Free Republic

"Comprehensive immigration reform," like virtually any initiative containing the magic word "comprehensive," looks good on the surface. But the details of the comprehensive immigration bill passed by the Senate in June by a 68-32 margin reveal a lot gone wrong underneath. Oblivious to this, top union leaders are gearing up for an all-out blitz this fall to secure passage of similar legislation in the Republican-controlled House of Representatives. Led by AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka (in photo), they are obsessed with providing 11 million or more persons living illegally in this country with amnesty and eventual citizenship, and with enabling millions...

McCain drops veil and all pretense, reveals self as complete traitor. Yes and Benedict Arnold was a war hero before he turned traitor too. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-07-25/mccain-ditches-combative-role-to-become-obama-senate-ally.html

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Architects of the Senate's immigration bill on Monday canceled a meeting that had been planned with business groups and other supporters to try to rally momentum for the legislation, in a sign of how difficult it will be to enact the reforms. Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer, Republican Senator John McCain and other members of the "Gang of Eight" that shepherded a sweeping immigration bill through the Senate want to enlist business, labor and religious groups to help persuade members of the House of Representatives to back reform. All members of the bipartisan group of senators except Republican...

Big Business, Senate Republicans and Democrats backing immigration reform have a target in their crosshairs: House Republicans. Senators like John McCain (R-Ariz), Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) met with tech giants such as Microsoft, Google and Intel, and pro reform groups like FWD.us to discuss a coordinated campaign to target more than 100 House Republicans on reforming the nation’s immigration laws when they are at home in their districts over the next month, according to sources familiar with the meeting. Graham suggested getting people to target Republicans at town hall meetings. Schumer said he wanted pastors giving sermons...

To save jobs in the Black community, Black Americans will march against amnesty for illegal aliens on July 15 in Washington, D.C. Buses are traveling from all over the U.S., as far away as from Florida in the South and from California in the West. Amnesty opponents of all races and colors will be participating. Yet are Democrats now starting to lose the Black vote? In open rebellion against the Democrat Party's agenda, the Black American Leadership Alliance will lead a rally and march on the U.S. Capitol at 9:30 AM on Monday, July 15, marching to demonstrate at the...

Until recently, Senator Marco Rubio of Florida had occupied something of a sweet spot in Republican politics: a favorite of the Tea Party but also trusted by the establishment wing of the G.O.P. Mr. Rubio’s embrace of comprehensive immigration reform, however, appears to have upset that delicate balance, and his support has slipped among the Republican base. The mention of his name drew boos at an anti-immigration reform Tea Party rally on Capitol Hill in mid-June, and recent public opinion surveys, taken amid the debate on immigration legislation, found his favorability rating falling and his standing in 2016 Republican primary...

Chad Pergram ✔ @ChadPergram Boehner: We have a broken #immigration system..We can't turn a blind eye and think it will go away. It's time for Congress to act. 4:48 PM - 8 Jul 2013 trolling from pro-amnesty forces via Greg Sargent. Although, is it really trolling if it’s true? I don’t doubt for a second that if Boehner allowed an up-or-down vote on the Senate bill, there’d be 20-30 Republicans willing to go all-in on amnesty with the entire Democratic caucus. The one and only thing stopping this from passing is John Boehner’s solemn promise that he won’t allow a...

Business interests want to expand the supply of cheap labor. Republican leaders want a magic bullet that’ll supposedly start to make them competitive again with Latino voters. No one but no one wants the party’s biggest young Latino star to have his presidential hopes dashed before he’s even begun to run — except of course for the handful of jerks like me who think lying bald-faced to your constituents on a key issue to get elected is a dealbreaker. It’s time for the Republican establishment to say, “Thanks, Marco.” Fox News viewers in Florida will see a new commercial in...

