The United States has always been a land of immigrants. But there's something different about our latest great wave of newcomers: They're settling in small towns and suburbs, not just the urban centers that for so long attracted the huddled masses from abroad. As a result, vast swaths of America are wrestling with questions of culture and their very identities.

The Chicago Tribune explores the patterns and the debates they're sparking in the latest installment of our United States of Anxiety series. Now we'd like you to weigh in.

How should the next president handle the hot-button issue of immigration?

And in a broader sense, what makes someone an "American" - and how is the latest immigration burst changing that, for better or worse?

We welcome your thoughts.

by Frank James

What do illegal immigration and Wall Street's financial crisis have in common? Not much it would seem. That hasn't stopped an anti-illegal immigration group, Americans for Legal Immigration PAC, from weighing in on the Wall St. bailout. It opposes it.

"We the People of America must not reward our government with more money and power for failure, as we did after 9/11," says William Gheen (ALIPAC's president.) "Otherwise, we have created a grand political and financial incentive for failure that will be repeated many times in the future."

"Instead of a bail out, we need immediate investigations, prosecutions and seizures of assets of any American or foreign business leaders who have violated laws and we need to hold politicians in DC and regulators accountable. No Amnesty for illegal aliens or Wall Street robber barons!"

Does this mean, if Gheen gets his way, we'll get to deport the investment bankers who helped create the current mess?

by Mark Silva

John McCain opened today with an old Irish joke about a couple of guys buying each other drinks at a bar and bit by bit discovering how much they have in common, even went to the same high school.

"The O'Reilly twins are getting drunk again,'' the bartender explains.

The green-garbed audience at the Irish-American Presidential Forum in Scranton, Pa., seemed to know the joke. "I'm proud to be the first Republican to appear before the forum,'' McCain, the Republican nominee for president, said to more cheers.

And before long, McCain was talking about a subject that hasn't been aired much lately: His vision for comprehensive immigration reform, helping some of the nation's 12 million undocumented immigrants find a "path to citizenship'' - including some 50,000 illegal Irish immigrants, as he noted in Scranton today.

The candidate pivoted quickly first to the bailout for Wall Street that the Bush administration is attempting to push through Congress this week.

"When we're talking about $700 billion of taxpayers' money, 'trust-me' is not good enough,'' McCain said. "Part of the reason we're facing this crisis is an antiquated system of regulatory agency.''

McCain, who has a record of allying with the Democrats on critical issues, is voicing a requirement that Democratic congressional leader also want to attach to any bailout: Limiting the pay that executives can collect from any of the financial institutions from which the government purchases bad mortgage debate.

"We can't have taxpayers footing the bill for bloated golden parachutes,'' said McCain, citing the collapse of Lehman Brothers, "where the top executives are asking for $2.5 billion in bonuses after they ran the company in the ground... The senior executives of any firm that is bailed out by Treasury should not be making more than the highest paid government official.''

McCain pledged to "fix the Wall Street mess, reform Washington... and get this country back on track....

"There are a couple of things we can learn from the Irish in that regard,'' said McCain, citing low taxes that have made the Irish strong international traders.

McCain also talked about another initiative with which he has allied with Democrats in Congress - an issue that the Republican who allied with Democrat Ted Kennedy on this hasn't been talking about much in the campaign: Immigration reform.

"I just want to remind you of a bit of history... I knew if I took on the issue of immigration, it was going to hurt me in my own party,'' said McCain, who struggled in his party's primary with a conservative base of voters who resent his advocacy of immigration reform.

This isn't the primaries any more. And McCain's Democratic rival, Sen. Barack Obama, has been going after McCain lately on immigration -- attempting to tag the Republican with radio's Rush Limbaugh and intolerant words that the talk show host has had for immigrants in Spanish-language ads airing in hotly contested Western states.

by Dave Marcus

A conservative think tank's announcement that illegal immigration to New York and other states is dropping dramatically has ignited a debate about the size of America's population of undocumented workers.

The Center for Immigration Studies, which calls for tighter enforcement of immigration laws, estimated yesterday that illegal immigration plunged across the country by 11 percent in the past year. "This may be due to the economy, or it may be due to the fact that places like Long Island have become more enforcement-oriented," said Steven Camarota, the group's research director.

