This Bargain Wouldn't Sell
Everyone found something to dislike about the 'grand compromise' on immigration, so the deal collapsed and a dysfunctional status quo endures
'Grand compromise" isn't quite an oxymoron, but the prospective immigration deal struck between Democratic and Republican senators certainly led to some bizarre political theater at a press conference last week. Senators, labor leaders, and Hispanic organizers took the podium in turn, all agreeing, essentially, that a major selling point of the bill was that it was equally unsatisfying to everyone, and could be fixed later.
"We feel quite confident that we are going to have a realistic chance to improve the legislation," said Frank Sharry, head of the National Immigration Forum. "Even if what leaves the Senate is something of an ugly duckling."
But no swan was forthcoming. Buffeted by potentially fatal amendments from both sides, the Senate's compromise immigration bill was pulled by Majority Leader Harry Reid after he twice failed to gain the 60 votes needed to close debate. Supporters pledge that the bill is only, in the words of Republican Sen. Arlen Specter, "on life support," not dead, but agreement between and even within the parties on immigration remains elusive. Experts say Congress has likely lost its last chance to attempt serious immigration reform until 2009, and is stuck with a system that all sides agree is riddled with flaws.
The bargain-brokered by about a dozen senators of both parties and announced with great fanfare in mid-May-would have allowed illegal immigrants in the country before 2007 to receive renewable four-year visas after paying fees and fines, and eventually get on a path to citizenship. It created a guest worker program that would have given two-year visas to 400,000 workers a year, though the bill was amended to halve that number. None of those programs would have gone into effect until certain triggers—including the hiring of additional border agents and the construction of hundreds of miles of border fencing—were met.
Teetering. Proposed amendments left the fragile compromise teetering on the edge of failure most of the week, but it was a late-night addition to the bill by North Dakota Democratic Sen. Byron Dorgan to end the guest worker program after five years that brought the compromise to the breaking point. Dorgan said he felt the guest worker program was "part of a strategy to put downward pressure on American wages."
Though the Democrats have mostly avoided the nasty public schisms of their colleagues across the aisle, Dorgan's economic nationalism is only one of many discordant strains within the party. Even traditionally allied groups found themselves on opposite sides. The National Council of La Raza, a Hispanic group, backed the bill, while the League of United Latin American Citizens opposed it. The union UNITE HERE was at odds with the AFL-CIO.
Democratic leaders blamed the failure of the cloture motion to end debate on Republicans, who supplied only seven aye votes and showed little loyalty to the White House. But 11 of the votes against ending debate came from Democrats, including Dorgan. And both parties' fissures turned what seemed to be a slam dunk—a bill backed by the Republican president, the Democratic majority in the Senate, and a number of Republican senators—into a fiasco.
How the public feels about that is difficult to discern. Surveys have generally shown respondents in both parties supporting a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants and even suggest that the loaded word "amnesty" isn't a deal breaker. But recent surveys also show the difficulty in crafting a popular bill. Though favoring the compromise's major provisions, respondents were opposed to the bill itself.
The setback does not mean nothing is being done on immigration. Spurred by legislation that Congress passed last year, the Border Patrol is in the midst of a hiring spree which is slated to add 6,000 new agents by the end of 2008. The border now features 87 miles of fencing, but the Border Patrol is hoping to increase the total to 370 miles by 2009. But the failure of the new bill leaves unclear the status of the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants currently in the country, while also essentially leaving in place a backlogged system for legally admitting foreigners.
Publicly, the backers of the compromise aren't giving up. Immediately after cloture failed, Reid contended the Senate needed to move on to other priorities but that he would eventually regroup and return to the bill. And supporters point out that the cloture vote is an imperfect gauge of support for the legislation, since Republicans were protesting what they say were insufficient opportunities to vote on amendments. Those voting no on cloture included three grand bargainers and a handful of others who traditionally back comprehensive reform.
But the challenges of resurrecting legislation are daunting. Even if it had passed the Senate, the immigration measure faced long odds in the House, which voted to make being in the country illegally a felony when in Republican control in 2005. With elections every two years, representatives are more fearful of angering constituents than their Senate counterparts, and 61 Democratic House members now hail from districts won by President Bush in 2004. Expecting significant revolt in her party's ranks, Speaker Nancy Pelosi has stated that Republican supporters of immigration reform would need to round up 70 votes—more than a third of the caucus—before she brings a bill to the floor.
The chances of a bill only decrease as the 2008 election increasingly dominates Washington politics and senators running for the White House jockey for position on immigration. Even after the inauguration, the next president is unlikely to show the same interest in immigration reform as Bush, a former border state governor.
Given the challenges, Reid was perhaps being more frank hours before the cloture vote, when he was asked whether, if the bill failed, he would ever bring immigration reform to the floor as majority leader again.
"Well, ever's a long time," he said.
Given the political realities of the moment, the ugly duckling may not fly.
This story appears in the June 18, 2007 print edition of U.S. News & World Report.