Bush has choosen Big Business in this fight at his own peril. He will NOT succeed with this amnesty garbage at the expense of middle America!
Folks it ain’t over till it’s over:
Amnesty Horror II: It’s Baaaack
Senate Amnesty bill can be resurrected this week with expectations that it will pass:
WASHINGTON – A stalled measure to overhaul US immigration laws is “alive and well” and will come back for a vote after a lobbying effort by President Bush, said Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez and other supporters of the bill.
The legislation might be approved by the Senate in as little as two days if Harry Reid, the Senate majority leader, allows debate on the proposal to continue, Gutierrez said yesterday in an interview on CNN’s “Late Edition.”
“I believe the votes were there, and some senators felt like they needed more time,” Gutierrez said. “This is first and foremost a national security bill. The reality is the law is weak, and this bill makes the law stronger.”
Senator Kyl predicts bill will pass before July 4th:
Seven Republican senators voted to end debate on the immigration measure, with 38 against it. The issue is damaging the party, said Senator Jon Kyl, an Arizona Republican.
“It hurts greatly. There is no political winner in this for us,” Kyl told “Late Edition.” “Maybe we could get it to a neutral, but that’s not very good politics.”
Still, Kyl predicted that the measure would pass the Senate before July 4.
Looks like the fight is not over yet and we have more work to do. We may have pulled the stake out to soon.
From Polipundit:
“Kennedy Plea Was Last Gasp for Immigration Bill”
This article is terribly unflattering to Senator’s Kyl and Graham, both of whom need to be run out of office. More behind the scenes reporting,
Desperate to salvage a measure in which he and others had invested months, Senator Edward M. Kennedy headed to the secluded Capitol suite of Senator Harry Reid, the majority leader, to make one last personal plea.
Mr. Kennedy, an immigration advocate since his first days in the Senate nearly 45 years ago, hoped to persuade Mr. Reid to delay a procedural vote that could kill the measure. As the two met shortly after 7 p.m. on Thursday in the well-appointed office that overlooks the Mall, Mr. Reid told Mr. Kennedy, Democrat of Massachusetts, that Republicans would just endlessly stall the bill and that it was time to move on. Mr. Reid had already granted enough extensions.
Um, yeah, can’t we all agree that 44+ years in the Senate is enough for Uncle Teddy at this point? More,
The creation of the bill, too, was highly unorthodox. Even participants in the private negotiations that led to the so-called grand bargain say their very approach created problems, producing contentious legislation embraced by the participants but met with skepticism by other lawmakers, the public and groups like organized labor and conservative research organizations. “The chance to create meaningful immigration reform legislation was lost the moment the bill emerged from its closed-door meeting with an immediate path to amnesty for anywhere from 12 million to 20 million illegal immigrants,” Senator James M. Inhofe, Republican of Oklahoma, said in hailing the defeat of the bill.
“This agreement was reached between a handful of senators,” said Senator Jeff Bingaman of New Mexico, one of the Democrats who balked and voted against limiting debate. “That should not be considered a substitute for deliberation by the full Senate.”
“Highly unorthodox” is a euphemism for “trying to rush a pile of crap through without anyone noticing.” I enjoyed this:
The office of Mr. Reid, who had emphatically sought to hold Republicans accountable for sabotaging a presidential priority, distributed a document titled “Republicans Brought Down the Immigration Bill.”
It listed news reports and Republican statements that put the onus on the president’s party. “Last night, Republicans torpedoed comprehensive immigration reform,” the statement said.
Republicans fired back, saying Mr. Reid never embraced the bill and had, rather skillfully in some people’s opinion, set up Republicans to take the fall.
This just shows how clueless the political class is. This bill is wildly unpopular, yet none of these people want credit for ending it. Proving that beltway myopia and an addiction to praise from the liberal media and “bipartisanship” are terrible and often corrupting influences.
Aw, the dilligent public servant hard at work,
In the hours leading up to the collapse, Mr. Reid looked weary, with dark circles surrounding his eyes. As he walked back to the Senate floor at 4:30, his voice carried barely a trace of optimism. “We’ve done more than our share,” he said, pausing for a moment. “We’ve sent all the signals we can to get the president to help. It’s his bill.”
No bias there! More, turncoats and heros:
Mr. McConnell had his hands full, as well. Senator Jon Kyl of Arizona, the No. 3 Republican, was an architect of the compromise. Others, like Mr. Cornyn, were critical but professed willingness to consider the measure if it were revised. Some, like Senators Jeff Sessions of Alabama and Jim DeMint of South Carolina, saw little hope of repairing the plan. Mr. DeMint even objected to Republican amendments on Thursday on the floor.
As the meeting stretched on, party aides shot updates to Democratic members of the immigration coalition via BlackBerry devices. Officials said Mr. Reid also called Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina, to encourage him to come up with a finite list of amendments.
…
The outcome left many lawmakers frustrated. Mr. Kyl noted that senators mingled on the floor for more than an hour after the decision, “because there seemed to be a sense that it couldn’t end with that vote.”
Kyl and Graham can’t leave the Senate fast enough. Don’t worry, the President was hard at work trying to revive this abomination. Let’s hope he fails.
— The Ace