Organizations that support immigrants' rights criticize the counting methods and deride the report as unscientific. "It's wishful thinking that as the economy gets worse, as we throw more money on the border and as the presidential candidates stop talking about it, somehow that'll solve illegal immigration," said Angela Kelley, director of the Immigration Policy Center in Washington, D.C.

The controversial report, "Homeward Bound," puts the number of undocumented residents nationwide at 11.2 million, 1.3 million fewer than last summer. At that rate, that number would be halved in five years, the report add.

Dave Marcus writes for Newsday. Read the full story on the immigration report at www.newsday.com.

by Paul West

News flash: Barack Obama and John McCain share an identical position on a matter of intense interest to voters--immigration--that is a symbol of Washington's failure to solve the nation's problems.

Does that mean something will finally get done about immigration when the new president takes over? Surprisingly, perhaps, the answer appears to be "No." And that might raise questions about exactly how much change the next president will deliver.

At the moment, Obama and McCain are intensifying their efforts to gain support from Latinos, whose votes have the power to decide the presidential election. Both candidates support a comprehensive overhaul of immigration law, an issue that remains stalemated at the national level.

Chants of "Si, se puede (yes, we can)" greeted Obama's pledge here the other day, to representatives of the nation's oldest Hispanic organization, that he'd "bring undocumented immigrants out of the shadows" and "avoid creating second-class servants in our midst."

When McCain promoted a plan to give millions of illegal immigrants a path to citizenship, it nearly cost him the Republican nomination. His rhetoric is more muted now. But he remains dedicated to dealing "practically and humanely" with those who are here illegally, he told the same Hispanic audience that Obama addressed.

The next round in their duel for Hispanic votes will come in separate speeches to the National Council of La Raza, which calls itself the largest Hispanic civil rights and advocacy organization, at its current convention in San Diego.

By itself, having a supporter of immigration reform in the White House means little. A weakened President Bush was no match for grassroots activists, whipped up by conservative talk radio, who blocked the attempt to push immigration reform through Congress in his second term.

According to those who track the issue, the key to breaking the stalemate is early action in the next president's tenure, when his influence will be greatest.

by Frank James

Reporters received an e-mail today of a website posting from ALIPAC, a group that's part of Americans for Legal Immigration which opposes comprehensive immigration reform. The posting expressed outrage at Sen. Barack Obama's comments made earlier in the week at a Georgia campaign stop:

In case you missed it, Obama said the following:

"I don't understand when people are going around saying, 'We need to have English only.' They want to pass a law 'We want English only.' Now I agree that immigrants should learn English. I agree with that. But understand this. Instead of worrying about whether immigrants can learn English. They'll learn English. You need to make sure your child can speak Spanish. You should be thinking about how can your child become bilingual. We should have every child speaking more than one language. It's embarrassing when Europeans come over here, they all speak English, they speak French, they speak German. And then we go over to Europe and all we can say is merci beaucoup, right?" (crowd applauds.)

Responding to Obama, the ALIPAC posting says in part:

Barrack (sic) Obama has stepped on a political land mine by stating Americans should be forced to learn to speak Spanish.

YouTube videos showing his speech have gone viral and the new media is quickly distributing his comments, which are opposed by approximately 4 out of 5 Americans according to Rasmussen Report polling from last month, which shows Eighty-three percent (83%) place a higher priority on encouraging immigrants to speak English as their primary language. Just 13% take the opposite view and say it is more important for Americans to learn other languages.

But what looks like a land mine to some is a stepping stone to others.

First off, it's not like Obama ever had much of a chance with voters who agree with ALIPAC in being completely opposed to any path that would provide legal status to illegal immigrants. Obama, after all, favors giving undocumented immigrants drivers licenses. At least that's what he said during a Democratic debate a few months back.

But his statement about the need for teaching children Spanish will be interpreted by many as showing respect for one of the world's great cultures. It will likely play very well with many Hispanic voters who are themselves bilingual and view bilingualism as positive, not an evil.

by Matthew Hay Brown

Growing up in the West African nation of Mali, Alima Traore assumed that girls everywhere had to undergo the procedure.

"In my country, it is usually an old lady" who performs the crude surgery, the 29-year-old woman said in her attorney's office. "They have a traditional knife for it. They cut your intimate parts. This knife is used for many girls."

