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Pro-immigration lobbies paying big money, but success elusive

Mike Madden
Republic Washington Bureau
Jan. 28, 2007 12:00 AM


WASHINGTON - Big business, labor unions, civil rights groups and other supporters of sweeping immigration reforms spent millions of dollars lobbying the last Congress only to see a stalemate between the House and Senate.

An Arizona Republic analysis of lobbying disclosures from the last half of 2005 and the first half of 2006, when each chamber debated and passed its own very different immigration bill, found at least $3.3 million was spent on lobbying on immigration, most of it by supporters of broad reforms.

It doesn't count hundreds of other groups that included immigration among several topics on which they spent money. Disclosure rules don't require them to itemize their lobbying expenditures for each issue.

The intense focus on immigration shows how high the stakes are for hundreds of organizations as Congress prepares to debate reforms this year, with the new Democratic leaders in the House and Senate saying they are more inclined to pass wide-ranging changes.

The money spent persuading lawmakers also underscores the cost of doing business in Washington. But the stalemate in the last Congress shows that even expensive lobbying efforts by powerful players sometimes fall short. A separate analysis by the non-partisan Center for Responsive Politics found the number of organizations lobbying on immigration climbed steadily over the past several years, reaching a peak of 302 in 2005, the last year for which the group had complete statistics.

"The ramifications, if (the Senate bill) passed, would be significant," said Sheila Krumholz, executive director of the Center for Responsive Politics. "It's not surprising that there was a final push and big bucks behind that. Particularly for the business community, it would most certainly impact their bottom line. (Lobbying) might be arguably a small price of doing business to get the results they want."



From the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to the Brazilian all-you-can-eat steak chain Fogo de Chão to the United Farm Workers, scores of groups weighed in to push for reforms that would have let millions of undocumented immigrants get legal status and allowed foreign "guest workers" to come here temporarily for jobs.

Reform supporters also lobbied Congress to block new border security restrictions passed by the House, which would have made it a felony for undocumented immigrants to remain in the United States. That worried businesses that have come to depend on immigrants to fill jobs, thanks in part to loose enforcement of existing laws against hiring anyone who isn't living here legally.

While groups that advocate tougher border security also lobbied Congress, disclosure forms indicate that effort was outnumbered by a broad coalition of corporations, unions and non-profit advocacy organizations.

"On other issues, you can see that there's a lot of money spent on both sides, and so you understand why nothing happens," said Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies, which advocates for reductions in both legal and illegal immigration. The center opposed the Senate reforms but doesn't engage in lobbying.

"On this issue, all the money is on one side because everybody who has an intense direct interest in the outcome benefits from loose enforcement and more immigration."

Still, even though the millions spent on immigration lobbying may seem overwhelming, it's barely noticeable next to what other industries spent. More than $203 million was spent lobbying on health care in the first half of 2006 alone.

Some lawmakers who supported the Senate immigration bill said business groups may have to work even harder this year if they want to pass legislation.

"I think if we're going to see meaningful, comprehensive reform, the business groups and others are going to have to be a lot more active and explain why it's needed" to skeptical members of Congress, said Rep. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., who broke with most House Republicans to push for broad reforms.