One more shot at immigration reform
By William McKenzie

The Dallas Morning News

(MCT)

The game is back on, and not a moment too soon.

Republican Jeff Flake and Democrat Luis Gutierrez filed a top-to-bottom immigration bill in the House last week that jump-starts a discussion that had gone into hibernation since the November elections. Last we heard, President Bush was signing a bill that authorized 700 miles of fence and barriers along the U.S.-Mexico border. That little bit of nonsense was as far as Washington could get in 2006. Even conservatives along the border, like Texas Gov. Rick Perry, thought a wall alone wouldn't stop the flow of illegal immigrants.

Everyone had been waiting for Ted Kennedy and John McCain to start things with a new Senate bill, but Flake and Gutierrez in the House beat them to the filing deadline, which is good.

Congress only has about six months to make serious progress on immigration, before the 2008 presidential campaign swamps everything, so Flake and Gutierrez offer needed giddy-up.

They also prove that bipartisanship is not dead in Washington. Their effort differs significantly from the House version of immigration reform from 2006, when Republicans controlled the chamber and produced a punish-the-illegals bill that led to a wall and little else.

This year, the House could help the country find a better answer. With Democrats in charge, and Bush still pushing, there's a greater chance legislators like Flake and Gutierrez can deal honestly with the large flow of illegal immigrants.

Their proposal mirrors what Senate reformers like Kennedy, McCain, Mel Martinez and Chuck Hagel persuaded their chamber to pass last year. The Flake-Gutierrez bill wants tougher border security, worksite enforcement, 400,000 legal foreign workers annually and a chance for illegal immigrants to earn citizenship.

That 400,000 number is important. It reflects the estimated number of illegal immigrants who come here each year. If we have enough guest worker passes to match that flow, we will have fewer people coming here illegally.

That's just one of the sweet spots legislators need to hit to reform our broken immigration system. Fixing the problem of 12 million illegal immigrants living here, and another 400,000 coming in annually, requires the right combination of toughness, openness and realism. Without each, we won't fix the problem.

The Bush White House will have its hands full getting enough Republicans to back this kind of broad fix. Plenty of those Republicans, now in the minority, still don't want to go beyond building walls and deploying more agents.

To its credit, the administration keeps trying. It is working with conservatives who opposed the Senate bill last year, including Texas Sen. John Cornyn. Team Bush needs to keep at it to see if it can help forge a deal that includes a number of Republicans and conservative Democrats.

If the president can't persuade the hesitant to jump on board, he will face decision time this spring. Should he support a full-bore fix passed with mostly Democratic votes?

Yes, he should.

First, the country badly needs it. The same-ol'same-ol' is not stopping illegal immigration. Instead, it's only tempting states like Texas and towns like Farmers Branch to solve a truly national problem.

Second, Bush doesn't want to return to Texas in 2009 as the guy who built a wall between the United States and Mexico. If that's all he brings home, that wall would contradict the understanding he has demonstrated since his days as governor of the two nations' symbiotic relationship. (Cecilia Munoz of the National Council of La Raza last year described Bush as the first president since LBJ who looks comfortable with Hispanics.)

Interestingly, some Republican opponents of a broad immigration plan might welcome a Bush victory, if they can't get one for their side. One GOP congressman I spoke with last week said some House members think it would be better if the train just ran over them, rather than leave the immigration issue hanging out there forever.

That's a few weeks down the road. Flake and Gutierrez have provided an opening for people in both parties to start cracking this nut now.

Senators like Kennedy and McCain can do us all a favor by coming up with a bipartisan Senate bill soon. The president has shown guts on this, and people in both parties want a solution. Let's find it this time.

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ABOUT THE WRITER

William McKenzie is an editorial columnist for The Dallas Morning News. Readers may write to him at the Dallas Morning News, Communications Center, Dallas, Texas 75265;

e-mail: wmckenzie@dallasnews.com