It wasn't until Traore came to the United States eight years ago that she learned that female genital mutilation has been condemned the world over as a human rights abuse. Now that she's here - she has been living in Maryland since 2000 - she doesn't want to go back.

Traore's fight against deportation - her student visa expired in 2003 - has put her at the center of a growing dispute between rights groups and the Bush administration over whether victims of the practice also known as female circumcision, or female genital cutting, qualify for asylum here.

Read about the debate in today's Baltimore Sun.

In considering her case last fall, the Board of Immigrations Appeals described the "infliction of FGM" as "reprehensible." But the board, a tribunal within the Department of Justice, ruled that Traore does not have a well-founded fear of future persecution if she were to return to Mali, because the damage, though permanent, has already been done.

That interpretation, which now is binding on immigration judges, has drawn criticism from rights advocates, physicians and others, who say it defies federal case law and reverses the board's own reasoning in earlier, similar cases.

by Jim Tankersley

At a basic level, the art of presidential politics is knowing just how far you can drift from your "base" supporters and still win their votes. It's an art both John McCain and Barack Obama practiced heavily last week.

Fresh from securing the Democratic nomination, Obama rankled liberals with a series of policy announcements that seem targeted at moderate swing voters, including: supporting a compromise bill on federal government phone surveillance, opposing a Supreme Court decision barring the death penalty for child rapists and carefully phrasing his reaction to a Court decision striking down the District of Columbia's handgun ban to express no judgment on whether he believes the ban was constitutional.

McCain, meanwhile, reopened a longtime feud with conservatives by slamming Obama for allegedly helping to kill a comprehensive immigration reform bill in the Senate. McCain sponsored that bill, but charges from his rivals that it constituted "amnesty" for illegal immigrants forced the Arizona senator to back away from it during the GOP primaries.

It's easy to see which groups both men are courting. McCain is after Latinos, a voting bloc that could sway the election in states such as Colorado, New Mexico, Nevada and Florida. In the parlance of the 2004 election, Obama appears to be after rural "NASCAR dads" who favor gun rights and suburban "security moms" who worry about crime and terrorist attacks.

Tacking to the center for a general election is a time-honored tradition in presidential politics. But the strategy could carry particular risk for both these candidates.

by Rick Pearson

Sen. Barack Obama's presidential campaign is going after Republican rival Sen. John McCain, questioning whether the Arizona senator is offering contradictory language on the hot-button issue of immigration reform following a closed-door meeting McCain held with activists during a recent trip to Chicago.

The criticism leveled by Robert Gibbs, Obama's communications director, marked a day of accusations between the Obama and McCain camps over which presumptive presidential nominee is more guilty of political doublespeak--a shorthand way to describe pandering versus truth telling. The Obama camp's move may be aimed at deflecting criticism the Democratic candidate said one thing--promising to negotiate a pact with McCain on public financing--and did another by rejecting it.

In the aftermath of McCain's closed-door visit with more than 100 Hispanic leaders on Wednesday--sandwiched into a fundraising visit by the Republican contender--a conservative anti-illegal immigration activist who attended the meeting contended McCain was offering conservatives one view of immigration reform while telling Latinos another.

In the meeting, attendees said McCain promised that, if elected, Congress would pass a comprehensive immigration reform bill. That's anathema to people like Rosanna Pulido, the director of the Illinois Minuteman Project, who attended the event. Pulido said McCain used the phrase "comprehensive immigration reform" three times. "To me, it's a code word for amnesty" for illegal immigrants to gain citizenship, she said.

by Matthew Hay Brown

Maryland's highest court has rejected a Pakastani man's attempt to invoke talaq, the Islamic divorce that enables a man to dissolve his marriage by telling his wife "I divorce thee" three times.

Farah Aleem already had filed for divorce in Montgomery County Circuit Court in 2003 when her husband went to the Pakstiani Embassy in Washington to invoke the talaq.

By doing so, World Bank economist Irfan Aleem argued, he ended the marriage and did not owe his wife a share of his assets, valued at $2 million.

The state Court of Appeals disagreed.

"If we were to affirm the use of talaq, controlled as it is by the husband, a wife, a resident of this state, would never be able to consummate a divorce action filed by her in which she seeks a division of marital property," the judges ruled.

