Immigration reform to be tackled too?

Congress has a busy rest of the year with health care now at the forefront in both chambers, a "cap and trade" bill set to be voted on tomorrow in the House, the call for new financial regulations, and Sotomayor's upcoming confirmation hearings in the Senate, but now another big issue may be around the corner. President Obama is meeting today with Congressional leaders on the issue of immigration reform.

Seeking to build momentum, Obama will meet today with at least 20 House and Senate members from both parties, officials said. But White House aides have worked to lower expectations, noting Congress's inability to deliver legislation to former president George W. Bush in 2006 and 2007, and vowing to proceed with debate this year only with strong bipartisan support.

"The president wants to make it clear he is serious," a senior White House official said yesterday. "He also wants to make it clear he's going to need strong partnership and leadership on both sides of the aisle to get the right policies moving."

Like so many issues, immigration reform is one with pressing need. But I can't say the chances look good with everything else on the Congressional plate right now. And like those other contentious issues, if it doesn't get done this year, it may not get done since Congress doesn't like to take those kinds of things up during an election year. It will take some serious political will to make it happen.

Is it there? We'll see, but it's good the conversation is getting started again.

Fugitive Program Targeted Non-Criminal Illegals

I think one thing that liberals and conservatives can agree on is that dangerous illegal immigrants should not be allowed to roam the country freely, and that they probably ought to be deported back to their home countries or made to face justice in some manner. Such was the supposed purpose of programs being run by ICE to enforce deportation orders against dangerous, criminal or fugitive illegals. Alas, the Bush administration managed to screw this up as well:

The raids on homes around the country were billed as carefully planned hunts for dangerous immigrant fugitives, and given catchy names like Operation Return to Sender.

And they garnered bigger increases in money and staff from Congress than any other program run by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, even as complaints grew that teams of armed agents were entering homes indiscriminately.

But in fact, beginning in 2006, the program was no longer what was being advertised. Federal immigration officials had repeatedly told Congress that among more than half a million immigrants with outstanding deportation orders, they would concentrate on rounding up the most threatening — criminals and terrorism suspects.

Instead, newly available documents show, the agency changed the rules, and the program increasingly went after easier targets. A vast majority of those arrested had no criminal record, and many had no deportation orders against them, either.

Internal directives by immigration officials in 2006 raised arrest quotas for each team in the National Fugitive Operations Program, eliminated a requirement that 75 percent of those arrested be criminals, and then allowed the teams to include nonfugitives in their count.


[...]

The impact of the internal directives, obtained by a professor and students at Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law through a Freedom of Information lawsuit and shared with The New York Times, shows the power of administrative memos to significantly alter immigration enforcement policy without any legislative change.

The memos also help explain the pattern of arrests documented in a report, criticizing the fugitive operations program, to be released on Wednesday by the Migration Policy Institute, a nonpartisan research organization in Washington.

[...]

Peter L. Markowitz, who teaches immigration law at Cardozo and directs its immigration legal clinic, said the memos obtained in its lawsuit reflected the Bush administration’s effort to appear tough on immigration enforcement during the unsuccessful push to pass comprehensive immigration legislation in 2006, and amid rising anger over illegal immigration.

“It looks like what happened here is that the law enforcement strategy was hijacked by the political agenda of the administration,” he said.

So instead of a program designed to round up dangerous illegals, combined with comprehensive immigration reform, we got a program that picked off the low-hanging fruit and no reform at all. Thanks guys.

More illegals leaving voluntarily

Or as this story puts it, "self deport".

The couple are among a growing number of illegal immigrants across the United States who are starting to pack their bags and move on as a crackdown on undocumented immigrants widens and the U.S. economy slows, turning a traditional Christmas trek home into a one-way trip.

