In an attempt to blunt the surging presidential candidacy of Texas Gov. Rick Perry, Mitt Romney recently embraced two hot-button immigration issues in an appeal to Tea Party followers: He called for an end to so-called sanctuary cities harboring undocumented aliens, and he insisted that the next president "must do a better job of securing its borders, and as president, I will."
Yet, Romney's hard-line rhetoric overshadows a family secret: Few have benefited more from porous borders and "sanctuary" cities on either side of the border than the Romney family.
Last week, in fact, both Perry and Romney put in well-covered calls to Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio for advice on the immigration issue. In the 19th century, Arpaio would have been taking a close look at the Romney's familial flouting of Arizona law.
Romney's ancestral legacy of polygamy, of course, is hardly news. The Washington Post did a feature story last month on Romney's sizable family community in northern Mexico, and the role of his great-grandfather Miles Park Romney, "who came to the Chihuahua desert in 1885 seeking refuge from U.S. anti-polygamy laws."
