Immigration on Deck for the Senate

When Congress returns to work next week, the Senate will likely tie itself into a knot trying to deal with the new immigration bill that a select group of Senators introduced on May 9, S. 1348, the Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act of 2007.
The small coalition of Senators who patched this together will have a hard time defending it from its critics in both parties.

The Republican Party is imploding over provisions that would legalize the status of the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants already in the US. They are labeling it an “amnesty” bill. Many Democrats are incensed about the guest worker program that provides no direct path to permanent residence and that focuses on employment needs over family needs. There are also interest groups that all seem to have a moral gripe with one provision or another. The only thing holding the bill together is a political need to advance the issues, but the devil is in the details, and there are many details in this bill.
For example, of particular interest to the adult education community is the language training that an immigrant could receive on the pathway to citizenship. As he did in last year’s immigration debate, Senator Lamar Alexander (R-TN) will likely offer an amendment that would allocate $500 for each "lawful immigrant" seeking citizenship to participate in English to Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) services. The $500 would come from the fees that each person would pay to gain citizenship and the funds could be used for ESOL programs provided by “accredited institutions of higher education or other qualified educational institutions (as determined by the chief).” This amendment, however, would likely create duplicative programs to ones already in the Adult Education and Family Literacy Act (AEFLA) and it would provide insufficient funding for those duplicative programs.
The bill has drawn so many criticisms that over 100 amendments to the measure have already been filed, and aides expect many more to be filed at the beginning of next week. It is unclear how Senate majority leader Harry Reid (NV) will manage them, but it is clear that immigration is quickly becoming an issue that will define the parties as they head into the 2008 election season.
Resources:
Beth Crowley, “Long List of Amendments Clouds Procedural Picture for Immigration Bill,” CongressNow, May 31, 2007.
Author: DAD