The article at first implies that one, a majority of illegals who are moving are going back to Mexico, and two, the reason is because of immigration crackdowns in many states. I have no doubt that these two things are connected, but I find it implausible that is the primary reason. The article itself later goes on to give contradictory evidence:

While some illegal immigrants are simply self deporting, others are moving within the United States to avoid federal immigration raids and pro-enforcement measures passed by a patchwork of state and local authorities.

I'm inclined to believe that more people would do that than simply leave. At a certain point, of course, the other, safer, states would simply run out of capacity to absorb them. However, we haven't seen that in any state in the US, ever, so it's not likely that would deter anyone from moving to say, Vermont or New Hampshire.

But although it would be hard to prove one way or another, I'd wager money that the more important reason is the economic downturn the US is suffering, especially in the housing sector. We've blogged about that before in a variety of posts you can see by clicking this link. New data (from Business Week Online) says:

U.S. home prices fell in October for the 10th consecutive month, posting their largest monthly drop since 1991, a widely watched index showed on Dec. 26. The record 6.7% drop in the Standard & Poor's/Case-Shiller home price index also marked the 23rd consecutive month prices either grew more slowly or declined.

And from NPR:

Not too long ago, foreclosures were considered a rare, unhappy event. Now entire cities are plagued by foreclosures — which are at their highest level since the Great Depression. At the same time, new home construction has fallen to the level it was at in 1991

Now couple that with this statistic (from the San Francisco Chronicle):

The National Association of Home Builders estimates that 20 percent of the construction workforce -- about 2.4 million people -- is foreign-born. While it's impossible to know how many are undocumented, some estimates put the number at 50 percent or more.

(It's a year old, but there's no reason to think it would have changed in that year). It's easy to see that there's going to be a strong connection between home construction and immigration. I'm not saying the crackdowns have nothing to do with it, but as with crackdowns on illegal drugs, they weren't showing a lot of success before. There's no reason to think that simply because enforcement got stronger there wasn't enough economic incentive for illegals to stay. After all, they've been being deported and sneaking back for decades already. Nothing much we do is likely to change that.

The point I'm trying to make is that people shouldn't be out there cheering in the streets because some illegals are finally going back home. The problem is not solved at all, and tougher laws and more stringent enforcement aren't the most effective answer. As you can see, it's all about jobs. One final point (from the AP article):

Other returning immigrants cite a slowdown in the U.S. economy as a factor, and the falling value of the U.S. dollar against other currencies, which has eaten into the value of remittances sent to support families at home.

Yeah, it's all about the money. If it's not worth it to work here, they won't. But watch, when in five years, or two or ten, whenever it happens, the US economy turns around and gets supercharged again, if we haven't solved the problem in the meanwhile they'll come back. They'll just come back to make money like they did before. That's an official TWM prediction and warning to lawmakers: do something about immigration before it happens!

Too Many Illegals

The City of Irving has apparently been a little too good at rounding up illegal immigrants and turning them over to Immigrations and Custome Enforcement. According to the DMN, ICE has responded by telling the city to stop turning over some of the immigrants they detain:

Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials told Irving city officials this week to stop referring illegal immigrants who have been arrested for Class C misdemeanors, according to a memo Irving officials provided to The Dallas Morning News on Tuesday.

The move is expected to dramatically alter which North Texas arrestees are interviewed by ICE and have deportation holds placed on them as part of the Criminal Alien Program. Irving officials estimate that about 60 percent of the more than 1,700 illegal immigrant suspects they have turned over to ICE since last year faced only Class C misdemeanor charges.

An ICE official reached Tuesday said he was researching the matter and could not confirm any details.

Class C misdemeanors range from assault to public intoxication to criminal trespass (of agricultural land) to hot checks. The penalty is a fine not to exceed $500. For comparison, Class B misdemeanors include disorderly conduct with a firearm, prostitution and driving while intoxicated. Penalties include a fine of up to $2,000 and up to 180 days in jail.

