Thread: Immigration Bill Quashed

Washington Times
Article published Jun 29, 2007
Immigration bill quashed

June 29, 2007

By Stephen Dinan

The on-again-off-again immigration bill took a fatal blow yesterday as a majority of senators voted to block it, responding to millions of e-mails, phone calls and faxes from voters furious over a measure they saw as amnesty.

The vote to block the bill was 53-46 — a crushing defeat given that supporters fell 14 votes shy of the 60 needed to limit debate and set an up-or-down vote. It also represents a major loss of support from just two days earlier, when 64 senators had voted to resurrect the bill from its first defeat three weeks ago.

"The message is crystal clear that the American people want us to start with enforcement, both at the border and at the workplace, and don't want promises," said Sen. David Vitter, Louisiana Republican. "They want action, they want results, they want proof because they've heard all the promises before."

It was a devastating defeat for President Bush, who invested a tremendous amount of political capital into immigration reform.

Despite teaming with Democrats, attacking some of his own staunchest supporters, deploying two Cabinet secretaries and much of his top policy hierarchy nearly full time to the Capitol and making calls himself, Mr. Bush was unable to secure victory and is now left without a major domestic accomplishment for his second term.

"A lot of us worked hard to see if we couldn't find a common ground. It didn't work," Mr. Bush said.

In yesterday's vote, 33 Democrats, 12 Republicans and one independent voted to proceed with the bill, while 37 Republicans, 15 Democrats and one independent voted to block it.

The bill was always hanging in precarious balance, written in backroom negotiations by a small group of Democrats and Republicans with the help of the Bush administration. It involved a trade — the Republicans agreed to a path to citizenship for the estimated 12 million to 20 million illegal aliens in the country, and the Democrats agreed to a temporary-worker program for future workers and to rewrite the immigration system to favor those with needed skills or education.

But concerns over amnesty, fears that a new guest-worker program would harm U.S. workers and a lack of confidence in the Bush administration to enforce stricter laws piled up.

Opponents pointed to an evaluation by the Congressional Budget Office that said the bill would only reduce future illegal entries by about 25 percent and said the new guest-worker program would actually lead to hundreds of thousands of new illegal aliens from workers overstaying their job permits.

Senate Democratic leaders said they may try again later this year, but Rep. Zoe Lofgren, California Democrat, who was charged with crafting a House bill, said yesterday's vote "effectively ends comprehensive immigration-reform efforts in the 110th Congress."

She said the House will instead see if there are small bills that can be passed to try to improve the current system. Many Republicans encouraged that approach, urging both chambers to turn their attention to the $4.4 billion in spending Mr. Bush said was needed to secure the borders.

In the meantime, Mr. Bush's Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said he will keep enforcing the law, including continuing to hire 18,300 border patrol agents, build 370 miles of fencing along the 1,950-mile U.S.-Mexico border and erect watchtowers to fill out the "virtual fence."

"You will continue to see heart-wrenching examples of families being pulled apart because I have an obligation to enforce the law, whether it's painful to do or whether it's pleasurable to do," he said. "But in order to regain the credibility with the American people that has been squandered over 30 years, we're going to have to be tough."

Senators repeatedly talked about pressure from voters swaying the day.

The opposition was so fierce it shut down the Senate's Internet server earlier in the debate and yesterday morning flooded the phone system beyond capacity, senators said. One grass-roots group, NumbersUSA, recorded 1.5 million faxes sent through its system to Senate offices during the weeks of debate.

"This immigration bill has become a war between the American people and their government," said Sen. Jim DeMint, South Carolina Republican. "This vote today is really not about immigration, it's about whether we're going to listen to the American people."

The bill's supporters, though, praised each other's courage for standing firm in the face of voters' demands.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, California Democrat, told senators to ignore the outraged phone calls flooding their offices, saying there were many parts of the bill "they don't understand." And Sen. Arlen Specter, Pennsylvania Republican, read from Irish statesman Edmund Burke's "Speech to the Electors of Bristol," in which the 18th-century lawmaker argued that elected representatives must follow their own judgment of what's best, even when the voters disagree.

Mr. Specter lamented those who switched their vote yesterday and in a vote Wednesday night on an amendment that punched a hole through the bill. He said senators changed their votes 23 times during that Wednesday night vote alone, jockeying for political advantage.

"We talk about profiles in courage — this is a profile in cynicism," Mr. Specter said. "Votes were changed in order to defeat the bill, not because they expressed the preference of the senators."

Mr. Specter, though, has acknowledged repeatedly he has done the opposite and voted against a number of amendments he actually would have liked to see passed simply to keep the bill alive.

Mexican President Felipe Calderon said the Senate had made a "grave error" in killing the legislation, according to the Associated Press. The action, he said, would cut off legal immigration, permit continued unlawful entries and human rights violations, and decrease security on both sides of the border.

In yesterday's showdown vote, one senator, Sam Brownback of Kansas, changed his vote midway.

"The country's not ready," the Kansas Republican said later when asked about his switch. "I thought we were, but just concluded the country's not ready."

He was the only presidential candidate in the Senate to oppose the bill. All four Democratic presidential candidates voted for it, as did Sen. John McCain, Arizona Republican.

Mr. Brownback said he wasn't sure how the issue can be split into separate parts.

"Maybe there's a way, but it seems to me now it's best to just give it a rest," he said.

