Gabby_ A Story of Courage and Hope - Alison Hanson [58]
From the start, Gabby spoke of the need for realistic immigration policies, but it was hard to be heard and easy to be misinterpreted. Her positions were nuanced. She said employers who hire illegal workers should be sanctioned with fines, or should even lose their licenses to do business. But she felt there also needed to be guest-worker programs so Arizona businesses would have access to needed legal, qualified workers. (It is especially hard to find enough Americans willing to work on farms bringing produce out of the fields; Mexican labor is crucial to parts of the Arizona economy.) Gabby also thought that hospitals and law-enforcement agencies in the district that were affected by illegal border-crossers needed to be compensated by the federal government.
She was not in favor of the sort of unconditional amnesty that President Reagan granted in 1986, but felt there should be a reasonable path to citizenship for the millions of illegal immigrants living in the United States. She favored a plan that would require people to register with the federal government, agree to criminal background checks, pay fines and back taxes, learn to speak English, and get in the back of the line. “It’s a path to citizenship,” she’d say, “but it’s not an easy path.”
Gabby’s views on immigration led to her being targeted by ads paid for by the Minuteman PAC, a group seeking stricter immigration policies. They called her “out of touch.” She responded: “Building a wall across the entire expanse of the border is not going to fix the problem.”
In a red state like Arizona, no politician is easily elected without supporting gun rights, and Gabby did, too. But she wanted to be rational. “I take my cues from law enforcement,” she’d say. “The mentally ill and convicted criminals shouldn’t have access to firearms.”
Gabby stayed on message. When she was criticized, she’d say she understood people’s frustrations. When she was taunted, she’d try to stick to the issues. She was tactful. She resisted getting irritated. As a military man, I was impressed by her discipline.
In campaign literature and at appearances, Gabby made sure she was referred to as Gabrielle Giffords. Her given name made her seem more serious, more mature. And that’s why many in the opposing party relished calling her “Gabby.” They hoped the nickname would make her seem girlish, younger, more frivolous. Voters were reminded that Gabby was the name of a character on TV’s Desperate Housewives. It didn’t sound like the name of a congresswoman.
Some of Gabby’s supporters thought the opposition was using “Gabby” in the same patronizing and sexist way they’d say “sweetie” or “honey.” Gabby didn’t let it get to her. She soldiered on.
Before friendly groups, she’d sometimes joke that her friends called her Gabby because she talked a lot. She’d get a few laughs by saying that. But mostly, she stuck with Gabrielle. A man named Lincoln can go by Abe instead of Abraham, a man named Carter can be Jimmy instead of James, but a woman named Gabrielle thought it best to wait a few more election cycles before she publicly allowed herself her nickname. I believe she was right in that decision.
Over the course of the campaign, I went with Gabby to several dozen appearances. Standing in the back of the room, I was always struck by the ease with which she held on to the audience, and how carefully she listened to people. I marveled at how fresh she could sound, repeating the same lines and answering the same questions. After a while, I could have delivered her entire twenty-minute stump speech. “When your family calls, you go,” she’d say. “That’s what you do. So I put on my boots, I got back in my pickup truck, I drove across the country, and I started changing tires the next day.”
I’d kid her. “So what did you do? Did you put on your boots? Did you get back in your pickup truck? When did you start changing tires? The next day?”
But Gabby knew