I don't know if any of you have been watching it, but it looks like Schumer or Durbin will determine if this gets passed through Congress because of the amendment from Leahy. Read more I personally think they will vote for the amendment because of their constituency. This however, will kill the bill in Congress. Ted Cruz was probably correct when he said that Obama doesn't want immigration reform to pass. This is the Demo's best chance at retaining their Senate seats come 2014. It will interesting.
Judiciary adopts six amendments to tighten border By Alexander Bolton - 05/09/13 11:57 AM ET The Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday adopted six Republican amendments to immigration reform legislation to strengthen the border. One amendment sponsored by Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) adds the Senate and House Judiciary Committees to the list of bodies the secretary of Homeland Security must report to about the implementation of its border strategy. A second Grassley amendment requires annual audits of the Comprehensive Immigration Trust Fund. The audits must include a report from a certified public accountant, a balance sheet and a cash flow statement. An amendment sponsored by Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) directs the Citizen and Immigration Services Ombudsman to assist the victims of crimes committed by immigrants near the border. An amendment offered by Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) adds human trafficking to the list of violent crimes that must be reported by the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting Program. The committee also approved an amendment sponsored by Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) adding private land representatives to the Department of Homeland Security Oversight Task Force. A second Flake amendment establishes report deadlines of every 180 days and directs the comptroller general to review semi-annual reports and assess the progress of the Southern Border Security Strategy. Read more: http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-brief...ix-amendments-to-tighten-border#ixzz2Sop2OdUs Follow us: @thehill on Twitter | TheHill on Facebook
Senate panel vote signals GOP support for immigration reform By Alexander Bolton - 05/09/13 12:28 PM ET The Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday adopted a substitute amendment to immigration reform legislation with a strong bipartisan margin, signaling which Republicans are most likely to support the bill. Only four Republicans voted against the substitute amendment, which expands the legislation to 867 pages and increases funding for implementation of reform by $900 billion. It passed by a margin of 14-4. Sens. Chuck Grassley (Iowa), the ranking Republican on the panel, Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Mike Lee (R-Utah) voted against the substitute, which sponsors characterized as a bundle of technical fixes. Four Republicans on the panel voted for it: Sens. Orrin Hatch (Utah), Lindsey Graham (S.C.), John Cornyn (Texas) and Jeff Flake (Ariz.). Flake and Graham are members of the Gang of Eight, which crafted the bill. Hatch has been eyed as a possible Republican swing vote, and his vote Thursday showed he is more sympathetic to the legislation than some of his GOP colleagues. Cornyn’s vote was a surprising split with Cruz. Cornyn has voted in close alignment with the freshman senator this year, a pattern that political strategists attribute to the possibility that Cornyn could face a primary challenge when he runs for reelection in 2014. About an hour later, in another sign of bipartisan support for the underlying measure, the panel rejected a Republican proposal that would have required that the border be under effective control for six months before the nation's estimated 11 million illegal immigrants are given legal status. Graham and Flake voted with Democrats to defeat the proposal in a 12-6 vote. Grassley, who offered the amendment, said the bill as drafted does not require border security before granting provisional legal status to illegal immigrants. He said he offered the amendment to ensure the nation does not grant a blanket amnesty without securing the southern border, a mistake he says the nation made in 1986. “I think we’re entitled to make sure because we were so certain in 1986, and we screwed up,” he said. One of the biggest changes in the substitute amendment was that it would increase the funding allocated to implement the legislation from $100 million to $1 billion. “Our watchword here is to have this bill pay for itself. In other words, we do not want it to incur any costs to the taxpayer, the Treasury or anybody else. That will be a balance. It will be the costs of administering the E-Verify program and the exit-entry visa program, the costs of strengthening the border and the costs of just administering the new immigrants who will be coming here,” said Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), a member of the Gang of Eight and a sponsor of the substitute amendment. Grassley’s amendment would have applied border security strategies to the