After a wave of polling data indicated that Mitt Romney was poisoning his chances at making in roads with Hispanic voters he has begun to moderate his stance on issues important to this group. The real question is will right wing conservatives let him. Representatives from local governments in the United States and Mexico are working together to make crossing their shared border easier. House Republicans are pushing legislation through congress which would allow the Border Patrol to control 50 national parks and forests.

Will the right wing really let Mitt Romney `pivot’ on immigration? After a wave of polling data indicated that Mitt Romney was poisoning his chances at making in roads with Hispanic voters he has begun to moderate his stance on issues important to this group. The real question is will right wing conservatives let him. “So Mitt Romney was overheard the other day saying it might be a good idea to come up with a “Republican DREAM Act,” such as the one being worked on by Marco Rubio, in order to make inroads with Latinos in the general election. But Kansas secretary of state and Romney immigration adviser Kris Kobach — who is widely respected on the right as a spokesman on the issue — told me yesterday that any such proposal is “unacceptable” if it confers any legal status on illegal immigrants en masse. This is a big deal, because if Romney sticks to Kobach’s standard, he may have little room to pivot on the issue. Today, Rubio was asked at a forum if his proposal passes Kobach’s test. As Evan McMorris Santoro reports, Rubio said it does.”

Binational Group Seeks to Make U.S.-Mexico Border Crossing Easier  Representatives from local governments in the United States and Mexico are working together to make crossing their shared border easier. “In hopes of improving the region’s economy, authorities in El Paso have launched a binational plan to reduce wait times in the lines of people entering the United States from Mexico at the border crossing. A task force reached an agreement with U.S. Customs and Border Protection to measure, using GPS technology, the wait times experienced by people at the international crossing points, El Paso Mayor John Cook told Efe. Cook mentioned that currently the wait times are registered by CBP using non-scientific methods, and he said that the agency agreed to install GPS technology at the crossing points and use the resulting data collected to determine the true wait times.”

House Republicans back Homeland Security powers in border parks House Republicans are pushing legislation through congress which would allow the Border Patrol to control 50 national parks and forests. “House Republicans are backing legislation in Congress to give the Department of Homeland Security control of more than 50 national parks and forests within 100 miles of the U.S. borders. The legislation involves a sweep of land along the frontier with Canada and Mexico, but exempts state land, private property and federal holdings used for mining, livestock grazing and timber harvesting. The new authority would carve through 54 national parks, including Joshua Tree, Saguaro, Acadia and Glacier. The National Security and Federal Lands Protection Act, sponsored by conservative Rep. Rob Bishop (R-Utah), would give Border Patrol and Customs agents and other federal officials the right to suspend any federal law on land managed by the departments of Interior and Agriculture. It would give Homeland Security the right to conduct any activity or construct any facility required to secure the border.”