Thread: Immigration bills wait for action

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Sunday, September 3, 2006
Immigration bills wait for action
DENA BUNIS
Washington Bureau Chief
The Orange County Register
dbunis@ocregister.com It's always dangerous to predict what Congress will do on any issue.

And when it comes to immigration, almost anything could happen. But here goes.

Congress returns from its August vacation this week and will be in session only until the end of the month before going home to campaign for election. Sitting on the table are two bills – an enforcement-only measure passed by the House last December, and a broader bill passed by the Senate in May that marries enforcement with a new guest worker program and a plan to legalize millions of illegal immigrants already here.

So the question is whether, in the next four weeks, Congress can bring these two very different positions together. Can lawmakers find a compromise that would pass the House and the Senate and get signed by President Bush?

I don't think I'm going out on a limb too far here by saying the chances of that are slim and slimmer.

Now there have been some rumblings.

Word is that the staffs of Arlen Specter, R-Pa., chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, have been talking in recent days and would like to come up with something both sides can live with.

Sensenbrenner has a particular reason for wanting to get a deal. He steps down as Judiciary chairman at the end of the year, and he'd love to have this issue as a check in his win column.

But Democratic staff members say they haven't been in on these talks. And without some Democratic support, any compromise is unlikely.

So even if Specter and Sensenbrenner's people were able to strike a deal, then what? Any agreement would probably have to include some form of guest worker program. And that is a non-starter with a vocal group in the House GOP caucus – whether a majority of the House Republicans would nix any guest worker deal is not totally clear.

What's been bandied about most on that front is the notion that a secured border would "trigger" a guest worker program. That idea seems to have some traction among the key players in this issue. It could also be attractive to some Republicans who are willing to countenance a guest worker plan as long as they can prove to their constituents that border security comes first.

The trigger idea was floated during the Senate debate and went nowhere.

But it has been fleshed out more since then by Indiana Republican Rep. Mike Pence and Texas Republican Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison. The pair held a press conference right before the break to tout their compromise.

Their idea falls somewhere between the enforcement-only House bill and the Senate measure.

Pence and Hutchison would create a guest worker program. But before it could take effect, the president would have to certify that the border is secure. New guest workers and people currently here illegally would have to return to an "Ellis Island" center located outside the U.S. to apply. It would take about 17 years for such workers to become permanent legal residents.

Sen. Edward Kennedy and other Democrats have repeatedly called Pence's idea "interesting.'' But the other day, the Massachusetts senator said the path to citizenship for illegal immigrants was "unclear" and that the Pence plan would be a non-starter unless that path were clarified.

Sensenbrenner and Specter's people reportedly aren't using Pence-Hutchison as a starting point. But I wouldn't be surprised to see some elements from their proposal in any new effort.

The key here is time. Is there enough time for the two sides to come together on such a plan? And how involved will the White House get. Bush has met with Pence but hasn't committed to his approach.

Meanwhile, the Democrats' strategy seems to be to put the onus on the president to force his party to act. While not explicitly endorsing the Senate bill, the measure has all the elements he has been talking about for years. And during the break, Bush has frequently brought up the need for broad reform.

In a conference call with reporters the other day, Kennedy said Arizona Sen. John McCain and other GOP lawmakers who back the Senate approach have asked Bush to convene a meeting on immigration when Congress returns from the break.

Such a move would be a win-win for the Democrats. If Bush could get his party to agree on something, Democrats could say they pushed him into it. If he can't, Democrats could continue to say Republicans can't lead and the electorate should take control away from them.

Some Republicans also would prefer to see this issue hanging out there for the election. Those who oppose Bush on this want to be able to use that opposition to show they are independent of a not-so-popular president.

All of this indicates to me that it would take a veritable miracle to get this done before the election.

That leaves us with Congress' planned lame-duck session in November.

Some say it would be easier to tackle this issue after the election. Others say it will take another Congress and more public pressure before any action is taken.

We'll be watching.

CONTACT US: 202-628-6381 or dbunis@ocregister.com

Pence and Hutchison would create a guest worker program. But before it could take effect, the president would have to certify that the border is secure.

Yeah right, that would be like asking the fox to certify that the hen house is locked.