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Immigration Bills May Split Republicans
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Issue
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| Contributor | RP |
| Last Edited | RP Mar 02, 2006 07:52pm |
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| Category | Proposed Legislation |
| Media | Newspaper - Washington Post |
| News Date | Friday, March 3, 2006 01:50:00 AM UTC0:0 |
| Description | The Senate will begin work today on legislation to overhaul the nation's immigration laws and plug its porous borders, but a bipartisan push to create a new guest worker program has put Senate Republicans on a collision course with their counterparts in the House.
The immigration question -- one of the volatile issues in this election year -- has split Republicans as no other issue before Congress. Vociferous opponents of illegal immigration are at odds with business interests and their allies, including President Bush, who are keen on establishing new, legal avenues to bolster the labor force.
But the controversy will lie with his new H-2C visa, which could be offered to hotel workers, cleaners, restaurant workers, meat processors and other "essential occupations" by employers who say they could not fill the posts with a U.S. worker. The visa would be good for six years, after which workers would have to return to their home countries for at least a year. The visa would offer no special path toward citizenship or a legal "green card."
But Specter's search for a compromise has been rewarded with attacks from both sides of the immigration divide. The editors of the conservative National Review editorialized yesterday that Specter would offer amnesty to more than 10 million illegal immigrants and their families, then create a "permanent underclass" by keeping them in the United States as exploited "non-citizens." |
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