Class C misdemeanors are the lowest class of criminal conviction you can receive, are on par with traffic tickets, don't get you any jail time, and aren't even reported on the defendant's criminal record. So it's not as if the City is letting hardened criminals return back to their neighborhoods. More importantly, it undermines the incentive of City officials to arrest those Hispanic immigrants charged with Class C misdemeanors, many of whom might not normally face arrest for their alleged misdeeds, because they can no longer turn them over to ICE. Given the percentages above, this puts a serious crimp in Irving's efforts to utilize minor criminal charges to have Hispanic residents deported back to Mexico.

UPDATE: More on the change.

Oops

I predict confidently that it will not take long before Republicans begin to deeply regret the death of the immigration bill. Here's this from Robert Novak in today's Washington Post:

It is difficult to exaggerate the pessimism about the immediate political future voiced by Republicans in Congress when not on the record. With an unpopular president waging an unpopular war, they foresee electoral catastrophe in 2008, with Democratic gains in both the House and Senate and Hillary Clinton in the White House. That's the atmosphere in which these lachrymose lawmakers have for several months faced an increasingly hysterical onslaught from constituents demanding the death of the "amnesty" for immigrants they heard vilified on talk radio.

These callers swamped phone lines to Republican congressional offices (as well as to the White House) with threats that they would never vote again for anybody supporting "amnesty."

To the Republicans who fought the bill I say, congratulations. You have sacrificed Hispanic, moderate and independent voters in favor of the nativists in your party who wouldn't have had anybody else to vote for next year anyway. Well done.

Senate blocks immigration bill

Senate supporters of comprehensive immigration reform fell 14 votes short of the 60 needed to stop debate and vote on the bill. There were Democrats, Republicans, and independents voting on both sides (you can get the roll call here). Basically, this means the bill is dead for good. It's not going to be brought up again this year or next year. I find this disappointing (though totally unsurprising) because I think the was truly a ripe chance to get reform. I'm also disappointed in the Democrats who voted against ending debate for non-liberal reasons, many of whom were newly elected in 2006.

Republicans, of course, made up the majority of those who voted against ending debate in order to block the bill from coming to a up-or-down vote (which used to be their favorite thing until they became the minority and have obstructed Senate votes at an alarming and record rate), including many facing tough re-election next year. I can only say that while they may think this is some sort of victory with their base, it will hurt them for years to come. There's no question that conservative Republicans are the face of the anti-immigration reform movement, and it will kill them with the Latino population (if there 2006 numbers weren't bad enough) which will, in turn, kill them in many districts, states and hurt their chances even more of winning the next presidential election. But that's what xenophobia gets you.

Senate Republicans block union bill, immigration bill advances

As expected, Senate Republicans almost unanimously voted to block a vote on the Employee Free Choice Act. The vote was 51-48, not reaching the 60 votes necessary for cloture. The bill would require employers to recognize unions after being presented union cards signed by a majority of eligible workers on their payrolls. Under current labor law, a company can demand a secret ballot election where employers have greater access to workers and corporate threats, intimidation and eventual firings are commonplace. Dragging out the election process, companies also often succeed in wearing down union enthusiasm.

This comes as Roll Call has reported that 239 other bills have been passed by the House of Representatives and sent to the Senate only to be held up, with conservatives “objecting to just about every major piece of legislation that [Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV)] has tried to bring up.” Ridiculous.

Meanwhile, the immigration bill did survive the cloture motion today, 64-35, but there's no guarantee it will overcome the possible Thursday vote on ending debate that will also require the backing of 60 senators. Even if that happens, there is no guarantee that it will ultimately attract even the simple majority it needs to pass either. It all depends on what amendments get passed over the next few days. I have to say I'm not optimistic.

UPDATE: Senate Republicans also blocked Democrats’ efforts to send the 9/11 Commission recommendations and the ethics and lobbying reform to conference.

