Free Republic

President Obama said Thursday that he would proceed with an overhaul of the immigration system this year if he could attract substantial Republican support. But a leading Republican who supports an overhaul said a bill could not go forward if the president used a legislative shortcut sidestepping Republicans to pass his health care bill. Obama spent most of the afternoon in meetings on immigration, including one with Senator Charles Schumer [D-NY]. and Senator Lindsey Graham [R-SC]. who have been holding closed-door sessions over the last six months to draw up a bill to revamp the immigration system. The White House...

Under a potentially controversial plan still taking shape in the Senate, all legal U.S. workers, including citizens and immigrants, would be issued an ID card with embedded information.Under the potentially controversial plan still taking shape in the Senate, all legal U.S. workers, including citizens and immigrants, would be issued an ID card with embedded information, such as fingerprints, to tie the card to the worker.

Lawmakers working to craft a new comprehensive immigration bill have settled on a way to prevent employers from hiring illegal immigrants: a national biometric identification card all American workers would eventually be required to obtain. Under the potentially controversial plan still taking shape in the Senate, all legal U.S. workers, including citizens and immigrants, would be issued an ID card with embedded information, such as fingerprints, to tie the card to the worker. The ID card plan is one of several steps advocates of an immigration overhaul are taking to address concerns that have defeated similar bills in the past....

Preoccupied with healthcare and expanding government, Obama is still working full throttle to shove through an immigration reform bill prior to the midterm elections. To appease the influential La Raza movement, Obama met privately with his staff this week to devise a measure that will grant United States citizenship to the country's estimated 11 million illegal immigrants.

President Barack Obama plans to focus attention on immigration next week by meeting at the White House with two senators crafting a bill on the issue.

WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama plans to focus attention on immigration next week by meeting at the White House with two senators crafting a bill on the issue. White House spokesman Nicholas Shapiro said Obama will meet with Democratic Sen. Chuck Schumer of New York and Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina on Monday. The president is "looking forward to hearing more about their efforts toward producing a bipartisan bill," Shapiro said Friday. The meeting will be the first Obama has had with Schumer and Graham on the proposal they are developing since they began focusing on it last...

Despite steep odds, the White House has discussed prospects for reviving a major overhaul of the nation's immigration laws, a commitment that President Obama has postponed once already. Obama took up the issue privately with his staff Monday in a bid to advance a bill through Congress before lawmakers become too distracted by approaching midterm elections. In the session, Obama and members of his Domestic Policy Council outlined ways to resuscitate the effort in a White House meeting with two senators -- Democrat Charles E. Schumer of New York and Republican Lindsey Graham of South Carolina -- who have...

February 28, 2010 Tom Friedman: Lindsay. Graham. Is. Awesome. [Greg Pollowitz] From his column today: It is early evening on Capitol Hill, and I am sitting with Senator Lindsey Graham, the South Carolina Republican, who, along with John Kerry and Joe Lieberman, is trying to craft a new energy bill — one that could actually win 60 votes. What is interesting about Graham is that he has been willing — courageously in my view — to depart from the prevailing G.O.P. consensus that the only energy policy we need is “drill, baby, drill.” What brought you around, I ask? Graham’s...

With national unemployment hovering around 10 percent and black male unemployment at a staggering 17.6 percent, it's just not true that undocumented workers are doing the jobs that we won't do. In October 2008, amidst claims that one of its subsidiaries was knowingly hiring illegal immigrants, North Carolina poultry producer House of Raeford Farms initiated a systematic conversion of its workforce. Following a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement raid that nabbed 300 undocumented workers at a Columbia Farms processing plant in Columbia, S.C., a spooked House of Raeford quietly began replacing immigrants with native-born labor at all of its plants....

On March 21st, we will march on Washington, DC to demand immigration reform. Our vision of reform includes immigrants and native-born U.S. citizens working shoulder to shoulder to achieve better wages, working conditions, and labor protections. People from all across America will lend their voice in the fight for reform. We will come together as one voice on the National Mall for a strong America – for families, for workers, for businesses, and for security. Join thousands from across the country in the March For America in DC on March 21st, and demand Congress act NOW to pass immigration reform...

