Beth Padgett
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Beth Padgett is editorial page editor of The Greenville News.

May 31, 2007:
Beth Padgett
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Beth Padgett is editorial page editor of The Greenville News.

May 31, 2007:
DeMint and Graham wrestle over immigration
http://news.greenvilleonline.com/blogs/padgett/
South Carolina's two U.S. senators are fighting over immigration. A big, very public fight.
No, no, they're not saying bad things about each other. I don't expect that. After all, Lindsey Graham and Jim DeMint agree on most issues. But when it comes to immigration reform, they're on opposite sides. Even more, each is playing a leadership role. Graham's a chief sponsor of the Bush-sanctioned immigration reform package that creates a pathway, although a slow one, to citizenship for many of the illegal immigrants in our country.
Now DeMint is promising to filibuster the bill. Graham's getting pats on the back from this state's business and agriculture leadership. By my count, DeMint's got most regular folks behind him. Read his guest column in tomorrow's newspaper. He defends his position well, ending with this paragraph:
Congress still has an opportunity to improve this bill, but we cannot pass a bill based on political promises alone. Americans are tired of their government offering only empty rhetoric. It is time we offered real solutions to this very real problem.
I think both of our senators are on to something, and I hope each prevails with the best of his ideas. Graham's right: We're not going to get political support to better secure our borders without some reasonable plan in place for dealing with the 12 million illegal immigrants in our country.
And DeMint has homed in on my biggest fear about the immigration reform package: We're asking the federal government to really mean it this time about cracking down on people entering our country illegally to look for work and the employers so eager to hire them.
Let's hope something emerges from Congress this year that stops the steady flow of illegal immigrants into our country and creates a sensible solution to dealing with the illegal people already here. It's only going to get worse if Congress and the president cannot approve an immigration reform package and then, more importantly, enforce it.
Posted by Beth Padgett at 12:23 PM |
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