Goings-On in Congress

Sen. Patrick Leahy, chairman of the Judiciary Committee, revealed that before signing the bill passed overwhelmingly by Congress earlier this year that repealed a Patriot Act provision to appoint interim U.S. attorneys without Senate approval, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales was able to install George Cardona in the Central District of California. The bill, the Preserving United States Attorney Independence Act of 2007, had been on the president’s desk since June 4th but was not signed by him until yesterday.

On Wednesday, the House passed by voice vote a NRA-approved gun bill in the wake of the Virginia Tech shootings. The measure would make more electronic data available to states for checking the criminal and mental health records of people who want to purchase guns. It would authorize new funding to help states enter felony convictions, mental disability and domestic violence records into the FBI’s National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS). Gun dealers use NICS, created by a 1993 law, to check whether a person qualifies to buy a firearm. CQ warns the bill may not pass the Senate as easily, but most think it will ultimately be passed and signed by President Bush.

In another round of votes on the Iraq war before the July Fourth recess, the Senate will cast separate votes on whether to cut off funding for the war after March 31st of next year, order troop withdrawals within four months, impose stricter standards on the length of combat tours, and rescind congressional authorization for the Iraqi invasion. The House will consider similar proposals later on.

The measures will be offered as amendments to the 2008 defense authorization bill, but will probably fall short of the 60 votes needed to invoke cloture and pass. However, this is seen as part of a strategy by Democrats to keep pressure on Republicans over the war.

Democrats were forced to set aside — at last until next week — their renewable fuels proposal after it became clear they lacked the 60 votes to proceed.

The bill, which will be combined with other energy legislation in the House, would require power companies to increase use of wind turbines, solar panels, biomass, geothermal energy or other renewable sources to produce at least 15 percent of their electricity by 2020. Only about 2.4 percent of the country's electricity is produced that way now. But the Senate reached an impasse when it rejected a GOP alternative that would have allowed utilities to meet the requirement by also building more nuclear power plants and taking conservation measures.

Republicans balked and refused to allow a vote on the bill. Now it's uncertain if it will get final approval before the Fourth of July recess.

Finally, Senate leaders announced a deal last night to bring back a comprehensive immigration reform bill either late next week or the week after for more floor debate. The measure had been pulled by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid last week after the Senate failed to invoke cloture, mainly because of Republican opposition. President Bush met with Republican senators and told them he would approve $4.4 billion in immediate funding for border security measures in order to get Republicans back on board. It will be one of 20 new amendments to be offered on the bill. Still, no one knows if it will ultimately get the support needed for passage, but things look better than they did just a week ago.

UPDATE:

The House today passed a $37.4 billion budget bill for the Department of Homeland Security on a 268-150 vote, but Bush has threatened to veto because it exceeds his funding request. An even more generous bill funding veterans programs and military base construction also exceeds Bush's funding request, but passed by an overwhelming 409-2 vote.

Republican Senator Jon Kyl blocked a vote in the Judiciary Committee on whether to authorize subpoenas to the Justice Department to obtain secret legal opinions and other documents related to the National Security Agency’s program of domestic eavesdropping. The action will block the vote for a week. After the vote next Thursday, Senator Patrick J. Leahy, Democrat of Vermont and chairman of the committee, "can decide whether to issue the subpoenas or use them as leverage in negotiations with the Bush administration over access to the documents."

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said today he might have to pull the energy bill off the floor next week to revive the immigration bill , although he vowed to complete both before closing shop for the July Fourth recess. “If this [energy] debate doesn’t speed up, we’ll have to move to end debate,” he said, according to CQ. “If they do, Democrats are prepared to work through the weekends and the July 4 district work period to accomplish our goals.”

The U.S. Senate begins debate on the Employee Free Choice Act on Monday, with a cloture vote expected Wednesday, June 20. The bill, which makes it easier for workers to join a union, passed the House months ago 241-185 but faces a tough, 60-vote hurdle in the Senate.

Phew.