Of 34 senators up for re-election in 2008, only nine voted to push the bill forward.

"When I saw the '08 Democrats voting against cloture the first time on that Thursday night [three weeks ago], I was like, 'You know what? This thing is in trouble because it's not just Republicans that have political trouble with this, it's Democrats,' " said Sen. John Thune, South Dakota Republican, who opposed the bill.

Sounds like the House is a little gun shy to handle this issue. Let's see how they stand up against the Hispanic lobbyists.

"The country's not ready," the Kansas Republican said later when asked about his switch. "I thought we were, but just concluded the country's not ready."

Right-o and we will never be 'ready' for the border tsunami you were signing on to! Get the fork, this one is done too!!!

"In yesterday's showdown vote, one senator, Sam Brownback of Kansas, changed his vote midway.

"The country's not ready," the Kansas Republican said later when asked about his switch. "I thought we were, but just concluded the country's not ready."

We will NEVER BE READY for what you have planned, Traitor.

Meet the Real Brownback: (Read second paragraph)

http://judiciary.senate.gov/oldsite/sb040401h.htm

Before the
Subcommittee on Immigration
Committee on the Judiciary
United States Senate

Concerning

"Immigration Policy: An Overview"

Wednesday, April 4, 2001
2 p.m., SD-22 6

America is a nation of immigrants. That is what Ronald Reagan reminded us in his final address to the nation. President Reagan said he envisioned America as a shining city on a hill, and in his mind it was a city that teemed with people of all kinds, living in peace and harmony. Then he said, "And if this city has walls, the walls have doors, and the doors are open to those with the energy and the will and the heart to get in. That is the way I saw it, that is the way I see it." And that is the way I see it, too.

America's greatest strength remains its openness to new ideas and new people. That openness explains why the United States is powerful, influential, and growing. Nicolas Eberstadt, a demographer at the American Enterprise Institute, wrote recently that "America's demographic prospects would seem to support – or even enhance – U.S. global influence in the years ahead." The reason? Immigration. He points out that while other developed countries will, on balance, shrink by 15 percent between now and 2050, the United States will grow by 40 percent, remaining the world's third largest country behind India and China.

More than numbers, legal immigrants bring energy, vitality, and innovation. An Alexis de Tocqueville Institution study by Phil Peters showed that immigrants create or co-invent one in five U.S. patents. Twelve percent of the Inc. 500 – America's fastest-growing private companies – were started by immigrant entrepreneurs.

To harness the energy and vitality of immigrants, we need to improve our current immigration system. As the new chairman of the subcommittee, I look forward to working with my distinguished ranking member Senator Kennedy, who has many years of experience on these important issues, as well as with my colleagues on both sides of the aisle – Senators Specter, Grassley, Kyl, DeWine, Feinstein, Schumer, Durbin, and Cantwell.

As chairman, I will work with the administration and my colleagues on legislation to produce fundamental reform of the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS). Such reform is sorely needed. I want to thank Senator Feinstein for her leadership on addressing immigration processing backlogs in last year's H-1B legislation. I think all of us realize that there is more work ahead. To address the inordinate delays at INS, I support President Bush's proposal to require INS to process immigrant and naturalization applications within 180 days and temporary visas within 30 days. I hope that once those deadlines are achieved, we can work to get the Department of Labor and INS process applications in even less time.

There is work to do in other areas as well. Some estimate that nearly half of the labor in American agriculture may not be working legally in the United States. If that is indeed the case, then something is broken. Growers, farm workers, Republicans, and Democrats have been working -- and should keep working -- towards legislation that meets the needs of farmers, farm workers, and the American economy.

In an area of particular interest to me, we must also look at the need to attract more people to rural areas that are depopulating and to help residents of rural areas find the medical personnel they need to receive proper health care.

I plan to work closely with the administration in three important foreign policy areas. First, I am heartened by the recent meeting between President Bush and Mexican President Vincente Fox aimed at establishing a more orderly migration process between the United States and Mexico.

Second, under the prior administration U.S. refugee admissions fell by 40 percent from the last year of President George Bush's administration. I will press the new administration to reverse that unfortunate trend to ensure that America is providing a safe haven for victims of persecution in line with our tradition as a generous nation.

Third, I look forward to working with the administration to implement fully the sex trafficking bill that Congress passed last year to deal with the victimization of women around the world.

At the turn-of-the-century, critics said that Italians and East Europeans would never become Americans. Today, the same arguments are made against Latinos, Asians, and other immigrants. Behind the rhetoric, the critics' arguments boil down to this: Immigrants aren't good enough to join us and America is not strong enough to absorb them. History teaches us nothing could be more wrong.

When the Pilgrims set out for America they sought a land where they could work hard, pray in peace, and enjoy the fruits of their labor. Nearly 400 years later, the same can be said of today's immigrants. America will prosper with policies that encourage legal and orderly migration and we must provide timely service to those who play by the rules and seek to join us as fellow Americans. America is best when we appeal to the hope in men's hearts, rather than the fear in men's eyes.

____________________________

Sammy Boy ... we don't want to be the world's third largest toilet bowl behind India and China and we will never be ready to become the disgusting overpopulated non-nation and impoverished slave people you envision.

You want to stop depopulation of rural areas in the United States? Then stop shipping all their manufacturing jobs out of the country and bring all the ones you shipped out ... back home where they belong.

20 million manufacturing jobs left the US in the past 6.5 years.