Thread: Menendez: Filibuster-Proof Majority not ‘Identified’ for Immigration Bill

posted 5/24/13
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Roll Call
Menendez: Filibuster-Proof Majority not ‘Identified’ for Immigration Bill

By Niels Lesniewski
Posted at 5:45 p.m. today

New Jersey Democratic Sen. Robert Menendez tells Univision that the “gang of eight” senators working on an immigration overhaul don’t yet have 60 votes.

“We don’t currently have 60 votes identified in the Senate,” Menendez said, according toUnivision’s translation of the interview, which will air Sunday.

Menendez was calling on supporters of the immigration overhaul to get in touch with their senators.

“The community in your state, in every state, should be contacting your state’s two U.S. senators saying that they want comprehensive immigration reform, that they are going to judge their political future based on this vote,” Menendez told Univision’s Jorge Ramos. “And if we do this, both in the Senate and, later, with the members of the House of Representatives, we can achieve the victory that we want.”

Menendez may simply be saying that the supporters of the “gang of eight” package haven’t conducted a formal whip count, rather than that they need to change the bill to get over a filibuster hurdle.

The Senate Judiciary Committee approved the immigration package 13-5 on Tuesday, setting the stage for floor consideration after the Memorial Day recess. Chairman Patrick J. Leahy, D-Vt., discussed the immigration bill at a news conference on Friday in Vermont, The Associated Press reported.

Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., signaled Thursday that the immigration measure would be either the second or third legislative item on the Senate’s agenda for June. First, senators will resume consideration of the farm bill. Then, Reid said there may be time to turn to what he termed a “little energy bill” before tackling immigration.

That’s most likely a bipartisan energy efficiency measure drafted by Sens. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, and Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H. Reid did say no other controversial bills would hit the floor before the immigration package.

“I’m not going to do anything to interfere with the immigration bill,” Reid told reporters Thursday. “I’ve spent a lot of my legislative life dealing with this issue. For me it is an extremely important issue personally and each day that goes by I become more convinced.”

Humberto Sanchez contributed to this report.

http://blogs.rollcall.com/wgdb/menen...igration-bill/

Sen. Robert Menendez should have to notify Cities, Counties, States as well as International Travel destinations

If and when he is traveling within 50 miles of where any under age girls live; familys need time to get them behind locked doors

People have to be able to protect their children and need advance notice of his where abouts

by Ben Shapiro 24 May 2013, 3:32 PM PDT
breitbart.com



According to Sen. Robert Menendez (D-NJ), the so-called Gang of Eight’s immigration reform bill does not have enough votes at this point to pass the Senate.

Even though the bill has exited the Senate Judiciary Committee with a 13-5 vote, Menendez says that it will not receive 60 votes thanks to Republican opposition. “We don’t currently have 60 votes identified in the Senate,” Menendez told Univision. “We need to add more votes on the floor. That means that the community in your state, in every state, should be contacting your state’s two US Senators saying that they want comprehensive immigration reform, that they are going to judge their political future based on this vote.”

Several Republican senators have expressed support for debating the bill, but do not support the bill itself yet, including Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT) and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY). Menendez does believe that by the time of the Senate vote, which he said will take place just after July 4, the votes will be there. “I believe that in those three weeks we can get the necessary votes and we will have the community. We are expecting that and working for that.”

The goal, said Menendez, would be to pressure the House of Representatives to pass a version of the bill by creating widespread Senate support. “We want to push this bill forward with the most positive votes we can find, more than sixty, the sixty we need to be able to pass it here in the Senate, so we can put pressure on the House,” he explained. “Speaker Boehner, will have to decide how he will proceed.”

Menendez’s statements on Univision are no coincidence – the Democrats’ plan for 2014 is largely built on the notion that by creating bipartisan support for immigration reform in the Senate, then forcing the House to stop a soft-on-border-security bill, they will be able to generate public support for taking the House back for President Obama.

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Governm...gration-reform

Menendez told Univision. “We need to add more votes on the floor. That means that the community in your state, in every state, should be contacting your state’s two US Senators saying that they want comprehensive immigration reform, that they are going to judge their political future based on this vote.”

Time to hit the phones.