Amendments Fail, Reform Advances

[Santi 353]

For your consideration...

Several controversial amendments to immigration reform were defeated today:

• An attempt to discard the path to citizenship included in the CIR
  
• Sharing immigration application information with law enforcement agencies, and perhaps some governments
  

Amendment that passed:

• Assistance to victims of crimes committed by undocumented immigrants
  

We will have to keep a close eye on ® senators Jeff Sessions of Alabama, Mike Lee of Utah, and Chuck Grassley of Iowa, which are among the strongest foes of comprehensive immigration reform.

However, the bill is gaining positive momentum and increased support from additional Republicans, which could ultimately benefit the performance of the bill once it reaches the senate floor in June...

A series of ambitious amendments by the Texas senators to significantly reshape immigration reform failed today, with several Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee joining a solid bloc of Democrats in foiling the efforts by Ted Cruz and John Cornyn.

The most controversial was an attempt by Cruz to strip the path to citizenship for unauthorized immigrants. The Houston Republican’s amendment, defeated on a lopsided 13-5 vote, would have allowed unauthorized immigrants to stay as legal permanent residents. Cruz passionately defended his proposal to the very end, saying a path to citizenship would encourage more illegal immigration.

While all of Cruz’s proposals were voted down by a bipartisan coalition of reform backers, Cornyn did succeed in attaching one amendment to assist victims of some crimes committed by undocumented immigrants.

Cruz said he knew in advance that the committee would decide to reject his proposals, but he warned his Senate colleagues of the consequences of their action.

“In my view that decision will make it much, much more likely that this entire bill will fail in the House of Representatives,” Cruz said.

Cruz’s amendment was as the first major “litmus test” for senators and gave Congress-watchers a good idea of which GOP senators will ultimately support the bipartisan measure working its way through the Judiciary Committee.

Three Republicans joined the 10 committee Democrats in opposition to Cruz’s amendment, including two “Gang of Eight” Republicans involved in the bill’s original draft—Jeff Flake of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina. Republican Orrin Hatch of Utah also voted against Cruz’s amendment.

Five Republicans on the committee, including Cruz and Cornyn, supported the amendment. The others were hard-line immigration reform foes Jeff Sessions of Alabama and Mike Lee of Utah, along with Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley.

Cruz soldiered on with an amendment that would deny means-tested welfare benefits such as Medicaid or food stamps to anyone who had been an unauthorized immigrant.

“We’re going to protect the hardworking taxpayer,” Cruz said.

Cruz’s series of amendments drew the ire of Democrats on the committee. Sen. Chuck Schumer of New York said there is no immigration reform without citizenship. Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois blasted the amendments for being callous towards those in need.

“What kind of America are you thinking about Sen. Cruz?” Durbin said.

A small applause from the audience of immigrant activists at the hearing followed Durbin’s response.

As written, the bill would provide a possible path to citizenship for the estimated 11 million unauthorized immigrants in the country. Those immigrants would have to pass background checks and pay back taxes. The path to citizenship would begin after the Department of Homeland Security declared the southern border as secure. The earliest those immigrants could become eligible was within approximately 13 years, according to statements by the bill’s authors.

Cornyn also proposed two amendments related to citizenship earlier that morning.

Cornyn’s first amendment, which passed, gave notice to victims of crime, under certain circumstances, when those convicted of the crimes are trying to immigrate.

Cornyn’s second amendment, which failed, would share immigration application information with law enforcement agencies, including some information with foreign governments.

http://blog.chron.com/txpotomac/2013/05/cruzs-attempt-to-strip-citizenship-provision-from-immigration-reform-fails-in-a-big-way/

[aloola 11]

Thank you for posting!

I don't understand Cornyn's first amendment that did pass.Can you help clarify what it would do?

[Gezinha 121]

Ted Cruz is an ass! Enough said. "We are going to protect the taxpayers".. I may be mistaken, but doens't the majority of us illegals pay taxes anyways? Doesn't it get taken out of our paychecks like it or not? Yeah, he must protect ALL taxpayers, not pick and choose who they want to protect in order to protect his future votes!

So tired of this bullshit, we don't have a right to demand this, but we have a right to respect and not have these absurd statements thrown around.It makes us look worse in the eyes of this nation than they already think we are. And obviously, we only look terrible because of people like Ted Cruz!