Progress Illinois

Mark Kirk's record on immigration reform is not sterling. It's also a topic he'd prefer to avoid. But if the North Shore Republican wants to run for U.S. Senate, the group Illinois Immigrant Action (the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights' 501(c)(4) sister organization) isn't going to let him dodge the issue.

At a press conference in Chicago this morning, IIA representatives and several Latino elected officials unveiled a $5,000 Spanish language ad-buy targeting Kirk. The spots mark the culmination of a two-week organizing blitz and will run in seven Spanish-language newspapers and on three radio stations.  They mock the Republican Senate candidate for his remarks on the House floor two years ago in which he explained his support for international family planning by suggesting that it would result in a slowing of Mexico's population growth rate (which actually had plummeted since 1980) and thereby "reduce the long-term illegal immigration pressure on America's borders." Organizers say immigrants and their allies deserve a sincere apology.

Kirk is contributing to "the fear and ignorance of the anti-immigrant forces out there," said State Rep. Susana Mendoza (D-Chicago), who also says he's making a poor political choice, given the rising number of Latino and Asian-American voters who support comprehensive immigration reform. Watch her statement:

While targeted and not on television, the blitz is still relatively small in size. But because of the "gossip factor" in the Latino community, ICIRR director Joshua Hoyt says they will have a "multiplier" effect. Because it's still early in the campaign season, the ad serves as a warning as well. "We want him to understand," Hoyt says, "that if he continues to scapegoat the immigrant community on issues like health care and crime and if he doesn't popse serious solutions, there will be a political price to pay."

Meanwhile, in his Sun-Times column today, Mark Brown took issue with the ads, which feature Kirk's head on a fake condom wrapper, because he thinks they "put words in Kirk's mouth." To support this criticism, he observes that "Kirk's complete remarks from 2007, as reported in the Congressional Record, make no mention of condoms."  On that narrow point, he's correct. You can read Kirk's full statement here.

But what Brown glosses over is that the amendment Kirk framed as a step towards curbing illegal immigration explicitly pertained to the distribution of contraceptives.  Indeed, here's the central provision:

That, in order to prevent unintended pregnancies, abortions, and the transmission of sexually transmitted infections, including HIV/AIDS, no contract or grant which includes funding for the provision of contraceptives in developing countries, shall be denied to any nongovernmental organization solely on the basis of the policy contained in the President's March 28, 2001, Memorandum to the Administrator of the United States Agency for International Development with respect to providing contraceptives in developing countries, or any comparable administration policy regarding the provision of contraceptives.

The bill was directed at reversing a Bush adminstration policy that prevented the U.S. from providing international aid to organizations that distributed contraceptives (such as condoms).