Immigration: Three up in the House, three down
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) essentially ducked the question today about whether she would take up immigration reform, now that the controversial legislation has been tabled again in the Senate.
Saying she had "anticipated that we would be working on an immigration bill soon", Pelosi added that the bill's demise in the Senate would make her rethink the matter. "My conversations with our leaders on this issue in the House, as well as interested parties throughout our caucus, is that we'll come back in a week, take stock of what the options are and go from there," Pelosi told reporters.
That doesn't exactly sound like a leader rushing to take up a highly contentious issue. And with good reason: Unlike the Senate, where Republicans were more sharply divided on the issue, the House presents a much more challenging environment for Democrats, whose more than 230 members span the ideological divide more so than Republicans.
Pelosi appears headed toward the conclusion that bringing up immigration legislation would only serve to put the 30 to 40 Democrats from conservative districts in a political bind. If the legislation can't get passed in the Senate, it can't become law - so why bother putting those Democrats in a political pinch?
With that outcome likely, Capitol Briefing brings back "Three Up, Three Down", a look at three politicians who benefited from this past week's actions and three who didn't. [Three weeks ago we looked at the Senate for "Three Up, Three Down" on immigration, so today's lineup will focus on the House and who won/lost based on the Senate's inaction.]
THREE UP:
• Rep. John Boehner (R-Ohio): Things couldn't have played out much better for the House minority leader. He was fairly outspoken in his opposition to the Senate bill, which was being backed boisterously by President Bush, so Boehner won kudos from within his own conference for staking out a position independent of the White House and the Senate. He allowed an internal conference vote (114-23) on a resolution disapproving of the Senate bill. And, most importantly, because the bill failed in the Senate and isn't likely to come up in the House, Boehner's actions didn't' alienate the White House very much. He won't come under any heat from Bush next month to let more of his own troops support immigration reform.
• Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.): It's tough enough trying to fill Rep. Rahm Emanuel's shoes as chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee because of the Chicago Democrat's finely tuned media image. But the immigration legislation, were it to come to the floor, would put the 30 Democrats in battleground seats in a tough bind, particularly the dozens of districts where the anti-illegal-immigrant movement is so strong. Now, Van Hollen can stick to out-raising Republicans in terms of money while telling potential recruits that the political environment is still anti-Republican.
• Candidate GiuRomSon: That's my word for anyone but Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.). Of the top tier Republican presidential candidates, McCain was the only backer of this bill, with Rudy Giuliani, Mitt Romney and Fred Thompson all opposed. In terms of winning endorsements from House Republicans, where McCain is already lagging behind Romney, this will only hurt McCain. Thompson's opposition will help solidify his support among southern Republicans, whom he'll need as his base with his late-starting campaign.
THREE DOWN:
• Rep. Heath Shuler (D-N.C.): The former Redskins quarterback had a bad week, and not just because he went 0-3 with two strikeouts in his debut as a member of the Democratic baseball team. Shuler had already signaled his opposition to the Senate bill by joining the House Immigration Reform Caucus, a group of mostly conservative lawmakers very opposed to any bill that would provide a path toward citizenship for illegal immigrants. So how did Shuler lose if a bill he likely opposed failed? Because Shuler hails from a conservative western North Carolina district, with GOP strategists licking their chops to beat him up over his support of the "San Francisco Liberal Agenda." It actually would have been a big sign of independence from Pelosi if he had the chance to stand up and vote against his leadership on the highest profile domestic issue of the year.
• Rep Tom Tancredo (R-Colo): Tancredo's presidential campaign is going nowhere fast. Had the bill made its way to the House floor, Tancredo would have been one of the floor leaders in opposition and received lots of time on the airwaves. Any little bit of exposure would have helped.
• Attorney General Alberto Gonzales (R-White House): Sure, Gonzales isn't actually a member of Congress. But immigration is no longer on the agenda for the House and Senate Judiciary committees. Consider this: on multiple occasions this week Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) declined to discuss with Capitol Briefing the latest developments in the ongoing saga over the fired U.S. attorneys, saying he was too focused on the immigration fight on the Senate floor. By 3 p.m. yesterday, four hours after the Senate's immigration vote failed, Specter convened a press conference to discuss the scandal and spent a good deal of his time blasting Gonzales. So, any minute Specter is not spending on immigration, that's just one more minute he can commit to making Gonzales's tenure miserable.
By Paul Kane |
June 29, 2007; 4:53 PM ET
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Posted by: Patrick Huss | June 29, 2007 6:45 PM
Miserable what a word. Lets hope these bad actors, who have cost us so much, realize the damage that they have done and say they're sorry. Someday....
