http://www.metrowestdailynews.com/colum ... eid=138824

Holmes: GOP losing ground on immigration reform
By Rick Holmes/ Opinion Editor
Sunday, August 27, 2006

CONCORD, NH -- The immigration circus came to town this week, but it didn't draw much of a crowd. There were more empty seats than full ones as the House Judiciary Committee brought its traveling immigration hearings to the Hall of Representatives at the New Hampshire State House.
This was designed to be political theater, not lawmaking. The committee hadn't bothered to have hearings on chairman James Sensenbrenner's immigration bill before approving it last December. Heavy on enforcement and border security, Sensenbrenner's bill had little support from Democrats. It contrasts sharply with a bill the Senate approved in May, which also established a guest worker program and a path to citizenship for some immigrants now here illegally. That bill had bipartisan support, including both of New Hampshire's senators, and was more closely aligned with President Bush's preferences.

Normally, bills approved by the Senate and House are sent to a conference committee to work out the differences. Instead, Sensenbrenner decided it was time to hold hearings -- 21 of them, in different parts of the country, especially places where Republican House members face tough challenges.

The political agenda is obvious in the name of the hearings: "The Reid-Kennedy Bill's Amnesty: Impacts on Taxpayers, Fundamental Fairness and the Rule of Law." There is no "Reid-Kennedy" bill. Officially, the Senate bill is named for two Republicans who shaped the compromise, Chuck Hagel of Nebraska and Mel Martinez of Florida. It was the House Republicans who decided to rename it after Democrats Harry Reid and Ted Kennedy.

Sensenbrenner's idea was to gin up the outrage over the Senate's "amnesty" bill by bringing his show to places like Concord, where New Hampshire's two Republican House members, Charlie Bass and Jeb Bradley, have been targeted by Democrats.

If Thursday's hearing was any indication, his plan, like so much House Republicans have tried in the last year, isn't going as planned.

Sensenbrenner (R-Wisc.) showed up with John Hostettler (R-Ind.) and a handful of hand-picked witnesses. The two Republican Judiciary Committee members were outnumbered by Democrats: Marty Meehan drove up from Lowell and Bill Delahunt from the Cape, and they were joined by member from Florida, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, who just happens to own a vacation home in New Hampshire.

The Democrats brought more energy to the hearing, and a withering critique of the House Republicans' handling of immigration and border security. They had charts showing that Bill Clinton had built up the border patrol at a faster clip than George W. Bush and that fines against employers for hiring illegals had dropped sharply under Bush. They charged that House Republicans had shot down efforts to strengthen border security -- and that Bradley and Bass had voted seven times against more funding for Border Patrol agents.

The 9/11 Commission had recommended adding 2,000 detention beds a year over four years on the border so that captured illegals wouldn't be released for lack of space, Meehan said, and the 9/11 bill adopted by Congress endorsed that goal. But Bush asked for just 200 new beds in his budget and the GOP-controlled Congress raised that to just 1,000 -- rejecting Democrats' push for the full 2,000.

Delahunt pointed north, where 5,000 miles of the Canadian border are patrolled by just 500 Border Patrol agents. The Democrats hammered Republican inaction on an issue they claim is so important. If you want to fix immigration, they asked Sensenbrenner, why are you here instead of pushing a bill through a conference committee?

Bush, the Democrats said, has already told Mexico's president that Congress won't be acting on immigration reform this year. When one party controls the House, the Senate and the White House, they have nobody but themselves to blame when one of their highest priority issues gets stuck in the mud.

As for the supposed beneficiaries of this political strategem, they seemed less than eager to play their part. Bass and Bradley each made moderate-sounding statements about immigration and declined to mix it up with the Democrats. They both left early, avoiding the post-hearing press conference.

If anyone's getting getting enervated by this process, it's the opponents of Sensenbrenner's enforcement-only approach. Pro-immigrant groups rallied before the hearing, not immigration hard-liners. The only applause at Thursday's hearing came as a loud burst after a witness spoke in support of the Senate bill.

Republicans had hoped to distract voters from Iraq and the Abramoff scandal by exploiting outrage over illegal immigration. But the GOP is divided on the issue, with House leaders like Sensenbrenner on one side, Senate leaders on the other. Bush and his wannabe successor, John McCain, want to pick up moderate and Hispanic support by taking a balanced approach to immigration reform. But the hard-liners will brook no compromise, and may punish their Republican friends for coming up empty.

Democrat Schultz couldn't explain the Republican's strategy: "Why they are giving us the opportunity to shine a spotlight on their failure is beyond me," she said after the hearing.

The mid-term elections are still 12 weeks away, and winning control of either the House or Senate is still an uphill challenge for Democrats. But no issue seems to be working for the Republicans, and the clock is ticking.

Rick Holmes' column appears on Sundays. He can be reached at rholmes@cnc.com.