The Flake-Gutierrez STRIVE Act amnesty returns...

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Thursday, September 6, 2007
Immigration bill gets a hearing
Subcommittee takes testimony on the issue despite earlier failure of a similar bill.
By VANJA PETROVIC
The Orange County Register

WASHINGTON - Although the debate about a comprehensive immigration overhaul was stopped cold in the Senate earlier this year, the House immigration subcommittee held a hearing on the issue Thursday.

The session, called by subcommittee Chairwoman Rep. Zoe Lofgren, came as a surprise because there is nearly no possibility of an immigration bill getting through Congress before the 2008 presidential election.

The hearing examined the STRIVE Act, which would toughen the nation's borders, create a new guest worker program, require employers to verify the legal status of their workforces and allow an estimated 12 million illegal immigrants to earn their way to citizenship. It had many of the same elements as the failed Senate bill.

Lofgren, D-San Jose, said she was enormously disappointed by the Senate's failure to pass a measure and wanted to give the issue a full airing in her subcommittee. "The details matter … and today, we will get the details," she said.

The subcommittee heard from a dozen witnesses, including House members, activists and people whose lives were personally touched by the immigration issue.

Eduardo Gonzalez, a Naval officer, told the subcommittee he was worried that before he gets back from his third deployment overseas his wife may be deported because she is undocumented. And Tony Wasilewski told the panel that his wife of 14 years was deported this year because she was denied political asylum. She took their 6-year-old son back to Poland with her.

Much of the testimony at the hearing was a repetition of old talking points on the issue from those who support or oppose the comprehensive approach.

"We should be ashamed of ourselves," for not passing a bill, said Rep. Luis Gutierrez, D-Ill. "We have failed the American people."

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., complained about the use of the word amnesty.

"This term amnesty has been misused more times in this debate than any other word I've heard in any other debate," Conyers said. "I've never before noticed so much anti-immigrant bias."

The subcommittee's ranking Republican, Rep. Steve King of Iowa, was one of the few dissenting voices. King compared the STRIVE Act to the 1986 immigration law. He said that both are amnesty and would reward illegal behavior and disrespect of American law.

"No one wants to repeat the mistake of 1986, but the STRIVE Act does that," he said. "The STRIVE Act sells U.S. citizenship for $2,100." King was referring to the fines illegal immigrants would pay to get on the path to citizenship.

Rep. Brian Bilbray, R-Carlsbad, agreed.

"The STRIVE Act and similar plans have failed to gain a wide support from the American people for a very simple reason: Americans do not believe that we should reward people for breaking our laws," he said.

http://www.ocregister.com/news/subcommi ... strive-rep