Ok House Republicans, especially you conservatives: It’s time for you to move on immigration reform. Our conservative Tea party hero Rubio has taken it half way delivering a bill in the Senate. Now it’s your turn. Our common sense conservatives McCain and Gramnesty (and Chuck Schumer) are warning you that their best friend Marco Rubio will not be able to win the White House unless you pass their immigration reform. We need to all pull together for him. He believes in the American Dream and he believes that the American Dream will make this work. He believes that the undocumented...

On Friday, President Obama took time out from his trip to Africa to call members of Senate’s so-called “Gang of Eight,” including Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL), to congratulate them on the immigration reform bill that passed the Senate on Thursday in a 68-32 vote. Obama was unable to actually reach Rubio. Obama also called Speaker of the House John Boehner (R-OH) to push him to take up the Senate’s immigration reform package.

Not unless House Republicans have completely taken leave of their senses, in which case, for the first time in my lifetime, talking about a new party won’t be crazy. As many flaws as the Gang’s bill has, we can never repeat too often that it is fundamentally misconceived in a manner that cannot be made right with a fence or even with improved interior enforcement, valuable as those things may be in their own right. The fundamental problem with the bill is what it does with legal immigration. Instead of reforming our Ted Kennedy-inspired, irrational 60s-era immigration regime, it perpetuates...

I had the opportunity very recently to have an extended conversation with a young gentleman who officially became a U.S. citizen just over a month ago. He claimed that he had always felt he “belonged here,” took the first opportunity to come to the U.S. presented to him and “never looked back.” He worked all sorts of jobs, traveled all over the country and met people from every socioeconomic sector and demographic. Coming from a country where the citizens have substantially less opportunity than in America and a more or less homogenous population, there were many things he still found...

Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, who has the most influence among conservative voters in Republican primaries, told Breitbart News on Tuesday that Sens. Marco Rubio (R-FL) and Kelly Ayotte (R-NH) should be primaried for their support of the Senate's immigration bill. “Conservatives are getting ready for the 2014 and 2016 primaries. We have long memories, and there will be consequences for those who break campaign promises and vote for this amnesty bill," Palin told Breitbart News. "Competition makes everyone work harder, be better, and be held accountable. This applies to politics, too. No one is ‘entitled’ to anything." She continued,...

Americans care about jobs, the economy, soaring health care costs, and taxes. Gun control is low on their list, but it’s very, very high on the Obama administration’s list of priorities. As Joe Biden promised, the White House did not stop campaigning for gun control even after its first effort went down in flames. Now, Vice President Joe Biden claims that he’s got the votes in the Senate to meet the 60 vote supermajority hurdle.

Under the Gang of 8’s backroom immigration deal with Senators Schumer, Corker and Hoeven, formerly illegal immigrants who are amnestied will be eligible to work, but will not be eligible for ObamaCare. Employers who would be required to pay as much as a $3,000 penalty for most employees who receive an ObamaCare healthcare “exchange” subsidy, would not have to pay the penalty if they hire amnestied immigrants. Consequently, employers would have a significant incentive to hire or retain amnestied immigrants, rather than current citizens, including those who have recently achieved citizenship via the current naturalization process. The issue is really...

No wonder Janet Napolitano supports the latest evolution of the Gang-of-Eight's immigration reform legislation; it specifically gives her the unilateral authority to ignore the key border security provisions.Late last Friday, Napolitano issued the following statement of supportfor the border security amendment offered by Republican Senators John Hoeven (ND) and Bob Corker (TN):"The president has made clear that commonsense immigration reform legislation must include measures to strengthen border security, create a path to earned citizenship, crack down on employers that hire undocumented workers, and streamline our legal immigration system so everyone is playing by the same set of rules.  The border...

Just like they did with Obamacare, some in Congress intend to “Pelosi” the amnesty bill. They’ll pass it in order to find out what’s in it. And just like the unpopular, unaffordable Obamacare disaster, this pandering, rewarding-the-rule-breakers, still-no-border-security, special-interests-ridden, 24-lb disaster of a bill is not supported by informed Americans. I am an ardent supporter of legal immigration. I’m proud that our country is so desirable that it has been a melting pot making a diverse people united as the most exceptional nation on earth for over two centuries. But I join every American with an ounce of common sense...

