The GOP Way Of Dealing With Immigration-- Sell Visas To Rich Foreigners And Rake Off A Cut

Primarily because of Harry Reid's childish pique at Tom Daschle, he isn't allowing the DSCC to engage in keeping the open South Dakota Senate seat blue. Reid is a madman who would have preferred Blue Dog corporate shill and sleazy lobbyist Stephanie Herseth Sandlin-- who was rejected by South Dakota voters in 2010-- instead of prairie populist, and Daschle ally, Rick Weiland. Reid should get over himself and get a grasp that control of the Senate is more likely to stay with the Democrats if they keep Tom Johnson's South Dakota seat than if they spend millions of dollars on showy-but-failed campaigns for conservatives Democrats in deep red Georgia and Kentucky. Weiland is on the verge of winning, even without DSCC help. If Reid wasn't playing the roll of spoiler, Weiland would be crushing the GOP's unattractive and corrupt candidate by now. But Rounds has already spent $2,962,183 and still has $754,800 cash-on-hand up against just $447,919 that Weiland has on hand, almost all of it from grassroots donors. Which reminds me, here's the Blue America Senate page if you can help out.

Last week we did a rundown of the Mike Rounds visa-selling scandal that is roiling the Senate race now. The independent ad above, from a non-partisan, good government SuperPAC called Every Voice Action (formerly Public Campaign Action Fund), started running on South Dakota TV stations on Wednesday. The group says their buy is $200,000... which goes a long way in South Dakota media.

It's the Mike Rounds citizenship-for-sale scheme. It all started with an exclusive no-bid contract. Gov. Mike Rounds gave his friend a no-bid contract to sell EB-5 green cards to the highest bidder. Now there's a half-million dollars unaccounted for. It's under federal investigation, and taxpayers are left with millions in EB-5 liability. Mike Rounds: rich foreigners get green cards; cronies make a profit, and South Dakota gets stuck with the bill.

South Dakota is the key to the Democrats keeping control of the Senate and it's the key to keep Senate Democrats on a progressive path, not on a path that has to walk gingerly around every issue crucial to working families because conservative Democrats in red states might lose in the next election.