northern as well as the southern border. Republicans criticized the bill for not requiring operational border security before putting illegal immigrants on a pathway to citizenship. “I just want to make clear that there is no border security trigger currently in the bill and what Sen. Grassley’s proposal would [do is] impose an effective trigger to do what we all know needs to be done, and we want done, which is provide operational control of the border,” Cornyn said. Schumer said creating fully operational control of the entire southern border is virtually impossible, but security can be dramatically increased. “Does that mean if one radar is broken on one part of the border, that you can’t begin legalizing the people who are here?” said Schumer. “Operational control deals with having a person in each place,” said Schumer. “If you want to have the whole federal budget [spent on] border patrol, you could probably have 100-percent control.” Schumer said aerial drones could substantially increase border security by enabling law enforcement to pick up illegal immigrants after they’ve traveled as many as 50 miles into the United States. Earlier in the hearing, the panel approved six Republican-sponsored amendments to improve border security. The committee also approved on a bipartisan voice vote an amendment sponsored by Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) and Cornyn to block the creation of a land-border crossing fee. Read more: http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/...op-support-for-immigration-bill#ixzz2SopOQvgH Follow us: @thehill on Twitter | TheHill on Facebook
Link to every ammendment In Senate, Efforts to Reshape, or Derail, Immigration Bill By ASHLEY PARKER WASHINGTON — The Senate Judiciary Committee began considering on Thursday more than 300 amendments intended to reshape — and, in some cases, even derail — legislation to overhaul the nation’s immigration laws. Four of the bill’s authors — Senators Richard J. Durbin of Illinois, the No. 2 Senate Democrat, and Charles E. Schumer, Democrat of New York, along with Republican Senators Jeff Flake of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina — sit on the committee and have previously indicated they would band together to vote against any amendments they feel would undermine the core of the bill, which offers a path to citizenship for the 11 million undocumented immigrants already in the country, as well as implements stricter border security measures. But it remains unclear just what amendments group members would view as “poison pills,” intended to thwart the bill, and what amendments they would consider as good-faith improvements to their legislation. Mr. Schumer, in his opening statements, said, “We know there are many who want to kill this bill,” but urged his colleagues to “be constructive.” “This is our chance, in this hearing room, to write an immigration bill for the 21st century, for America and its future,” Mr. Durbin said. Senator Ted Cruz, Republican of Texas, in his opening remarks acknowledged that the Democratic majority had the power to vote down Republican amendments, but implored his colleagues to consider all measures with an open mind. “I am hopeful that the majority on this committee will work, as I trust it will, in good faith, to improve this bill and consider amendments that would make real changes,” Mr. Cruz said. Before noon on Thursday, the committee had adopted six Republican-sponsored measures, including one that requires the secretary of homeland security to report to the Senate and House Judiciary Committees on how the border security strategy is being implemented. Senator Patrick J. Leahy, Democrat of Vermont and the committee chairman, had planned for a marathon markup, as the process of adding amendments to legislation is known. In a move intended to head off criticism from opponents that the process is too rushed and not fully transparent, Mr. Leahy decided to make all the amendments available to the public by posting them on the committee’s Web site Tuesday night. As chairman, Mr. Leahy has wide discretion to manage the politically delicate process as senators formally introduce their amendments to be voted on by the committee. While Mr. Leahy has not yet defined all the procedures, he said senators should expect a series of intense all-day sessions, and that he hoped to finish work before the Congressional recess at the end of the month. On Thursday, the committee planned to work its way through the entirety of Title I of the bill, which focuses on border security. Senator Charles E. Grassley, Republican of Iowa, said he worried that the current bill is “legalization first and enforcement later.” “We need to work together to secure the border first,” said Mr. Grassley, the ranking Republican on the committee. “People don’t trust the enforcement of the law.” Mr. Grassley has offered 77 amendments, including one that was approved Thursday that would require continuous surveillance of 100 percent of the United States border and 90 percent effectiveness of enforcement of the entire border. Currently the 90 percent rate applies only to high-risk sectors of the border.
