Maybe comprehensive immigration legislation would move along faster if those working on it took Washington game-playing literally and got themselves a handful of "full speed ahead" cards.
Four years of efforts to get a major immigration bill moving already bring to mind the classic card game called Mille Bornes, in which players try to be the first to accumulate cards totaling 1,000 miles.
Along the way, opposing players try to slow each other by slapping down "hazard" cards, such as flat tires, stop signs and speed limits. Once a player has been stopped or slowed, she needs a corresponding repair or a "go" card to resume racking up mileage.
From a Mille Bornes perspective, President George W. Bush dealt the deck of cards in the summer of 2001, when he proposed a guest worker program and a way for immigrants already here without authorization to legalize their status.
The changed priorities in Washington after the September 2001 terrorist attacks suspended any movement on the subject for two years. Then, advocacy organizations started raising their concerns, most notably with the Immigrant Workers Freedom Ride, a cross-country mobilization campaign in September 2003.
In January 2004 Bush gave a major speech about fixing problems with the immigration system. Players began moving their cards once again.
Though Bush said immigration legislation is of the highest priority, the White House has never put forward more than broad principles to define what he means.
In lieu of such guidance, there have been a handful of smaller immigration-related bills introduced in Congress, moving the issue along in fits and starts.
The Agricultural Job Opportunity, Benefits and Security Act, known as AgJOBS, which would help several hundred thousand farmworkers legalize their status, and the Development Relief and Education for Alien Minors Act, known as the DREAM Act, which would open the door to in-state college tuition and legalization for some minors who are here illegally, languished through the last session of Congress. AgJOBS has been reintroduced this session, with no sign of movement.
Other bills would give some due process rights to people in immigration proceedings and would make involvement in gangs a crime for which long-term legal residents could be deported.
The Real ID Act became law in May with no public hearings or floor debate when it was attached to an appropriations bill for the Iraq War. Among other things, it sets nationwide standards for states to verify that driver's licenses are issued only to legal residents and makes it more difficult for asylum applicants to prove their need for asylum.
This May the first comprehensive immigration legislation surfaced, and a second bill soon followed.
When the Senate Judiciary Committee announced a July 26 hearing with witnesses including the secretaries of Homeland Security and Labor, it looked as though the effort to pass a comprehensive reform bill had finally drawn a handful of "right of way," "go" and "end of speed limit" cards.
Heading into the hearing, many of the interest groups that focus on immigration, including the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, weighed in with support for one or another of the bills.
In testimony submitted to the committee, Bishop Gerald R. Barnes of San Bernardino, chairman of the bishops' migration committee, outlined the church's approach to immigration policy and encouraged the passage of the Secure America and Orderly Immigration Act. The bill is co-sponsored by Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., and House members from both parties.
"It most closely comports with the policy recommendations outlined in my testimony," Bishop Barnes said. "While it does not contain all of our recommendations, it includes major changes ... which we believe are necessary to repair the broken U.S. immigration system."
He also said Congress should address how U.S. economic and trade policies affect workers in Mexico and Central America; pass the DREAM Act and AgJOBS; re-examine immigration enforcement policy; and deal with backlogs in the current legal immigration system.
The bishop's testimony came soon after the USCCB launched its Justice for Immigrants campaign to encourage legislation and policies that are in line with church teaching and to educate Catholics and the general public about the moral and human rights issues of immigration.
Others endorsing the McCain-Kennedy bill include the U.S. Jesuit Conference, Jesuit Refugee Service, the National Immigration Forum, various unions including the United Farm Workers, and business interests including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and associations of restaurant, hotel and health care employers.
Kennedy, McCain and the sponsors of the second comprehensive bill, Sens. John Kyl, R-Ariz. and John Cornyn, R-Texas, all testified at the July 26 hearing.
But Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff and Labor Secretary Elaine Chao canceled at the last minute and did not send representatives or the long-hoped-for guidance from the administration. Speed limit and flat tire cards seemed to have landed atop all the player's hands.
While the hearing proceeded without the administration witnesses, Judiciary chairman Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., made it clear he was disappointed.
"I want to hear what their program is," Specter told reporters after the hearing. "I want to know what the president would like to accomplish."
Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., ranking minority member of the committee, said he was "particularly disappointed in the administration's cancellation of Secretary Chertoff's appearance. Members of the committee would have benefited from engaging in a discussion with him on the various approaches to comprehensive reform."
At a White House press briefing two days later, spokesman Scott McClellan told reporters that, "at this point, we have really just begun some of the intensive consultations with members of Congress about moving forward on a comprehensive piece of legislation."
That last hand of Mille Bornes cards must have been heavy on speed-limit cards after all. ---CNS |