With every single Senate Democrat on board, theyn only need 7 republican votes to get to 60. By count they have them and then some. Am I a missing anyone? 1-4) The gang of 8 a-holes. 5) Kirk - IL 6) Ayotte - NH 7) Alexander - TN 8) Corker - TN 9) Hoeven - ND 10) Graham - SC 11) Murkowski - AK

One of the things I learned from Obamacare was that each section of the law could take many hours to understand because of cross-references to other sections and other laws. Amendments make the problem even greater. Put that problem into a 1000+ page bill, and it is almost impossible to uncover all the mischief — intentional and unintentional — buried in the language, something we are learning after the fact with Obamacare. The rush to pass the Gang of 8 1000+ page bill is another example. As if that weren’t bad enough to start, Sen. Bob Corker last night unveiled...

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Boehner: "I have no intention of putting a bill on the floor that will violate the principles of our majority and divide our conference."WASHINGTON – Sen. Bob Menendez expressed displeasure Tuesday over House Speaker John Boehner’s decision to withhold consideration of any immigration reform measure that doesn’t have the support of the majority of the Republican caucus. Menendez (D-N.J.), a member of the Gang of Eight, a bipartisan group of upper-chamber lawmakers who have pieced together a delicate immigration compromise, questioned Boehner’s seriousness about addressing the issue “if he is willing to put tea party politics ahead of the will...

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) said late Tuesday that he supports securing the United States border with Mexico with a double-tiered fence but voted against an amendment to the “Gang of Eight” immigration bill that would have required exactly that. Rubio and his fellow Gang of Eight Republicans helped the Democrats kill an amendment from Sen. John Thune (R-SD) that would have required the double-tiered fence be built, as current law requires, before amnesty was granted to America’s at least 11 million illegal immigrants. The only other Republican to vote against the amendment was Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK). “I support Senator...

Senators on Tuesday rejected building the 700 miles of double-tier border fencing Congress authorized just seven years ago, with a majority of the Senate saying they didn’t want to delay granting illegal immigrants legal status while the fence was being built. The 54-39 vote to reject the fence shows the core of the immigration deal is holding. The vote broke mostly along party lines, though five Republicans, including Sen. Marco Rubio and the rest of the bill’s authors, voted against the fence, and two Democrats voted for it.

Monday, June 17, 2013 Coming to America Posted by Daniel Greenfield @ the Sultan Knish blog How does one define a nation? That is truly the fundamental question of amnesty. The libertarian argument in favor of amnesty comes down to the question of whether nations even necessary at all. If the only characteristic that matters is freedom then borders and the other vestiges of nationhood only interfere with the flow of the free market. America then becomes a set of ideas and its only usefulness is as a space for harboring those ideas. This ideological definition of a nation demands...

The White House is playing a larger role in developing the Gang of Eight’s immigration bill than its supporters publicly admit, according to a forthcoming article in The New Yorker. “‘No decisions are being made without talking to us about it,’ the official said of the Gang of Eight negotiations … ‘This does not fly if we’re not O.K. with it,’” a senior Obama official told author Ryan Lizza for the pending article. White House officials also believe the emerging bill will be a huge success for President Barack Obama.

Politico’s Playbook has an excerpt from a new Ryan Lizza piece from the New Yorker that is not yet online. It contains a passage on the back-and-forth between labor and the Chamber that has a quote from a Rubio staffer that is going to raise eyebrows, to say the least: “There are American workers who, for lack of a better term, can’t cut it. There shouldn’t be a presumption that every American worker is a star performer. There are people who just can’t get it, can’t do it, don’t want to do it. And so you can’t obviously discuss that...

