Posted on 06/14/2013 10:46:41 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), who helped draft the immigration reform bill currently being discussed in the Senate, says he will walk away from the negotiations if it includes a controversial amendment to provide immigration benefits for gay couples.
"If this bill has in it something that gives gay couples immigration rights and so forth, it kills the bill. I'm done," said Rubio during an interview on the Andrea Tantaros Show on Thursday. "I'm off it, and I've said that repeatedly. I don't think that's going to happen and it shouldn't happen. This is already a difficult enough issue as it is."
On Tuesday, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman, Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) decided to file the amendment that would allow gay couples to sponsor green cards for their foreign partners as part of the immigration reform bill.
He was forced to withdraw the measure last month when several Democrats told him they would oppose it if it threatened the overall passage of the bill.
In filing the measure that has little chance of passing on the Senate floor, however, Leahy declared that the fight for equality was the right thing to do.
"Seeking equal protection under our laws for the LGBT community is the right thing to do," he said in a statement. "I withheld my anti-discrimination amendment during the Senate Judiciary Committee markup. As the entire Senate turns to debate the immigration bill, the fight for equality must go on."
While he supports same-sex marriages, left-leaning evangelical leader Jim Wallis, agreed last month that entangling gay rights issues in the immigration reform discussion is a bad idea.
"I support equal protection under the law but I think this is the wrong place in the wrong time to try and resolve this contentious issue. This must be a bipartisan bill. Our focus must be on the 11 million undocumented and vulnerable people who this is their time, their chance, this is their moment," said Wallis, president and CEO of Sojourners.
The amendment is expected to face a much more difficult road in passing on the Senate floor than it would have faced in the committee.
Passing the measure in the committee only required a simple majority. On the Senate floor, however, it is likely to require 60 votes.
During the debate of the measure in the committee last month, Sen. Lindsay Graham (R-S.C.), a gang of eight member who helped craft the bill, noted: "You've got me on immigration. You don't have me on marriage. If you want to keep me on immigration, let's stay on immigration."
In his remarks, another gang of eight member, Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), noted during the same debate: "As much as it pains me, I cannot support this amendment if it will bring down the bill."
A Supreme Court ruling on the Defense of Marriage Act expected later this month could enable gay couples to petition green cards for their foreign partners.
He’s done already.
“Hes done already.”
Beat me to it.
But he’ll go on Spanish language Tv and state the opposite.
likewise
Oh NOW he takes a stand?
This isn’t stand on principle, he’s just trying to take a cowards way out now that he has been found with his hand in the cookie jar.
Rubio has been proven a liar and shouldn’t ever be trusted again.
Pandering POS Schumer.....
NO, he won’t. He will not pass up getting his foreign constituents amnesty no matter what.
Marco, as far as I'm concerned you might as well don the pink tutu and shimmy for your new masters. My vote isn't coming back to you. Amnesty was a permanent buzzkill.
Marco Rubio, you are done, period.
You’re done PERIOD, Rubio. Hasta la vista, baby.
Oh nos! Who’s he going to get to invite him to the club, dinners, parties. They’re going to drop him like a runner up for homecoming queen.
Oh c’mon Rube
I’m sure you can adjust and endure it
Why this time next werek you’ll be back to “lovin it” just like last week..
after all this AMNESTY Bill is the only thing you have going for you
it makes you the big man on campus...
do you really want to lose all that ???
eh ???
Seeing your political future run away from you, are you?
Don't worry. Hannity still likes you, possibly Limbaugh, but I think Levin has had enough.
I look forward to hearing him tear what's left of your poser reputation into little bitty pieces to go with your similarly sized integrity.
Before this is over, Marco Rubio will be caught wearing his wife’s clothes and on a date with Leahy.
You might as well Rubio, we’re going to tell everyone you did anyway.
There was a time when I actually liked this guy, but that was before he started sleeping with the democrats.
This just shows that Rubio is a ruthless negotiator against Dems. He is not going to cut them a single break for a minute. He is watching them like a hawk and that bill too. He has our back.
They (dems) will have a bitter pill to swallow when Rubio gets done with them, and w this bill.
Hail Marco our King!
Yeah, that’s his bridge too far. Real border security amendment tabled without so much as a word because Chuck Schumer says it’ll take years and years and years to secure the border. Yet his modus operandi has been to delay, delay, delay any border enforcement so that more illegals can come in.
And we had a bill become law to build a fence in 2006 and the funding was quietly pulled by Kay Bailey Hutchinson, who has thankfully been replaced by Ted Cruz.
But gay immigrants are just a bridge too far for Marco Rubio. Does he think he’s fooling people with this?? This is the “ok, we’’ll pull that amendment if you just vote for the bill” gambit. So transparent.
The comedians are going to have a field day with his flip flops (the big lie/or misspeaking in Spanish or was that the truth) and his very own statements on this issue. Rubio was this way in the Florida legislature though he played he was against amnesty. Now, he’s become worse because we see how he really thinks about this issue. He wants his family of hispanics to be able to come out of the shadows.
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