Washington – Legislation that would dramatically reshape the nation’s immigration laws returns to the Senate’s priority list next week, with lawmakers pressing to pass a bill by month’s end.
A bipartisan agreement announced Thursday by Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., and Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., allows the measure to move forward.
Senators will start debate as early as Monday on a bill that would create a temporary- worker program, stiffen penalties for employers who hire undocumented workers, and allow millions of illegal immigrants to apply for citizenship.
It’s the same legislation senators planned to consider before Easter, when a disagreement between Republican and Democratic leaders derailed it.
Whether immigration reform will reach President Bush’s desk this year isn’t clear. The Senate bill as written would run into fierce objection from many Republicans in the House who oppose any legal status for illegal immigrants.
“By caving in to the Democrats this morning, Bill Frist pushed the Senate towards the biggest illegal-alien amnesty in American history,” said Rep. Tom Tancredo, R-Colo., the leader of those Republicans. “It is a sad day for legal immigrants who embrace this country by following our laws, and it is a sad day for all Americans who are concerned about our national and economic security.”
President Bush supports many aspects of the bill.
“We congratulate the Senate on reaching this agreement, and we look forward to passage of a bill before Memorial Day,” said Blair Jones, a White House spokesman.
Sen. Ken Salazar, D-Colo., supports the legislation, saying comprehensive and fair reform is needed. Sen. Wayne Allard, R-Colo., opposes it, believing it gives amnesty to lawbreakers.
The bill would create a three-tier system for illegal immigrants seeking to stay in the country. People who could prove they have been here five or more years could apply for citizenship. Those who have lived here two to five years could stay as guest workers and later apply for citizenship.
Illegal immigrants here for less than two years would be required to leave.
Under the deal announced Thursday, senators can offer amendments to the bill, although Frist and Reid have not yet agreed on how many can be added. That was one of the issues that led to the bill’s demise last month.
The pact reached Thursday also centers on how the bill – if passed by the Senate – would be merged with one approved by the House in December. That bill does not include a guest-worker plan or a path to citizenship. It would increase penalties for staying in the country illegally, build fences along stretches of the U.S.-Mexico border and ramp up border enforcement.
Frist and Reid agreed on the composition of a conference committee that would be formed to merge Senate and House immigration bills. From the Senate, the panel would have 14 Republicans and 12 Democrats.
Reid wants Salazar to be one of the senators who would negotiate with the House, The Associated Press reported Thursday night. Salazar spokesman Drew Nannis said the senator has not been contacted.
Reid had stalled a vote on the bill before Easter, in part because he feared Republicans in the conference committee would yank out guest-worker and citizenship provisions.
Tancredo said he fears that the deal allows Frist to put enough Republicans favoring those provisions on the committee that the merged bill would include legal status for illegal immigrants.
Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, is among at least three Republicans who oppose those provisions and will sit on the conference committee. It will also include Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., a backer of a guest- worker program.
“My focus will remain on fighting for stronger border security, interior enforcement, employer verification and reform that brings the current illegal population into compliance with the law,” Cornyn said.
The Frist-Reid agreement, which also involved other powerful Republican senators, includes a plan to meet with House leaders before the conference committee gathers, to try to agree in advance on aspects of a merged bill. But Cornyn spokesman Don Stewart said the House “won’t agree to something with amnesty.”
The entrenched position of many in the House led one political analyst to predict doom for immigration reform, at least before the November election.
“It could happen, but the odds are strongly against getting a bill out (of conference committee),” said Norman Ornstein with American Enterprise Institute, a Washington think tank. “Republicans are frightened of doing anything that turns off their base.”
