Free Republic

In narrowly winning her seat last year, Senator Claire McCaskill of Missouri ran hard against what she saw as a flawed approach in Congress to dealing with illegal immigration. Ms. McCaskill, a Democratic newcomer, says she is not about to change her view now. “I hope this never wears off, but I like to keep my word,” said Ms. McCaskill, part of a triad of moderate Democratic freshmen balking at the proposed immigration overhaul and complicating efforts by President Bush and Senate leaders to pass it this week. Her compatriots in opposition are Senators Jim Webb of Virginia and Jon...

WASHINGTON -- The Senate immigration bill was bleeding support from the left and right, leaving President Bush in danger of losing a closely fought vote this morning to end debate and move toward passage. "We're going to finish this legislation," vowed Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D., Nev.), and the White House worked into last night trying to salvage a narrow victory. But more than a half dozen Republicans and Democrats were at risk of defecting, and Sen. Jeff Sessions (R., Ala.), a leading opponent, predicted "there is a realistic chance the bill will fail." House Republicans hurt the president's...

Washington, D.C. (AHN)-President George Bush called on Congress to muster the "political courage" to pass an immigration overhaul that has foundered for weeks in the U.S. Senate. "We have an obligation to solve problems that have been piling up for decades," President Bush said in his weekly radio address. "The status quo is unacceptable." The proposed legislation, drafted by a small group of senators and White House negotiators, would create a guest worker program and a path to citizenship for an estimated 12 million immigrants in the United States illegally. The proposal has been derided by opponents as an amnesty...

Yesterday, a GOP aide, who is one of my sources in the Senate, gave me the rundown on what's currently happening with the Senate immigration bill (You can see my two previous reports from this source here and here). To begin with, the key thing to keep in mind about the upcoming vote on the Senate immigration bill is that the pro-amnesty forces have two key cloture votes that they have to win. The first is the vote on the so-called "clay pigeon" strategy. What this does is take the original bill and all of its amendments and reintroduce it...

WASHINGTON, June 15 — At 4:30 p.m. on June 7, the Roman Catholic Church defied the sponsors of a comprehensive immigration bill and urged the Senate not to move toward final passage of the measure without significant changes. A few hours later, after the Senate rejected his motion to end debate on the bill, the Senate majority leader, Harry Reid, Democrat of Nevada, pulled it from the Senate floor. His action prompted advocates to rally behind the bill. Within 24 hours, the Catholic Church and many business, labor and Hispanic groups were urging the Senate to resurrect it. They had...

WASHINGTON — Senate leaders have agreed on a way to bring a pulled immigration bill forward, breaking the impasse that had stalled the bill, Fox News confirms. The compromise legislation could come up as early as the middle of next week, once the Senate completes a large energy package. Legislators will consider 19 amendments (10 from Republicans and nine from Democrats) that are in need os some 'polishing' a senior Republican aide tells Fox News. President Bush's support for a $4.4 billion infusion of border security cash today apparently helped to ease concerns of many conservatives, as well as some...

The collapse last week of a comprehensive immigration bill in Congress that called for a huge guest-worker program, fast-track visas, and a sort of earned citizenship for illegal aliens has unleashed a backlash against those opponents of it who prefer to close the border first and legislate the details of illegal immigration later. Washington pundits and Beltway politicians are furious at various critics of the bill, from radio- talk-show hosts and writers for conservative magazines to frontline congressional representatives and Republican presidential candidates like Rudy Giuliani, Mitt Romney, and Fred Thompson. These critics are dubbed cynical nativists — or racists...

A GOP Aide, who's one of my sources in the Senate, gave me the rundown on what happened to the Senate bill today. After the 2nd cloture vote failure at noon on Thursday, Harry Reid could not get unanimous consent to call up amendments to the bill because Jim DeMint refused to give his consent. This was extremely problematic for Reid because he wanted to get in votes on 6 more amendments before the last try at a cloture vote. At that point, all the senators who were participants in the "Grand Compromise" AKA the "Masters of the Universe" by...