheriff's seat in a purple part of your state, this is your litmus test too.
State senate and state House hopefuls? This is your litmus. Every state has a Springfield or a Charleroi. A Frisco or a Lewiston.
As our politics converge fully around immigration and the battle of who we are, there are no more sidelines, only the field.
In November 2028, besides the presidency, Republicans will challenge for 34 United States Senate seats, all 435 seats in the U.S. House of Representatives, 11 governorships, nine lieutenant governorships, 10 state attorney general offices, seven secretary of state offices, and another 90 state executive positions, including treasurers, auditors, comptrollers, agriculture commissioners, insurance commissioners, education officials, and public utility commissioners.
And that is just the federal and statewide executive offices. At the state legislative level, elections will be held for roughly 5,800 seats in state senates, houses, and assemblies, spread across 44 states. Altogether, approximately 6,400 federal and state elected positions will be decided in 2028.
Beyond these offices, roughly 1,300 sheriff positions and approximately 1,000 local chief prosecutor positions, including district attorneys, state's attorneys, and prosecuting attorneys, appear on the regular election calendar. Some of these elections are nonpartisan, some offices are elected together, and not every contest will feature a Republican candidate.
For each of these races, you, the Republican hopeful, may soon begin commissioning polls, making calls to prospective donors, and assembling your political team. If you're running for federal office, you'll file a Statement of Candidacy with the Federal Election Commission and designate your principal campaign committee. If you're running for state office, you'll file with your secretary of state or designated election authority. And if you're running for county office, you'll file with the appropriate office per local rules.
All of that work will be accompanied by campaign announcements, fundraising events, county Republican dinners, candidate forums, local news interviews, and formal kickoff events. Though formal ballot filings in many states won't happen until 2028, much of this activity will happen in 2027, as the primary battles and lines of succession come into sharper relief.
And so, this question will arrive long before November 2028. For most of you, your answer is due in 2027.
It's not only a yes to mass deportation as a general slogan. It's a yes to the 2024 campaign definition of that term, written in all caps in the Republican Party platform by the only man who has gotten them across the finish line in twenty years.
It's a yes to removing millions of people. It's a yes to federal law existing across the homeland. It's a yes to American sovereignty.
For every single one of you Republican hopefuls out there, you will be asked your views on mass deportation.
If you're unsure on the issue, you won't survive the primary.
Jason Killmeyer left government in April of 2026 as the Chief of Staff of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and previously served as the Chief of Staff of the Department of Homeland Security's Office of Strategy, Policy and Plans.
The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the Daily Caller.
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