Ted Cruz: ‘Let me be clear, I want common-sense immigration reform to pass’ Thursday, May 9, 2013 As part of our comprehensive coverage of the immigration debate, Texas on the Potomac will publish the Texas senators’ opening statements at the Senate Judiciary Committee’s consideration of the bipartisan “Gang of Eight” immigration reform plan. This post is adapted from Texas Sen. Ted Cruz’s opening statement. I’d like to start out by thanking the Gang of Eight who have worked very hard on a complex issue and have put a great deal of time and energy into addressing it. Virtually everyone agrees the immigration system we have now is broken. I very much hope that we are embarking on what will prove to be a real markup that will improve this bill. The majority has the votes on this committee to vote down every minority amendment, virtually every minority amendment, if it so chooses. I hope the majority does not take that approach. We have seen that approach in prior instances and that is not an approach that, in my view, leads to passing a bill. Let me be clear: I want commonsense immigration reform to pass. I think the American people want it to pass, but they want it to pass in a way that fixes the problem and I am hopeful the majority on this committee will work, as I trust it will in good faith, to improve this bill and consider amendments that would make real changes to this bill. I have introduced three types of amendments that are important for improving this bill. The first, and we are considering a set of amendments today, addresses border security and, in my view, the bill has grave problems when it comes to border security. As currently drafted, the bill is essentially a plan to plan for the Department of Homeland Security and it contains toothless metrics which, in my judgment, would render it a virtual certainty that if this bill were passed a few years hence we would be having yet more hearings discussing why the border is still not secure and the problem of illegal immigration remains. I have introduced amendments and others have introduced amendments to put real teeth in the border security elements. I hope this committee will give those amendments serious considerations. Secondly, I have introduced a pair of amendments to improve legal immigration. In my view, the best elements of the Gang of Eight bill are the elements dealing with legal immigration and I think we should improve and streamline legal immigration. I’ve introduced one amendment to double the cap of legal immigration from 675,000 to 1.3 million. Another, to take the high-tech H1-B visas that are coming in and to increase them by 500%, from 65,000 to 325,000. I think we need to remain a nation that welcomes and embraces legal immigrants and in both regards my amendments go further to improving legal immigration than does the Gang of 8. And, finally I’ve introduced amendments to remove the path to citizenship for those who are here illegally and make them ineligible for means-tested government benefits. If those provisions are insisted upon, and the majority has the votes to insist on those provisions, it is likely to scuttle this bill and cause it to be voted down in the House of Representatives. I don’t want this bill to be voted down and I hope the stakeholders who want this bill to be passed will be interested in amendments to craft a bill that will pass and I look forward to working with the committee members in that process. -------------------- It looks like either the Demos will compromise or the bill will die. The ball is in the Demos court.
Ted Cruz has some good ideas and bad ideas. I agree with him that we should be raising the visa cap per year. The rest of his ideas are bad. No pathway to citizenship for people already here is bad because many of these people that he wants to forever exclude from our society are functioning Americans. There are hundreds of kids in the U.S. who have been here since babies, speak Spanish better than English, would much rather watch America kick ass on 24 than watch telenovelas, and know nothing first hand of their country of their birth. Ted Cruz would see these kids punished for really no good reason other than because they might vote Democrat. He would also punish the undocumented parents of US citizen children by preventing their parents from ever moving up the economic totem pole with secure legal status. I know this issue will never get any traction because it is too complex for a 30second sound bite, but to have someone who has personally benefitted from being born to a naturalized US citizen cuban father tell other immigrants that they need to get to the back of the line is hypocrisy at its most base and selfish. Cubans are the only group which enjoys a myriad of unfair benefits of a backward immigration policy which gives them status for no good reason other than simply being Cuban. There is no line for Cubans, they just show up and cut everyone. For Ted Cruz to personally take advantage of that benefit and then pull up the latter for everyone else is morally repugnant. Under our current immigration system, Cubans are given federally tested means benefits once they enter the U.S. simply to get them on their feet - they just have to show that they are Cuban. The fact that he wants an amendment that makes it so that people with RPI status will forever be ineligible for means tested benefits appears wrong given the benefits that were accorded to his family and people. Additionally, those getting RPI status were already ineligible under the current iteration of the bill so I have no idea why he is proposing a superfluous amendment. His push for border security does sound all nice an commonsense, but it is economically wasteful if it is intended to be a forward looking policy. If it is designed to be pork barrel spending for Texas then it does seem commonsense. The bill already sets aside 5 billion + for border enforcement. If his stated goal is to stop the problem of illegal immigration, that money would be better spent shoring up the economies of our southern neighbors. Illegal immigration is an economic issue first and foremost. You can raise the opportunity cost of coming to the US by spending ludicrous sums on border security, but that doesn't raise all boats and is only a stop-gap measure.
It is good to see that you are against something that made it into the bill at the behest of Republicans. Write Senators Cruz and Cornyn to urge them to change their minds on E-verify.
