This article is from the source 'nytimes' and was first published or seen
on .
It last changed over 40 days ago and won't be checked again for changes.
Drawing Bipartisan Praise For a Soft-Pedal Approach
(about 9 hours later)
WASHINGTON — The day after President Obama reiterated his call for an overhaul of immigration laws in the State of the Union address, the Senate Judiciary Committee — which will likely put its own stamp on any immigration bill to reach its conference room — is set to hold its first hearing on the topic on Wednesday.
WASHINGTON — President Obama’s nonconfrontational tone on an immigration overhaul in his State of the Union address on Tuesday night probably did more to advance the issue, lawmakers said, than if had he offered a fierce rallying cry, as he did about gun restrictions.
The consensus on Capitol Hill and among those on both sides of the immigration debate is that the Senate will have to lead the charge when it comes to creating and passing any meaningful changes to the country’s immigration system, and Wednesday’s hearing will be closely watched, a first glimpse of how the issue will play out in the upper chamber. A bipartisan group of eight senators has spent recent weeks working on immigration legislation.
As senators gathered Wednesday for the first hearing on the proposed sweeping changes in immigration law, they said the president’s decision to give members of both parties room to maneuver on the delicate politics of immigration was a strategic choice that could pay off as negotiations continued.
“I’d like something that faces reality,” said Senator Patrick J. Leahy, Democrat of Vermont and the Judiciary Committee’s chairman. “We have 12 million people in this country that are undocumented — that’s a reality. It’s not going to be like they’re all going to leave. One of the reasons I’m holding this hearing in the morning is to hear from somebody who actually understands what’s involved here — Janet Napolitano — and I hope that from what she says and what we hear from her, we can start building some consensus.”
“He’s walking a tightrope here, trying to allow Congress on a bipartisan basis to come up with a comprehensive immigration reform bill in the Senate,” said Senator Richard J. Durbin of Illinois, the No. 2 Senate Democrat. “He encouraged us, told us he doesn’t want this to drag on forever, and if we can’t get it done he’ll play more forceful role.”
Ms. Napolitano is the homeland security secretary, and her department has jurisdiction over immigration enforcement matters.
Mr. Durbin, a member of a bipartisan group of eight senators working on an immigration bill, added, “The reason he’s on this tightrope is the Republicans don’t want to make it appear that they are bending to the president on this issue.”
Though the bipartisan group released a broad set of immigration principles last month, they have yet to introduce any actual legislation and aides have said they are unlikely to litigate their continuing internal discussions in public during the hearing. But Senator Charles E. Schumer, Democrat of New York and a member of the group, said he expected the hearing to strike an optimistic tone.
Influential Republicans praised Mr. Obama as well. Representative Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin, the party’s vice-presidential nominee last year, said the president’s tone on immigration was measured and constructive.
“I think on this issue more than any other we’re going to see sort of a bipartisan longing to get something done, and hopefully you’re not going to find the fisticuffs that you would find on lots of other issues,” Mr. Schumer said. “I think you’ll be able to glean a sense of progress without us revealing the specifics.”
“I thought on immigration he used the right words and the right tone, which tells me he actually doesn’t want to politicize this, which is conducive to getting something done,” Mr. Ryan said.
In his address on Tuesday, the president once again framed an overhaul as an effort that would strengthen economic growth, because he said it would “harness the talents and ingenuity” of immigrants.
Given their losses in the Congressional elections in November, Republicans in both the House and Senate have demonstrated a new openness to immigration changes that could lead to legal residency for millions who have entered the country illegally. At the same time, polls have shown that the president’s involvement in the debate decreases Republican support.
Mr. Obama reiterated that he wanted “a responsible pathway to earned citizenship” for illegal immigrants, although he did not get into the weeds of specifying how many of the millions of those immigrants in the country would get legal status. He said illegal immigrants would have to pass background checks, pay back taxes and a fine, learn English and go to the back of the line behind immigrants who have tried to come to the United States legally.
White House officials said the president was just as aggressive on immigration as he was on firearms, though his appeal for changes in gun laws was one of the emotional peaks of the night.
In his brief comments, Mr. Obama also said that reform should include “strong border security.”
Cecilia Muñoz, director of the White House Domestic Policy Council, said immigration was “an issue on which we expect an outcome and we expect it soon.”
Mr. Leahy has strong feelings about what should be included in any immigration legislation to come through his committee, including favoring protections for immigrants in same same-sex relationships and creating a path to lawful permanent residence for illegal immigrants, who could then choose to pursue citizenship. He also supports putting forward a comprehensive bill rather than several smaller pieces of legislation. Some Republicans have cautioned that including provisions like the one dealing with same-sex couples could doom the legislation, and many would accept legal status only if certain border security “triggers” are first met.
The president, who most recently laid out his own immigration principles in a January speech in Las Vegas, told Congress on Tuesday night that “the time has come to pass comprehensive immigration reform.” It was a refrain he repeated several times to applause.
“I intend to have protections for the L.G.B.T. community in there,” Mr. Leahy said, referring to gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people. “I’m not going to make choices between that community and the non-L.G.B.T. community.”
