WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama says he wants to make it easy for Congress to pass immigration reform. But with a Senate-approved bill stalled in the Republican-controlled House of Representatives, it’s become clear that reform legislation will likely get broken up into smaller pieces before moving forward.
And breaking reform into smaller bills is something the president can live with, his spokesman says.
It is unlikely that significant immigration reform will pass with only a few weeks of legislative activity left in 2013. Although critics say comprehensive reform won’t happen in 2014 – a mid-term election year — major immigration bills have been signed into law during election years.
“Just because we wait until an election year with an even number, doesn’t mean it’s dead,” said Alex Nowrasteh, an immigration policy expert at the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank. “History shows us why.”
The last three major immigration laws that improved the United States immigration system passed in 1986, 1990 and 1996 – all election years.
House Speaker John Boehner said he’s hopeful of bringing immigration reform to a vote, but not as currently detailed in the Senate bill. Democrats in the House recently introduced legislation that is similar to the bipartisan bill passed in the Senate by a vote of 68-32 on June 27. But it’s unlikely that the House version – sponsored by Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi — will get passed as a comprehensive bill.
“If Speaker Boehner doesn’t want to take up the Senate bill, he won’t take up the House [version] bill,“ said Mary Giovagnoli, director of the Immigration Policy Center, a research and policy wing of the non-profit American Immigration Council.
According to policy experts who have followed immigration legislation and bi-partisan efforts to pass it, pieces of the Senate plan are likely to be tackled in the House in a series of smaller bills pegged to specific issues.
“If it’s going to happen, it’s going to be broken up,” said Nowrasteh.
With House Republicans sticking to their guns, demanding more border security before considering legal status, it’s likely the first bill would deal with border-crossing issues. The McCaul-Jackson Lee “border security” bill could be considered soon since it has bi-partisan support, Giovagnoli said. It outlines a strategy to maintain operational control of the international borders.
A possible second bill that could be brought up for debate would deal with some aspect of legal status for those who have entered the country illegally. Many Democrats want to grant a pathway to citizenship for the nearly 12 million undocumented workers already in the United States. The Senate bill would do this under certain conditions.
Cato’s Nowrasteh said Republicans are not the party of ‘No’ on immigration, despite some outspoken members who are against many aspects of reform as defined by the bill approved in the Senate where Democrats have an edge.
“I won’t say it’s a majority, but you still have a solid amount of support with Republicans in the House,” said Nowrasteh. “There are 86 or so that say they want a path to citizenship or legalization – it’s not hopeless.”
A third piece of legislation, possibly linked with the second bill, would deal with the issue of work visas. As spelled out in the Senate immigration bill, the overhaul calls for changes in the existing employment-based visas that grant workers legal permanent status.
Breaking up the immigration bill is “sort of like rolling the dice,” Giovagnoli said, and some of these issues could get lumped back together.
“The most critical thing that has to happen is that each side is both willing to give and trust each other enough to take one vote that will be followed by another.”
Lawmakers and the public they represent need to see that immigration reform is possible — and the more bills that pass, the more confidence people could gain in the reform effort. With congressional approval in polls at an all-time low, enactment of an immigration bill would be seen as a sign that Congress can accomplish something.
“We’re going to get there,” said Giovagnoli. “If they can maneuver enough that they get something to a vote on the floor, and then it comes back as a comprehensive package, then at this point, that’s the end goal.”