Congress Braces for Immigration Battle

U.S. and Mexican officials have yet to reach a deal on what to do about immigrants who came to the U.S. unlawfully, but members of Congress geared up Wednesday for a heated fight over the issue and skirmished over what solution a wary public might accept.

“I think there’s a growing recognition in the White House that the battle is going to quickly move from the negotiating table to the halls of Congress,” said Frank Sharry, executive director of the National Immigration Forum, an immigration advocacy group.

The prospect of a battle on Capitol Hill over the issue loomed larger Wednesday, as Mexican President Vicente Fox emphasized his wish for a bilateral accord by the end of the year, a timetable that would lead to a congressional debate in the run-up to U.S. elections next year.

Although White House officials did not agree to any deadline, a congressional ally of President Bush suggested the broad outlines of one approach: a gradual, phased-in overhaul of immigration policy that he predicted could pass Congress.

Rep. Chris Cannon (R-Utah), Bush’s point man on immigration policy in Congress, said an immigration reform could involve an “earned adjustment” in status that would enable undocumented immigrants to qualify for legalization after paying some sort of penalty.

“People have a tendency to say that will be OK,” Cannon said in an interview. By contrast, he added, “if you talk about amnesty, you get a total turnoff.”

Dissenting Views on ‘Earned Legalization’

But in a preview of the coming conflict, another Republican lawmaker took direct aim at such an approach.

“If they come up with a great guest worker plan, I’m very willing to look at that, and I think most of my colleagues are,” said Rep. Thomas G. Tancredo (R-Colo.), who heads a House caucus on immigration reform. “But it absolutely cannot be tied to some bogus concept of regularization or earned legalization or any kind of goofball idea like that.”

On a day in which much of official Washington was focused on Mexico, the Fox visit also sparked a range of dissent outside Congress--over the two nations’ economic relationship; shared environmental issues; and their disorderly, 2,000-mile border. Environmental protesters gathered at the State Department. Conservative activists announced an anti-amnesty petition drive. Economic nationalists decried the North American Free Trade Agreement.

From Web sites to paid advertisements to media interviews, critics expressed grievances and insecurities that have been overshadowed in recent months by attention to the blossoming friendship between Bush and Fox.

“It’s heads we win and tails you lose,” said Alan Tonelson, research fellow at the conservative U.S. Business and Industrial Council, arguing that Mexico’s position on NAFTA and other economic matters is often contrary to the U.S. national interest.

On immigration, Mexican officials pushed Wednesday for a sweeping overhaul. U.S. observers said Fox’s challenge to strike an accord by the end of the year could be met only if the White House confronts extremely difficult issues about the status of the illegal population in the U.S., estimated to number between 6 million and 8 million, half of whom are Mexican.

Although Mexican officials have called unabashedly for the “regularization” or legalization of that group, such a move remains explosive within conservative Republican Party circles.

The National Immigration Forum’s Sharry predicted Wednesday that a key feature of the emerging plan would be a temporary-worker program that might be available to some immigrants now illegally in the U.S., paving the way for legal status. Such an approach could be consistent with that outlined by Cannon.

“While it’s a tough pill to swallow for some in the GOP, it’s the only way they can achieve a policy overhaul and a political victory,” Sharry said of the legalization component. “Are they struggling with it? You bet.”

Earlier this week, a Zogby International poll conducted for the restrictionist Center for Immigration Studies found 55% of respondents opposed to amnesty, including majorities of conservatives, Democrats and union households. Even Latino voters were sharply divided.

Sympathy but Wariness on the Part of the Public

Other polls suggest greater sympathy for immigration but still underscore the public’s mixed feelings on the matter. A survey conducted last month for the pro-immigration Service Employees International Union by Republican pollster Ed Goeas and Democratic pollster Celinda Lake found that 59% of respondents would support “legislation that would legalize a limited number of undocumented immigrants.”

Recognizing the public’s wariness, Cannon said the “earned adjustment” approach could gain support because it means that immigrants who came to the U.S. unlawfully would have to pay some sort of penalty, gaining legal status only through a process that takes time.

“You don’t just come here and take benefits for breaking the law,” he said.

Already, opponents of anything resembling amnesty are organizing. Phil Kent, president of the conservative Southeastern Legal Foundation in Atlanta, said Wednesday that his organization had collected 25,000 signatures on an anti-amnesty petition, with the goal of sending 100,000 signatures to the White House.

“We abhor the idea of rewarding lawbreakers--that’s our bottom line,” said Kent, whose petition describes past amnesties as “a social and taxpayer catastrophe for the United States.”

Senate Vote Sought on Temporary Workers

Underlining the sensitivities that surround immigration, a flap was brewing inside the Senate on Wednesday, where Democratic leaders were planning to force a vote sometime this week on a bill that allows certain temporary workers in the U.S. to apply for legal status without returning to their home countries. But the issue is controversial with some Republicans, and Sen. Phil Gramm (R-Texas) threatened to block the vote.

Other Mexico-related concerns were not aimed at immigration but at the increasing economic integration and a range of trade rules that critics say have harmed U.S. workers and compromised environmental standards.

“Integration isn’t so much the problem as is the kind of integration,” said Dan Seligman, a trade expert with the Sierra Club. “Are we integrating in a way that raises standards or lowers them? We look at the U.S.-Mexican border and find that the cleanup mechanism has failed.”

Others complained about working conditions faced by low-income Mexicans in the United States.

“We’re a nation of immigrants, yet we daily visit injustice upon new arrivals to our shores--a cruel irony not lost on those of us who share experiences as children of immigrants,” said AFL-CIO President John Sweeney, whose parents came to the United States from Ireland.