Senate Republicans hold up Dream Act (Massive Amnesty) for children of immigrants

Washington Post ^ | 9/22/2010 | Shankar Vedantam

[tobyhill]

Republican lawmakers on Tuesday stalled a Senate measure to allow children of undocumented immigrants to get on a path to citizenship, and accused the Obama administration of seeking amnesty for illegal immigrants through administrative changes within the Department of Homeland Security.

The Dream Act, which would grant permanent residency to immigrants who were brought to the United States as children and who have completed some time in college or in the armed forces has been a sought-after goal for Democrats, who attached the measure to an important defense spending bill. Republicans used a procedural vote to block the bill. Immigration advocates accused Republicans of sacrificing the well-being of thousands of young people to cater to nativist sentiment.

Brent Wilkes, national executive director of the League of United Latin American Citizens, said the vote showed that the Republican party had "once again proven that when Latinos need support, they support a different constituency even when the constituency they are supporting does not have a dog in the fight. If my kids are legal and they are going to college, why would I want to stick it to my neighbor's kids?"

[LibLieSlayer]

I do not care if you are a latino or an El Camino... if you are here illegally... I want you the hell out of my country. If you latinos side with our enemies... you will become our enemies. That did not work out well for you last time. You want to be a citizen... do it the right way or take the highway south.

LLS

[Ronin]

Typical Washington Compost style writing.

No bias here, right? /sarc

[cripplecreek]

Everybody has to start somewhere.

[wolfpat]

I disagree with the college part, but if they want to do a complete tour of duty in the American military, then I would favor citizenship.

[wita]

Amnesty in any form, is still amnesty. Break the law, and win big is not a founding principle. IMHO anyone pushing such is worthy of a treason trial. Over half the congress is pushing this idea. That says a lot about those who are elected to serve their constituents and protect the country.

Remaining comments self censored.

[central_va]

I wonder how much the Demolition Party would be in favor of illegal immigration if the Northern border was overflowing with white people coming in illegally and becoming conservatives and assimilating in a “white” way?

[hal ogen]

The “dream act” is misnamed. Shouldn’t it be the “nightmare act”?

[black_diamond]

I see it as a bipartisan vote against it.

[LibsRJerks]

I do NOT favor citizenship even in exchange for the military duty. What that means is that you will take them on and all their familiy members as military dependents — forever.

You have no idea whether or not they hold a loyalty to our Constitution, to our country. Who says they are patriots?

And what are we going to do — hold boot camp in Spanish? Make all sort of adaptations to them to educate, house, distribute benefits for life? Hand over weapons to them?

Ugh.

[HospiceNurse]

They already can.

Qualifications

A member of the U.S. Armed Forces must meet certain requirements and qualifications to become a citizen of the United States. This includes demonstrating:

•Good moral character

•Knowledge of the English language;

•Knowledge of U.S. government and history (civics);

•and Attachment to the United States by taking an Oath of Allegiance to the U.S. Constitution.
Qualified members of the U.S. Armed Forces are exempt from other naturalization requirements, including residency and physical presence in the United States. These exceptions are listed in Sections 328 and 329 of the INA.

[BuffaloJack]

> I disagree with the college part, but if they want to do a complete tour of duty in the American military, then I would favor citizenship.

Amen, to that.
Anyone willing to put their life on the line defending my country is welcome.

[suthener]

Do we really want a bunch of illegal immigrants in our military? What if their name is Mohammad? I’m not sure that’s really a good idea. How do know where there loyalty is?

[Tex-Con-Man]

I wonder why the article is titled...

"Senate Republicans hold up Dream Act for children of immigrants"

Instead of...

"Democrats continue to push unpopular amnesty legislation"

/rhetorical question

[RebelTXRose]

Our news last night did not mention amnesty at all in their report of the cloture vote. They made it all about “don’t ask/don’t tell”.

[wolfpat]

Thank you for that. I was thinking there might be such a provision, but I didn’t know much about it.

[Humble Servant]

Radio news folk around here are telling people it was held up over Don’t ask, Don’t tell. Not even mentioning Dreamnesty.

[PSYCHO-FREEP]

For the same reason that the media calls “ONLY” 455,000 more jobs lost in a week and that it is somehow “GOOD” news that those job losses were down 25,000 from last week. (It becomes a sure sign that MaObama’s plan is working.)

Besides, they have Democrats to elect. It's a natural.

[aces]

Good, this must stop, if illegal, your children are not citizens should pass as an amendment

[from occupied ga]

For those of us who are going to have to foot the bill for these criminals it's a "nightmare" not a "dream"