It's that time of year again. Pundits, pollsters and lobbyists are gathering in the nation's capital to tell conservative activists how to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. ... This year, the Beltway leaders of conservatism are racing hard to catch up with a parade they did not launch and cannot control. Across America, grass-roots patriots and anti-Obama protests have changed the political landscape in ways conservatism's entrenched Beltway Politburo did not anticipate. ... The greatest threat in 1960 was international – how to deal with the threat of Soviet communism and the "missile gap" – and anti-communism was...

To clarify, so you support a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants? I do because I understand why people would want to be in America. To seek the safety and prosperity, the opportunities, the health that is here. It is so important that yes, people follow the rules so that people can be treated equally and fairly in this country.

The number of illegal immigrants living in the United States dropped by 1 million people in two years, according to new estimates by the Department of Homeland Security. The government thinks that 10.8 million illegal immigrants lived in the country in January 2009, down from a peak of nearly 12 million in 2007. If the official estimates are correct, not since 2005 has the population of illegal immigrants been as low as it was last year. Some private researchers, however, are questioning the magnitude of the drop. # Top countries of origin for illegal immigrants in the U.S.: Mexico: 6.65...

Granting citizenship to millions of illegal immigrants would expand the "progressive" electorate and help ensure a "progressive" governing coalition for the long term, declared a recent adviser to President Obama whose union group is among the most frequent visitors to the White House.

The illegal alien aunt of President Obama could learn this week whether she can put down roots in Boston - or start packing her bags for a one-way trip back to Kenya. And, save for U.S. Immigration Court Judge Leonard I. Shapiro, she’ll know before anyone else. Zeituni Polly Onyango has persuaded Shapiro to bar the public from her removal proceeding Thursday morning at the John F. Kennedy Federal Building, though it’s unclear why. “I assume (Shapiro) thought it would be a three-ring circus. She’s the aunt of the president of the United States - the most famous man in...

At the very end of his State of the Union address, President Obama said, “we should continue the work of fixing our broken immigration system -– to secure our borders and enforce our laws, and ensure that everyone who plays by the rules can contribute to our economy and enrich our nation.” Like most Americans, I agree with those broad principles, and that is exactly why Obama was so vague in his speech. His claim that “jobs must be our number one focus in 2010” would be exposed as a complete fraud if he promoted giving amnesty for illegal immigration...

Since I knew His Majesty wouldn't say much of anything about immigration, and I can no longer stand the sound of his voice, I just went to bed. But he said even less than I expected: We should continue to work at fixing our broken immigration system to secure our borders and enforce our laws and ensure that everyone who plays by rules can contribute to our economy and enrich our nation. That's it? I was figuring at least three sentences, or maybe two. As Roy Beck put it:

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said today that skeptical Republicans and Democrats should throw their support behind climate change legislation not only because it's good for the economy and the environment, but because Congress desperately needs a win under its belt. "We tried immigration. It's hard. And we failed. We tried Social Security. It's hard. And we failed. We tried health care. It's really hard. And it looks like we're going to have to start over again," Graham somberly told a luncheon audience of energy and climate advocates on the Hill. "On the energy, climate change front, I don't want to...

Markos Moulitsas Zuniga, a Democratic strategist and founder of the left-wing blog “The Daily Kos,” told reporters Thursday that “comprehensive immigration reform” legislation sponsored by Rep. Luiz Gutierrez (D-Ill.) -- which would provide a “pathway to citizenship” for illegal aliens -- has a good shot at passage this year. But Moulitsas said that “teabaggers” and Republicans who “hate brown people” would try to push back against it. “I think the votes want to be there in the Senate -- I think the House is fairly solid -- I think the votes want to be there,” he said of an immigration...

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano extended temporary amnesty to Haitians who were illegally inside the U.S. before Tuesday's earthquake, but warned that the Coast Guard would turn back any new refugees fleeing the devastation... If refugees take to the sea--the normal reaction to turmoil throughout Haiti's recent history--officials in the U.S. and other countries will have to grapple with how to deal with a new wave of immigrants, most of whom will arrive without visas. Ms. Napolitano warned that no new arrivals would get amnesty and the U.S. Coast Guard and other authorities would move quickly to stop new migrants....