Karl Rove's recollection of the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act ("Immigration Reform and the Hispanic Vote," op-ed, June 6) is, shall we say, highly selective. That law, he writes, "essentially told those here illegally that if they had arrived in the U.S. prior to 1982 and wanted to become citizens, simply raise your right hand." He asserts that the Gang of Eight bill is different because it "has plenty of penalties and hurdles for those here illegally who seek citizenship." Well, I was there in '86. I read that bill carefully. (We did that back then.) And I can...

What to make of this?  I'll raise a few theories below, but here's the Washington Post's Greg Sargent on supposed internal conflict within the 'Gang of Eight:' Republican and Democratic senators in the “gang of eight” immigration reform group gave Marco Rubio an earful at a private meeting this week, telling him they were frustrated with his public embrace of overly conservative border security measures and his failure to adequately communicate with them over strategy, which they said was putting reform at risk, I’m told. The details of the private meeting on Wednesday – which were shared with me by a source familiar...

That brings us back to Senator Rubio. Is he being played or is he playing us? Contrary to the Americans for Conservative Reform advertisement in which he appears, the law does not prohibit illegals from getting benefits. Sure, some welfare benefits will be excluded as will, though it is debatable, Obamacare, but a sizable portion of entitlement benefits actually flow through tax credits in the tax code that these immigrants would get. Contrary to the advertisement, the law does not secure the border in any meaningful way, in fact the “border security on steroids” as the ad claims does not...

As a long time Senator from the border state of Arizona, John McCain knows all too well the immense negative ramifications that illegal immigration has had on his state. Still, today, as the Senate held discussions on the controversial ‘Gang of Eight’ immigration bill, one that both he and his fellow Arizona Senator Jeff Flake support and developed, McCain accidentally let the cat out of the bag. Though he meant to say “the rest of this legislation”, he clearly stated “path to citizenship” before realizing he revealed a truth that he meant to hide. Watch. (VIDEO-AT-LINK)

Welcome to Opposite World again. As the U.S. Senate geared up yesterday for the Gang of Eight illegal alien amnesty bill debate, President Obama goaded Capitol Hill to pass what he called “smarter enforcement, a pathway to earned citizenship and improvements to the legal system” of immigration. Bullcrap. The White House has already bulldozed a traffic-jammed superhighway for immigration law-breakers by executive fiat. Obama and his open-borders pals pay lip service to fairness and the rule of law for the cameras. But behind closed doors and beyond the reach of public accountability, they’ve already paved the way for mass deportation...

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell endorsed a modest amendment to the “Gang of Eight” immigration bill Tuesday, a move that could set the stage for a major concession by the Kentucky Republican and his party on the far-reaching and relatively unpopular bill. Although Nevada Sen. Harry Reid, the Senate’s majority leader, called the amendment offered by Texas Republican Sen. John Cornyn a “poison pill,” a major opponent of the bill dismissed Reid’s description as posturing to help Republicans portray it as a major improvement to the bill. Cornyn’s amendment, which McConnell promoted at a 2:15 press conference Tuesday, would require...

WASHINGTON, June 11, 2013 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- On Monday, July 15th the Black American Leadership Alliance (BALA) will host a march and rally on the National Mall called the DC March for Jobs. The purpose of the march is to oppose all forms of amnesty, to protect American jobs for American workers. The BALA and participants will march to the steps of the Capitol to petition Congress, the Gang of Eight and the Congressional Black Caucus, demanding that they protect black labor by opposing amnesty and halting efforts to double legal immigration levels, as required under the bill. The U.S. Commission...

(CNSNews.com) - In his prepared text for a speech he is delivering today at the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference and Latino Partnership for Conservative Principles, Sen. Rand Paul (R.-Ky.) said to illegal aliens who want to live and work in the United States: “[W]e will find a place for you.” Paul also said he envisions today’s illegal aliens becoming additional “taxpayers.” “Imagine 12 million people who are already here coming out of the shadows to become new taxpayers,” said Paul. Illegal aliens working in the United States today are not exempted from complying with the nation's tax laws anymore...

