Republicans Squaring Off Over Bush Plan on Immigration

WASHINGTON, Jan. 26 - The battle within the Republican Party over immigration policy was joined Wednesday as President Bush vigorously promoted his proposal for a guest worker program and conservatives in Congress introduced an alternative proposal to tighten immigration restrictions.

At a news conference, President Bush said again that he considered his guest worker proposal "a priority" even though Senate Republicans left it off their list of top goals. "A program that enables people to come into our country in a legal way to work for a period of time, for jobs that Americans won't do, will help make it easier for us to secure our borders," Mr. Bush said, adding: "I know there is a compassionate, humane way to deal with this issue. I want to remind people that family values do not end at the Rio Grande border."

Party conservatives, however, have strenuously opposed a guest worker plan since Mr. Bush introduced the idea in 2001, even staging a losing revolt over its inclusion in the party platform at the 2004 Republican convention. Many conservatives call the president's ideas "amnesty" - a term Mr. Bush disputes - because his plan includes ways for currently illegal immigrants to obtain temporary worker permits.

On Wednesday afternoon, Representative F. James Sensenbrenner Jr., the Wisconsin Republican who is chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, again introduced a measure to block illegal immigrants from obtaining driver's licenses.

At a news conference, he said the committee would not consider other immigration proposals, implicitly including the president's, until his own measure passed. A similar measure was removed from a bill to enact the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission last year. Senator Jon Kyl, Republican of Arizona, is expected to introduce a driver's license restriction this year.

Mr. Sensenbrenner said his bill was primarily directed at border security, distinguishing it from other changes in immigration policy. "Immigrants are not terrorists, except a few of them," he said. "The legislation that was introduced today is designed to get the bad apples out of the barrel before the barrel was spoiled."

He said a group of House Republicans had written a letter to Mr. Bush urging him to provide full financing for provisions in last year's antiterrorism bill doubling the number of border patrol agents and tripling the number of beds for detaining illegal immigrants over the next five years. The Department of Homeland Security said recently that it was planning a smaller increase in financing, drawing the ire of advocates of tighter immigration laws.

Asked about the president's proposal, Mr. Sensenbrenner said his committee was "going to be plenty busy with other priorities, a lot of which are the priorities of the White House."

In an interview, Representative Chris Cannon, a Utah Republican who supports the president's plan, said a guest worker program would not amount to an amnesty because it would include a monetary penalty for currently illegal immigrants. "The people who want to kick them all out are not reasonable people," he said.

But Representative Tom Tancredo, Republican of Colorado and chairman of the Congressional immigration caucus, vowed to defeat any program that in his view would reward lawbreakers, even questioning the president's motives. "Could it be just the corporate interests, the money interests that rely so heavily on cheap labor?" he asked

You'd get a lot more traction if you would tone down your name calling and condescending attitude. I read your "about page" and you make some very sensible points about immigration - I think they're wrong, but still they are well written and appear to be well thought out.

You are right. I know this and in fact I have been trying to consider my word more carefully recently. a warning from the FR founder will do that, but I find myself frustrated when I encounter much of the 'logic' I read from the other side and it manifests itself in my writing. I sometimes throw my hands in the air and diplomacy out the window. I'm not proud of it but I enjoy the sinful pleasure of condescending name calling too much to stop just because I might actually change someone's mind. I consider you a better man for keeping your dispassionate and rational tone when posting.

In my business dealings I know you attract more bees with honey than vinegar, but at FR I like to argue and sometime the argument takes on a life of its own separate from ideology.

Thank you for your kind words regarding my writing. It is a higher compliment indeed considering you disagree with my opinion.

This isn't about being selfish, its about controlling our borders and protecting our country from the unfair trade practice of "dumping".

It's about supply and demand. Latin America has lots of workers - The USA has lots of jobs. Let them enter legally and the illegal immigration will subside. You want to protect the country then let's remove illegal workers from the roles of criminals and terrorist. If the demanded workers are allowed to enter legally then they will not need to enter illegally and we can focus our attention on the drug dealers and terrorist who also seek to enter the USA illegally. The right fringe lumps them all together as illegal immigrants. The drug dealers and terrorist are not stealing anyones job, but Sensenbrenner and Tancredo portray legislation to prevent illegal workers from getting drivers licenses as a method of stopping terrorism. It is not.

If their citizens want to immigrate to the United States, they should get in line along with everyone else.

That takes years and years. It is unrealistic and inhuman to expect starving and oppressed people to die before their application is even considered. IMO The alternative to loosening the immigration restrictions is to build a trade and tourism strangling fence with towers and armed storm troopers around the land of the free and the home of the brave. I find this a unnecessary and costly and freedom stifling option.

The solution to most illegal immigration is to enforce our existing laws. This has not been done in over 30 years. All legitimate businesses obey labor laws and pay taxes for their legal and illegal employees. They file an I-9 and W2 on the employee with the federal government. Both forms require a social security number. Our government will sometime catch a faulty number and inform the employer. The employer is required to let the employee resubmit the forms with the corrected SSN. The employer is not allowed to fire a employee for submitting an incorrect SSN. As I understand it these are federal directives. I have been told this by several HR administrators. Many employers know they are employing illegals but they have submitted all the proper forms are in compliance with the law. I do not want to give business the duty and responsibility to investigate legal status. I don't want some employer making assumptions and firing an employee because the employee is hispanic and he transposed 2 numbers in his SSN. It is the governments responsibility to enforce our laws not business.

The problem is that there are so many illegals in this country with jobs and families and ties to the community and so many businesses dependent on these workers that a massive exodus of illegals is certain to cause massive economic and human carnage.

I believe if we loosen the restrictions on immigration and find a way to allow law abiding and productive illegals to stay, the damage would be minimized. Then we can enforce the existing laws. They haven't been fully enforced in 30 years. IMO A year or 2 to iron out and implement Dubya's guest worker program with lots of announcement is sensible before cracking down on illegals who have not yet registered.

Mexico sure protects its southern border from illegal immigration - why do you think that is?

I don't think you can look at Mexico and America as equals. Nor do I wish to emulate them. Why do they let their sheriffs rape 13 year old girls? Do they know something we don't? Why do they shake down the wives of tourist who die in Mexico and want the body buried back home? Maybe we should look into that as a revenue generator.

Latin America doesn't have jobs. Mainly because they don't have government that will protect investors. I see nothing wrong with accepting workers who flee to the US.

My wife has a friend who believes anyone who makes less than $100,000 shouldn't be allowed to have children. I wonder who she thinks will be her child's nanny? The daughter of affluent parents? I extrapolate this argument with the "If businesses paid a higher wage Americans would take those jobs" argument. This is laughable. Most of the unemployed are unemployable. They are drug addicts, emotionally disturbed, physically handicapped or just plain lazy. If janitors made $20 an hour, everybody else's wages and salaries would rise to that level of inflation to negate the buying power of the higher wage.

I believe freedom makes America great. There are too many stories about uneducated immigrants or children of uneducated immigrants who fought our wars, developed new technology, and created or innovated business to believe immigrants destroy our culture. They envy us. They want to be us. They are not coming to America to destroy it.

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