Obama Promises Immigration Reform, But the Senate Numbers Don't Look Good

June 19, 2009 - by Donny Shaw
Last time Congress tried for comprehensive immigration reform, they spent more than two months in the summer of 2007 on a bitter, racially-tinged debate that ended in overwhelming defeat (see the OpenCongress wiki article). The final vote in the Senate that secured the bill’s death went down 46-53 – fourteen votes shorty of the sixty that were needed to keep the debate alive.

Democrats gained some seats in the Senate this session, but not enough to make up that difference. All of the 15 Democrats that voted against the bill last time around are still there. Furthermore, three of the Republicans that voted for the bill last time have been replaced in this session of Congress with Republicans who strongly oppose comprehensive immigration reform that includes a path to citizenship program for illegal immigrants. Below are quotes on immigration from the three new Republican Senators (what immigration-reform advocates call a “path to citizenshipâ€