To say that there is disgust growing in the ranks is an understatement. If adults who broke the law to come here illegally get citizenship, it will be a spit in the face of millions of legal immigrants who followed the rules, and many millions more who wait patiently on the other side of the oceans and borders. It will sent a message of lawlessness which will encourage more lawlessness. Marco Rubio and others are imploding the party to achieve Chuck Schumer’s dream Mickey Kaus in The Daily Caller, Wake Up!: If the conservative public were paying attention, the flaws...

Sen. Marco Rubio said Friday that illegal immigrants will get legal status no matter what happens with border security, but said the Senate will have to stiffen enforcement in order to win the 60 votes needed to pass his bill through his chamber. “Nobody is talking here about preventing legalization. Legalization will take place,” Mr. Rubio told Univision in an interview scheduled to air Sunday. “First comes legalization, then comes this border security measure and then comes the permanent residency process. What we are talking about here is the permanent residency system,” the Florida Republican said, according to the English...

Grover Norquist of Americans for Tax Reform does not think much of the Heritage Foundation’s recent projection of the total cost of amnesty. Heritage figured a taxpayer cost of about $6 trillion over the next 50 years. Norquist takes many issues with this figure, including some that aren’t really problems with the report itself – for example, he criticizes the way other people have presented its conclusions when describing it, and unfairly asserts that the time frame of 50 years was somehow hidden by the authors. In truth, the Heritage researchers were very clear about the time frame, and about...

A high-ranking senate aide told Breitbart News on Wednesday that Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) is searching for an escape hatch from the “Gang of Eight” immigration bill. “Rubio and his staff are trying to get out of the Gang of Eight,” the aide said. “They’re looking to use other Republican members as their parachute to get out.” Rubio has laid some of the groundwork toward walking away from the Gang of Eight already, but has not made a public move towards doing so. On Monday, he said the bill does not have the 60 votes required to pass it out...

The Gang of Eight can't defend the Gang's own amnesty bill, S.744, or even explain it to public or TV audiences. The Gang's premier salesman, Senator Marco Rubio, admits that it isn't acceptable in its present form and must be amended on the Senate floor. Public opinion surveys show that the American people want the border secured and current laws enforced before we even discuss amnesty. The Gang's promise that amnestied aliens must pay back taxes is a fraud because neither aliens nor employers have documentation for the years the illegal was paid in cash. The Gang of Eight bill...

One of the many sad signs of our times is the way current immigration issues are discussed. A hundred years ago, the immigration controversies of that era were discussed in the context of innumerable facts about particular immigrant groups. Many of those facts were published in a huge, multi-volume 1911 study by a commission headed by Senator William P. Dillingham. That and other studies of the time presented hard data on such things as which groups' children were doing well in school and which were not; which groups had high crime rates or high rates of alcoholism, and which groups...

The bill created in secret by the Gang of Eight is an outrageous betrayal of American workers, both high-skilled and low-skilled. Claiming it is bipartisan, the drafters were Democrats and globalist Republicans. Economics 101 teaches that prices of products and wages go up when there is a shortage and go down when there is an ample supply of whatever. But funny thing, a consortium of billionaire oligarchs and high paid lobbyists have defied those axioms by rejecting U.S. STEM college graduates (science, technology, engineering or math) and then crying about shortages. Half of American STEM graduates are not currently hired...

Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) on Sunday proposed a new bipartisan “Gang of Eight” to draft a bill to create guidelines for future investigations of media leaks by the government. “I proposed along with [Sen.] Lindsey Graham [R-S.C.], we’ll be announcing that we have four Democrats, four Republicans, another Gang of Eight,” said Schumer on CBS’s Face the Nation. “I love these gangs of eight I guess.” Schumer said the bipartisan group will “introduce “legislation that sets up rules where… if the government wants to go to a member of the press and say you have to divulge your sources and...

That Gang of 8 thing may not have been such a shoe-in after all. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) has come back to report that, despite having sailed through the Judiciary Committee and garnering the support of at least four Republicans, they may still be coming up short.. “We don’t currently have 60 votes identified in the Senate,” Menendez said in an interview with Univision. “We need to add more votes on the floor. That means that the community in your state, in every state, should be contacting your state’s two U.S. Senators saying that they want comprehensive immigration reform, that they...

Sen. Robert Menendez (Dem-NJ) said Friday that the “Gang of Eight” immigration bill doesn’t have enough votes to pass the Senate. The bill won approval from the Senate Judiciary Committee in a 13-5 vote, but Menendez said it lacks the 60 votes necessary to clear the Senate — despite the bill's four Republican co-sponsors. “We don’t currently have 60 votes identified in the Senate,” Menendez said in an interview with the latino channel--Univision. “We need to add more votes on the floor. That means that the community in your state, in every state, should be contacting your state’s two U.S....

According to Sen. Robert Menendez (D-NJ), the so-called Gang of Eight’s immigration reform bill does not have enough votes at this point to pass the Senate. Even though the bill has exited the Senate Judiciary Committee with a 13-5 vote, Menendez says that it will not receive 60 votes thanks to Republican opposition. “We don’t currently have 60 votes identified in the Senate,” Menendez told Univision. “We need to add more votes on the floor. That means that the community in your state, in every state, should be contacting your state’s two US Senators saying that they want comprehensive immigration...

Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) said Friday that the “Gang of Eight” immigration bill doesn’t have enough votes to pass the Senate. The bill won approval from the Senate Judiciary Committee in a 13-5 vote, but Menendez said it lacks the 60 votes necessary to clear the Senate — despite the bill's four Republican co-sponsors. “We don’t currently have 60 votes identified in the Senate,” Menendez said in an interview with Univision. “We need to add more votes on the floor. That means that the community in your state, in every state, should be contacting your state’s two U.S. Senators saying...

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) on Tuesday said he would not try to block immigration reform from reaching the floor despite the opposition of some conservative leaders. The green light from McConnell is a promising development for the 800-plus-page bill from the Gang of Eight that was unveiled at the beginning of the month. While McConnell stopped short of pledging his support for the legislation, he praised the Gang of Eight’s work and said he is “hopeful” of passing a comprehensive immigration fix through the Senate. “The status quo is not good, the current situation is not good,” McConnell...

Over 150 conservative leaders, groups and grassroots activists have signed an open letter opposing the Senate immigration reform bill. “We write to express our serious concerns regarding the Gang of Eight’s immigration bill, S. 744. We oppose this bill and urge you to vote against it when it comes to the Senate floor,” the letter to be released Tuesday and obtained by The Daily Caller reads. ”No matter how well intentioned, the Schumer-Rubio bill suffers from fundamental design flaws that make it unsalvageable. Many of us support various parts of the legislation, but the overall package is so unsatisfactory that...

EVERSON, WA, May 20, 2013 (LifeSiteNews.com) – A 31-year-old illegal immigrant raped a preteen girl in Washington State last June, then took her to Planned Parenthood two months later to cover his crime. According to reports, last June, Luis Gonzalez-Jose approached the young girl as her mother was taking a shower and asked "if it was OK to have a baby with him." After she said no, he stripped the girl and raped her on the spot. In August, he took the pregnant girl to a Planned Parenthood and forced her to abort their child. She told employees she had...

The Senate immigration bill’s authors acknowledged Tuesday that their legislation does not require illegal immigrants to pay all back taxes, saying it would be too difficult to make them ante up everything they might owe. Sen. Charles E. Schumer, the New York Democrat who is chief sponsor of the bill, said illegal immigrants by definition are living in the shadows, and requiring them to reconstruct their pay history could be tough — and potentially keep many of them from legalization. “We all realize that the system is broken. We all realize that people did wrong things. And the goal is...