Free Republic

Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) urged their House Republican colleagues to pass immigration reform legislation in a closed-door meeting Wednesday, with the Speaker arguing his conference would be “in a much weaker position” if it failed to act. A divided House Republican conference met for more than two hours in the basement of the Capitol to begin hashing out a response to the sweeping immigration bill the Senate passed last month. -snip- He (Issa) said the House would deal with the 11 million illegal immigrants, but that the conference viewed them not as a uniform block,...

Speaker John Boehner told Republicans that the internal debate over immigration reform is an “important conversation,” as the House GOP kicked off its closed-door meeting Wednesday afternoon. Boehner said the House will “not” take up the Senate-passed bill, but said members must do something to address the issue, according to sources inside the room. Majority Leader Eric Cantor, harkening back to when President Barack Obama first took office, said Republicans need to have a counter offer, just like their alternative to the stimulus.

Call it open mic day in the House GOP conference. Republicans are set to huddle behind closed doors Wednesday afternoon to discuss the politically complicated issue of immigration. What to expect in the meeting? Some pretty stark differences in opinion in a group that has mostly refused to march in lockstep on a variety of other fronts. Further complicating matters is the fact that GOP leaders are expected to hear a variety of viewpoints Wednesday on border security, visas, and the most contentious question of all, whether illegal immigrants should be offered a path to citizenship or legal status. Rep....