Posted by: WOW | June 29, 2007 9:38 PM
after watching the senate this week i cannot belive what a group of misfits we have ellected to make our laws god help america we are really in trouble
Posted by: g callahan | June 29, 2007 11:24 PM
Its no wonder you two don't post your full names along with your thoughts -you must be embarrassed by your inability to spell or create a complete sentence.
To all those people who were so vehemently opposed to immigration reform, now look at what you've got... the same damn thing you've had for decades....broken borders, millions of undocumented workers, undermining competition from farms in countries where unskilled labor is cheap and plentiful, underground economies where the undocumented are paid in cash - much of which is then sent out of the country, employers who can't find enough Americans to fill high-tech jobs, and any number of other ills stemming from the lawlessness that is the status quo.
So, to sum up, in defeating immigration reform outright, as opposed to finding an effective compromise, you have virtually guaranteed that all the things you hate about American immigration policy will continue unabated indefinitely.
Well done. Now you can all afford to hire an undocumented worker to pat you on the back.
Posted by: Patrick Huss | June 30, 2007 9:35 AM
Ninny Peloser better hear the People! We DEMAND ACTION!
I am sick as hell at her pretentious attitude that she can just behave how ever she feels! WE are the Deciderers "Lady"(And BELIEVE me, I am using THAT term loosely!).
Get you ugly Bod out of the way of the Honorable John Carter's and others way, of HR:1940-Birthright Citizenship Act!
We want it RATified, And I mean YESTERDAY!
Be a good little San Fran Nan, and I might even consider Kissing you too!-But Man, all the Baggage!(Honestly, it would almost be like kissing Kennedy, the Horse-Faced One, and Howling Dean-By Proxie!)-Yeach!
Posted by: RAT-The | June 30, 2007 2:08 PM
The feeding frenzy is on; we're talking about ultimate power games here, who in Congress becomes the next member to SAVE THE WORLD, PROTECT OUR CONSTITUTION, ETC....
As for Mr. Specter, he seems bent on a personal agenda against those who don't listen to King George.
Is it possible to have someone run for office who will REMEMBER WHO THEY REPRESENT; I say throw the whole lot out and start fresh, to many MILLIONIARES in office, with their SPECIAL INTERESTS dictating how they vote.
Posted by: HELLO | July 2, 2007 8:53 AM
This is video of a June 29 news conference with leaders of the major sectors of the electric power industry reacting to current congressional energy legislation.
Mike Eckhart, President of the American Council on Renewable Energy, Lynn Lemaster, a Senior VP at the Edison Electric Institute, Luke Popovich, a Senior VP at the National Mining Association, and Alex Flint, a Senior VP at the Nuclear Energy Institute discuss their disappointments and satisfaction regarding important provisions of current energy legislation.
Click on "Power Sector Reaction to Current Energy Legislation":
Posted by: | July 2, 2007 10:59 AM
Well children, I hear that the U.S. chamber of commerce is trying to give the Painted pig resusitation in the Senate.
Mr. Spector, needs to register as a Democrat as most of his ideas are more Democrat than Republican.
Mr. Leahy to get his hands on documents that may be top secret.
Tell me was he or was he not kicked off of the Senate Intelligence commitee because he could not keep his mouth shut during the VietNam war? His rachet jaw caused loss of U.S. lives! Think about it, and in the mean time keep your eyes and ears open to the revival of the Immigration Amnisty (protection of corporate greed) act. Have a very good day!
Posted by: h1m912009@plateautel.net | July 2, 2007 12:16 PM
Without a doubt, when it comes to immigration, all we now have is what we had before.
A government that refuses to actually enforce our current laws calling for border fencing, more Border Patrol Agents, & high tech surveillance systems, plus a DHS Chief who refuses to actually push for workplace enforcement.
The difference is, without the bill, we save on in-state college tuition costs to taxpayers, welfare or other social services costs to taxpayers, a Social Security system that is faltering, but may now last until 2040 rather than be inundated by illegal alien claimants who would bankrupt it a decade or more earlier.
Immigration "reform" need not include benefits for aliens. It does need to include "real" enforcement. It need not grant the earned income tax credit, despite tax payment amnesty. It need not include criminal alien amnesty despite already issued deportation orders for those criminals. It need not include the patent lie background checks would be done in "24 hours." The current backlogs at DHS prove they are incapable (read: bent on not doing anything at all until the backlogs are cleared by amnesty so they do not have to do any work at all!), of actually doing what they already are authorized to do, so why authorize even more loopholes?!
We do need reform. We do not need a giveaway program. That is what was planned.
We also need our government to give us two to three years of actual proof they can, will, and are, doing the border security - workplace enforcement job they were hired to do! No proof, no amnesty!
Posted by: Steve R | July 4, 2007 3:46 PM
The comments to this entry are closed.
"So, any minute Specter is not spending on immigration, that's just one more minute he can commit to making Gonzales's tenure miserable."
Go Arlen!