The illegal immigration activists who set up a video ambush of Scott Walker in Plainfield, Iowa thought they could really embarrass him, but Walker deftly turned the tables on them. The Washington Post’s account (video below):

As presidential hopeful Scott Walker toured a farm in this tiny town where he lived as a child, he was confronted by an undocumented worker from Mexico who is living in Wisconsin and demanded to know why Walker does not support President Obama's plan to give temporary status to some undocumented workers, including parents of children who were born in the United States.

"We're a nation of laws," Walker, the Republican governor of Wisconsin, repeatedly told Jose Flores, 38, who was joined by two of his four children, Luis, 7, and Leslie, 13, who had tears rolling down her cheeks throughout the exchange.

A little girl crying is the Kryptonite of the progressive no-borders crowd.  William Jacobson of Legal Insurrection calls it the “why do you want to deport my daddy” strategy.  His verdict is that Walker handled the strategy “pretty much perfectly.”  Even the Post was impressed with Walker’s response:

It was an opportunity for Walker to demonstrate how he calmly fights back against challenges from activists. He was forceful as he told the Flores family that immigrants must follow the rules, but he added, "I completely sympathize with the situation you're all in and others are in."

One of the activists, Sam Freeman of Wisconsin's Voces de la Frontera, cut the governor off and shouted, "So that's why you want to separate their family?"

Walker curtly said that he wanted to talk only with the family and that their plight is the reason the United States must go forward with "putting in place a logical system." To address illegal immigration, Walker said, the nation needs to secure the border and enforce its laws before it can focus on other issues. An immigration system cannot come at the cost of American workers and their wages, he added.

"The president had years to deal with this throughout the legitimate legislative process," Walker said. "He had his own party in charge for the first two years … he was in office."

John Hinderaker of Powerline sees how this issue and Walker’s response could be a huge plus:

What is most interesting to me is how Jose Flores came to confront Governor Walker:

[T]he Flores family waited by his campaign bus and approached him again, an exchange that was captured by reporters and three immigration activists, one of whom drove the family to Iowa.

So the whole encounter was a setup, orchestrated by a group of pro-illegal immigration activists. There is a cognitive dissonance surrounding the issue of illegal immigration: liberal activists and most beltway denizens believe that opposition to illegal immigration makes Republicans look bad. The rest of the country thinks it makes them look good.

The Post tells us about the Flores family:

Flores, who lives in Waukesha and works for a medical supply factory….

So, is this one of those jobs that Americans won’t do? The Democrats are always railing about high-quality factory jobs that are being “shipped overseas,” to the detriment of American workers. But for some reason, they think it is great for workers from those same countries to come illegally to the United States and take jobs away from American workers. And Flores’s employer is violating the law by employing him. Why is that company, obviously known to the Post and others, not being prosecuted? The most important step that needs to be taken to combat illegal immigration is to initiate criminal prosecutions against employers who hire illegal aliens, and send some of the scofflaws to prison.

Illegal immigration is the issue that Donald Trump has been riding.  But calm, polite, and gutsy Scott Walker, governor of the state where Flores is taking a good factory job away from an American, is in a position to press the issue of the employer’s misconduct.  Carol Brown e-mailed the following, which I think is worth considering as we evaluate the GOP field:

Walker was gracious, soft-spoken, and yet quite clear. He also exhibited what appeared to be genuine sensitivity to the little boy and handled the entire situation quite masterfully. I think. (snip)

He seems very present and very genuine. And in his own low-key way, he really does take command. And obviously he wasn't able to accomplish what he did in Wisconsin without possessing leadership skills in a big way. His style is just not super charismatic and certainly not bombastic.

It is still far too early to know who will emerge, but Walker’s low-key approach to Trump’s marquee issue may be a way for the GOP to find its path forward, regaining the allegiance of the alienated Trump supporters, but without the abrasiveness of Trump himself.  We’ll see.  None of the candidates, including Walker, is without a downside.  But we can expect wave after wave of ambushes for whoever becomes the nominee, and Walker clearly has some skill in dealing with them.

Here’s the video: