Posted on 06/07/2007 7:51:42 PM PDT by TornadoAlley3
As prospects dimmed on immigration legislation yesterday, senators from both parties started targeting scapegoats in a bid to limit the political backlash from a failure to pass the sweeping bill.
New opponents and roadblocks surfaced yesterday, threatening to tear apart the fragile, bipartisan coalition that has stayed intact for weeks.
But the biggest obstacle was the process. Republicans balked at initial Democratic efforts to limit debate and move to a final vote on the far-reaching bill, which would establish a process for 12 million illegal immigrants to win legal status.
Regardless of the outcome of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.’s) second bid to limit debate on the bill, which was scheduled after press time yesterday, final passage of the behemoth immigration bill remains a heavy lift. The measure has come under sustained attack from the base of both parties.
Mindful that Latinos will play a greater role in the 2008 elections, leaders from both parties yesterday traded sharp attacks to deflect blame from a key part of the electorate.
Reid and the Democrats sought to portray the failure as President Bush’s responsibility, pointing to a lack of Republican support for limiting debate even though reforming the nation’s immigration laws is a top priority for the White House.
“The headline is going to be: ‘The president fails again,’” Reid said.
But some Republicans said lobbying by Bush could only make things worse.
“With regards to the president on this issue, I hope he concentrates on the G8. His comments last week were not helpful,” said Senate Republican Whip Trent Lott of Mississippi, referring to Bush’s strong criticism of Republicans who call the bill “amnesty.”
But Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) pointed a finger at Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), echoing Democrats’ weeklong assertions that Republicans are stalling in an effort to kill the bill by procedural means.
“He wants a longer parade, he wants more and more floats,” said Durbin as he described McConnell’s repeated amendment requests.
After a cloture vote to limit debate yesterday failed by a decisive 63-33 vote, Reid said he would pull the bill from the floor if the Senate failed to invoke cloture a second time.
“It’s not our fault,” the majority leader argued on the Senate floor.
On their part, Republicans blamed Democrats for effectively killing the bill by not allowing for enough time to debate the complexities of immigration legislation.
To get the bill through the Senate, “it’s going to take more votes than you’d like to make,” McConnell shot back.
Failure to work through Republican concerns in a narrowly divided Senate “is the reason why this Congress to this point has a paltry list of accomplishments,” McConnell said, calling Reid’s move a “power grab.”
If cloture is not won as the weekend approaches, Reid could push immigration into next week or move on to the waiting energy bill and no-confidence vote on embattled Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. Reid has said that the immigration measure is unlikely to reemerge if this two-week run does not succeed, but anything is possible after a debate full of unexpected shifts and anti-climaxes.
Even as Republicans were pushing for more amendments to be considered, earlier yesterday some initial supporters were threatening to withdraw their backing if the Senate kept language adopted Wednesday to sunset a guest-worker program after five years.
That language was adopted after the Senate voted 49-48 to approve the amendment, which was authored by Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.). A key Republican negotiator, Jon Kyl of Arizona, said the bill was “off track” and the language needed to be stripped before final passage.
To complicate matters, four of Kyl’s Republican colleagues— who had initially opposed the Dorgan amendment — eventually voted for it in a bid to kill the underlying bill.
“This was the opportunity, if you couldn’t strip amnesty out of it, to say ‘No’ to the legislation,” said Elizabeth Dole (R) of North Carolina, who was joined by Republicans Mike Enzi of Wyoming, Jim DeMint of South Carolina, and Jim Bunning of Kentucky in switching her vote in favor of the Dorgan amendment.
An angry Lott lashed out at those Republicans, saying, “I don’t think that’s responsible.”
“I am embarrassed to say they were trying to kill the bill by passing that,” Lott said. “And I told them what I think of that. And I probably am going to tell them more later. In my opinion, I think that was not a good thing to do, period.”
Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.), who had originally opposed Dorgan to show “good faith” with the immigration negotiating team that he had helped lead before splitting from the final deal, also had harsh words.
After the bill moved rightward and several family-reunification changes he backed fell short, Menendez told The Hill “there was no need to continue to try to show more good faith.”
If cloture fails, Menendez said the bill’s fate would rest with the balance between senators who want it to collapse and those who want to continue the difficult process of compromise. But he warned: “The bill’s only getting worse, not better, with every amendment that passes.”
Meanwhile, outside interest groups on both ends kept working to bring down the legislation unless changes could be made to reflect their priorities.
The National Network for Immigrant & Refugee Rights sent members a bilingual alert calling for intensified grassroots lobbying against the bill, writing that “the so-called ‘grand bargain’ … contains many problematic provisions and does not respect the human rights of immigrants.”
The League of United Latin American Citizens, which had supported early work on the bill, wrote to 15 Democratic senators late Tuesday “after much debate, analysis and soul-searching,” asking them to oppose the bill as written and “join in totally re-crafting [it].” Four other Hispanic advocacy groups co-signed the letter.
For its part, the National Governors Association rapped the bill’s proposed use of “Real ID,” a national identification program plagued by controversy and delays, to verify all workers’ employment status.
Montana’s two Democratic senators, Max Baucus and Jon Tester, are pushing to strike Real ID from the bill, even though they had not won a vote as of press time.
Let the recriminations begin!
Blood on K Street!
I don’t think the two who wrote this have a clue about politics in this county. The first statement, “a bid to limit the political backlash from a failure to pass the sweeping bill,” demonstrates a basic ignorance that is stunning. They have no concept of what the backlash would be if the bill passes.
Oh? And from whence is this "backlash" to come?
Ohhhhhhhhh, yes. George Soros and his scum-under-the-sludge-at-the-bottom-of-the-barrel ilk.
Reiod must be even dumber than I formerly believed and thats tough. He is trying to blame this on Bush. Bush pushed this thing hard ,and he deservedly caught hell because of it ,then this Reid idiot is trying to sya its his fault for its failure.
hey-—Reid—You dipstick, you friggin idiot, It failed becasue the bill sucked. The American people told you they didnt want it and you buttwipes tried to shove it down our throats anyway.
Go back and make a real bill with real teeth and enforce US laws on the border and in the rest of the country like we elected you to do. Send illegals home and make them enter legally or not at all./
There have been to many decades of this nonsense.
Thank god for the Internet, now we can read bills ourselves!
I think there would have been a bigger backlash if this bill actually passed. What a mess.
"AMNESTY BILL FAILS -- "THE COUNTRY & REPUBLICAN PARTY IS SAVED FOR NOW!"
No kidding....if we build the wall, enforce ALL existing laws I’d be at least willing to look at some type of reform in some way, shape or form....but until then, fuggetaboutit
If Bush had his head screwed on right, he’d have pushed to close the border after 9/11 and cracked down on illegals, instead of trying to cram this amnesty down our throats in his lame duckness.
It wasn’t just a bad bill, it was incompetent politics.
I can't believe I'm actually happy about the 'accomplishments' of Reid on this. What a collection of jackasses we have in DC these days. The less they get accomplished, the better.
When they try to ramrod stupid laws like this “Gridlock” looks like the good old days.
Go ahead....make my day!
Or just enforce some laws...then we can talk. When you are down here in Texas and paying a fortune to educate the children of Mexico (which can certainly afford to educate its own kids) then one’s perspective is different. I won’t even get started on health care...
<< The first statement, “a bid to limit the political backlash from a failure to pass the sweeping bill,” demonstrates a basic ignorance that is stunning >>
They meant to say “limit the political backlash from the hispanic immigration rights groups and the open-borders business lobby.”
The MSM is only able to think in terms of ethnic blocks and interest groups. Average Americans don’t enter into their thinking.
that's what this has been all along... all i've heard from proponents is, "we've gotta do something... we've gotta do something." nobody, including Mr. President, explained why this particular bill was worthy of passage... just that we had to do something... anything...
The Libs and Rinos dodged a bullet here. They (the Rinos) believe that there will be a "backlash of Latino voters in '08."
That will be nothing like the one they will face from their non-Latino voters!!!
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