Immigration bill in doubt after vote

[CMF Newsman]

WASHINGTON - A fragile compromise that would legalize millions of unlawful immigrants risks coming unraveled after the Senate voted early Thursday to place a five-year limit on a program meant to provide U.S. employers with 200,000 temporary foreign workers annually.

The 49-48 vote came two weeks after the Senate, also by a one-vote margin, rejected the same amendment by Sen. Byron Dorgan (news, bio, voting record). The North Dakota Democrat says immigrants take many jobs Americans could fill.

The reversal dismayed backers of the immigration bill, which is supported by President Bush but loathed by many conservatives. Business interests and their congressional allies were already angry that the temporary worker program had been cut in half from its original 400,000-person-a-year target.

A five-year sunset, they said, could knock the legs from the precarious bipartisan coalition aligned with the White House. The Dorgan amendment "is a tremendous problem, but it's correctable," said Sen. Arlen Specter (news, bio, voting record), R-Pa. The coalition will try as early as Thursday to persuade at least one senator to help reverse the outcome yet again, he said.

story

[bernardjenkins]

The failures of Congress from 1986 are coming back to bite them on their ass. The 1986 amnesty bill was a lie. That legislation has been a betrayal. That bill promised there would be no further need for amnesty. Today we have 12-20 million illegal immigrations roaming our country in the "shadows." Congress has ignored their own 1986 immigration legislation by not enforcing the laws that they wrote.

Opposing view: It’s 1986 all over again
Amnesty, lax enforcement repeat mistakes of last immigration bill.
By David Vitter

In studying the immigration bill that was on the floor of the Senate, my overriding question was: Does it repeat the fatal mistakes of the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act? That bill was supposed to solve our illegal immigration problem once and for all. Instead, it quadrupled it — from more than 3 million illegal aliens in this country then to more than 12 million today.

Why? Two reasons. The '86 bill provided amnesty for millions here illegally and lacked strong enforcement. Those fatal flaws combined to create a magnet for more illegal border crossings with inadequate enforcement to stop them. Unfortunately, the latest bill repeats those fundamental mistakes.

Black's Law Dictionary defines amnesty as a "pardon extended by the government to a group or class of persons, usually for a political offense," and even gives the 1986 act as a textbook example. Again in this year's bill, the federal government would forgive an entire class of lawbreakers with the Z visa provision. As in 1986, they'd have to pay a few fines and take other modest action. But they would never have to leave the country or spend one day in jail.

Supporters of the bill argue that those who came to this country illegally would have to go to the back of the line before they could become citizens. But Z visas make a mockery of that assertion. It's hardly the back of the line to wait in this country and enjoy its benefits, while those at the front of the line wait for years outside our borders.

The current immigration bill has enforcement triggers that must be met before the Z visas are implemented. But this is highly misleading, too, because the triggers include only a fraction of the measures necessary to truly enforce the law. The trigger provisions are completely silent on critical elements, such as ensuring that visa holders leave the country when their visas expire and that we actually detain illegals we find.

In sum, this bill is amnesty with inadequate enforcement. How can we repeat the mistakes of '86 and expect different results?

[legaltender]

The answer, of course, is more indecision. Doing nothing is silent amnesty. If Congress stalls, illegal immigrants stay in the country without doing anything to resolve their status. And those millions - many of whom you can't locate - are not going to be rounded up and sent back.

[Deleted]

Why is it called immigration instead of invasion?

[bernardjenkins]

Maj. Leader Reid has pulled the Immigration Bill. The bill failed two cloture votes today,so this bill has been set aside.

[Warkitty]

Ask an American Indian what happens when unfettered immigration is allowed.

[tncoaster37]

Kitty, the fact is that we conquered them. It's usually the ones who have the most powerful guns that make the rules that the rest obey. It's an invasion at it's truly sense of the word. Kitty, there are groups that are demanding that the southwest return to mexico and will fight to do it. If that isn't an invasion and act of war then I don't know what is. They are using their numbers to force the US government to kiss thier ass in order to get what they want which is open borders for all just like the liberitarians want.

[Justin Thyme]

They are using their numbers to force the US government to kiss thier ass in order to get what they want which is open borders for all just like the liberitarians want.

So are you suggesting this is a Libertarian plot?

[Felix]

"Libertarian" seems to have flexible meanings depending on the poster. Coaster doesn't seem likely to debate the meaning of the word, he throws it in like "liberal," another word which more folks than Coaster use as a pejorative of adjustable definition.

The immigration question doesn't lend itself to simple answers, but opponents of the stalled bill on both extremes seem to gravitate towards such answers.

We are all immigrants or descendants of immigrants, so the debate ought to focus on means and ways to impose order on the process, and on the thornier issue of what to do about the millions of illegal immigrants already in this country. I don't think there is a Gordian knot sort of solution to the problem. Damned if I know what the answer is.

[Deleted]

The monks in Tibet charge visitors to their country $200 / day, so I hear. How about that for a solution?


No tipping, please.

[tncoaster37]

Marvell, have you been to thier meetings or read what they believe in. Yes, they do believe in open borders. They are for liberty for all to come in and take what they need from the USA.

I have been to more than a few of their meetings locally and find them to be very eliteists in nature. All of them have some form of college degree and look down on those who don't. I mentioned ways that they can raise money for thier projects and they tried to overtalk me and talk down to me just because I don't have a degree. Liberitarians can kiss my ass since all they do is talk, wants the big prize without going through the smaller seats of government. So you can take the liberitarians and shove them where the sun don't shine. As far as the immigration bill goes, it's a amnesty bill since it doesn't adddress the main problem and that is enforcing the laws on the books on these illegals.