Mr. Obama proceeded to highlight what he believed are the three goals of any immigration deal — ensuring that the borders are secure, creating a meaningful path to citizenship, and overhauling the system to deal with legal immigration. But when talking about immigration, he seemed to lack the emotional resonance, not to mention the forceful call to action, that he exhibited when discussing gun control, where he exhorted the country to remember that all victims of gun violence “deserve a vote.”
Mr. Leahy also supports the Dream Act, which offers a path to legal status for young illegal immigrants who receive college degrees or serve in the military.
Which may have been exactly the point.
On the question of a path to citizenship, Senator Charles E. Grassley, Republican of Iowa and ranking member of the committee, said that while “it’s perfectly all right” for Mr. Leahy to want legalization and citizenship, the real question in his mind remains, “Is the border secure?”
Senator Charles E. Schumer, Democrat of New York, began his remarks at Wednesday’s hearing by thanking the president for his State of the Union comments on immigration.
“The pathway is entirely tied to the issue of border security,” Mr. Grassley said. “You can’t have a pathway to legalization until the border is secure.”
“His remarks last night on immigration were just right,” Mr. Schumer said. “He importuned us to act, he stated how important it was to get this done for the future of America, but at the same time he did not make it a wedge issue. He made it clear that we had to act in a bipartisan way and gave us, in our little group, the space to come up with a bipartisan proposal, which we know is really our only hope.”
President Obama unveiled his own proposal for an immigration overhaul last month, and though Republicans, and even some Democrats, have said they fear that any plan by the president could derail the current efforts in Congress to reach a bipartisan consensus, Mr. Leahy said he welcomed any input from Mr. Obama.
Senator Jeff Flake, Republican of Arizona, and a member of the bipartisan group, said he had “no complaints — actually I thought it was good for the process.”
When asked on C-SPAN last month how he expected immigration to make its way through is committee, Mr. Leahy replied, “One, if the president does send up specific language, that will make it easier, ‘cause we’ll work from that. May not accept all of it, may add to it, but at least we’d have something to work off of so that would be, that would be very helpful.”
“If he were to be seen as leading the effort, it likely wouldn’t be that helpful, Mr. Flake said. “But to say that he’ll sign the bill we put on his desk, that’s helpful.”
In his speech on immigration last month, Mr. Obama said that he would include measures to protect same-sex couples, and Mr. Leahy plans to reintroduce the Uniting American Families Act in the Senate, which would grant same-sex immigrant couples the same rights as heterosexual ones.
The hearing focused largely on border security and enforcement, with an entire panel devoted to just one witness — Secretary Janet Napolitano of the Department of Homeland Security. Ms. Napolitano said that border security was often used as an excuse to prevent meaningful changes.
Last week, a House Judiciary Committee hearing on the same topic carved out clear dividing lines between House Democrats and Republicans over how to handle the millions of immigrants already in the country illegally. Many House Republicans stopped short of a path to citizenship — which their Democratic counterparts favor — and instead offered up what they said was a middle-ground option that would include only legal residency. They also made clear that they were open to breaking any immigration legislation into smaller pieces, another option most Democrats oppose.
But in a glimpse of the debate to come, Ms. Napolitano met resistance from key Republicans — including Senator Charles E. Grassley, Republican of Iowa, the committee’s ranking member, and Senator John Cornyn, Republican of Texas — over enforcement. “I do not believe that the border is secure,” Mr. Cornyn said. “And I still believe we have a long, long way to go.”
The House hearing devoted ample time to issues of border security and enforcement, a topic that will come up in the Senate’s hearing, as well. The first panel consists of just one witness, Ms. Napolitano, the secretary of homeland security, who will likely address enforcement concerns. (When the bipartisan group in the Senate laid out their broad immigration principles earlier this month, they made securing the borders a prerequisite for any other immigration overhaul, and in a news conference a few days later, Mr. Schumer said that the Department of Homeland Security would likely be tasked with determining when the borders were secure.)
The four Democratic senators in the bipartisan group — Senators Michael Bennet of Colorado and Robert Menendez of New Jersey, as well as Mr. Durbin and Mr. Schumer — were to meet with Mr. Obama at the White House on Wednesday evening to discuss the group’s progress. They hope to introduce their legislation in March.
The witness list for the hearing also offers a window into some of the inherent conflicts with which members of the Senate will struggle as they try to tackle a solution for the nation’s broken immigration system. In addition to Ms. Napolitano, witnesses include Chris Crane, president of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents’ union, and Jose Antonio Vargas, founder of Define American, which seeks to influence the dialogue in favor of immigration changes; Mr. Crane and other ICE agents sued Ms. Napolitano in federal court in Texas claiming that the Department of Homeland Security was ordering them not to deport young illegal immigrants and threatening them with disciplinary action if they tried to enforce the law, and Mr. Vargas, who was sent to the country illegally when he was 12, is one of the illegal immigrants Mr. Crane is tasked with deporting.
Jonathan
Weisman contributed reporting.
Other issues to which Mr. Leahy remains committed, aides said, include protecting refugees and ensuring that diary farmers are protected under any agriculture worker program. Mr. Grassley, meanwhile, has said that he wants to make sure the senators have learned lessons from 1986 — the last time such a broad immigration overhaul passed — like border security, as well as how to deal with the future flow of legal immigrants, especially highly skilled workers.
“I’ve got this institutional memory that I want to remind people of past mistakes,” Mr. Grassley said. “The real one was being naïve to think that you could do it once and for all.”