The talaq, they wrote, "directly deprives the wife of the due process she is entitled to when she initiates divorce litigation."

Nick Madigan of The Baltimore Sun has the rest of the story, after the jump.

bv Matthew Hay Brown

An Idaho high school teacher put a student's Mexican flag in a garbage can this week, fueling a protest from the community's Latino popluation, according to news reports.

Froyland Camelo told The Times-News of Twin Falls that he was celebrating Cinco de Mayo on Monday at Minico High School in Rupert when a physical education teacher "grabbed" the flag from him. When the 16-year-old ninth-grader asked for the flag back, he said, teacher Clint Straatman taunted him.

"I said, 'What's the problem?'" Camelo told the newspaper. "He said, 'The problem is that we are in the United States and not in Mexico.' He grabbed it from me. He threw the flag in the garbage can."

Straatman acknowledged taking the flag and putting it in the garbage can, but said he was protecting Camelo from "white kids" who might have hurt him.

"I had to confiscate it so it wouldn't escalate any problems in class," Straatman told The Times-News. "We're worried about that stuff all the time. We always have kids saying stuff to each other, and we have a lot of fights between kids."

by Matthew Hay Brown

A day after Congressional Hispanic Caucus members blasted Democratic leaders for failing to take on comprehensive immigration reform, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said she appreciates their frustration.

"I am frustrated, too," the California Democrat told reporters today. "And as I have said since the day we took over here, we're not going to have an immigration bill unless the president takes the lead on it. There is no way to have a partisan immigration bill. And we saw what happened in the Senate on it."

An immigration reform package collapsed last year in the face of Republican objections. Democrats this year have attempted to pass individual bills focusing on highly skilled and seasonal workers, but the all-Democratic Hispanic caucus has blocked what members call piecemeal legislation.

Rep. Joe Baca of Texas, the caucus chairman, called such efforts "nothing more than a Band-Aid being used to cover up a gaping wound," in comments reported by the Associated Press.

"My party wants to do what is easy, not exactly what is right," added Rep. Luis Gutierrez of Illinois. "The leaders in our party who are arguing for consideration of helping just a few immigrants are risking the future of all immigrants."

Rep. Raul Grijalva called fellow Democrats "spineless."

by Josh Drobnyk

Hillary Clinton’s campaign today abruptly cancelled a meeting that some of her volunteers scheduled with Hazleton Mayor Lou Barletta, calling the matter a “mistake” brewed by over-eager supporters of the New York senator.

The meeting would have been striking because Barletta is a Republican running against Rep. Paul Kanjorski, a Clinton supporter. Also, the mayor is at odds with Clinton over immigration policy. He has gained national attention for introducing an ordinance to crack down on businesses that employ illegal aliens and landlords that rent to them. Clinton supported a Senate measure last year to give illegal aliens a path to citizenship.

“The campaign has volunteers who go to primary states on their own and discuss Sen. Clinton’s record on different issues,” said Clinton communications director Howard Wolfson. “In this instance they made a mistake. As soon as we found out about it, of course the meeting was cancelled. … There is no way that the campaign would authorize a meeting with Mayor Barletta.”

Barletta’s camp didn’t take news of the cancelled meeting lightly.

“A half-hour before they were supposed to be in Hazleton, Sheila Menz, Senator Clinton’s economic development aide, told Campaign Manager Vince Galko they were unable to attend the meeting they arranged,” said Shawn Kelly, a Barletta campaign spokesman. “What happened? Why did they set the meeting then cancel it?”

Barletta's campaign has invited all of the presidential candidates to meet with the mayor to discuss immigration policy. Presumptive GOP nominee John McCain's campaign has said he's far too busy -- all the way through November.

by Matthew Hay Brown

A leading Latino civil rights group is calling on the Bush administration to suspend local law enforcement of federal immigration law after an undocumented immigrant was left in an Arkansas jail cell for four days without food, water or a toilet.

Adriana Torres-Flores, 38, was arrested for selling pirated CDs at a Washington County flea market and ordered held March 6 when authorities discovered she was in the country illegally, according to news reports. A bailiff took her to a holding cell and then forgot about her.

That was a Thursday. A snowstorm hit the region, and a reduced staff at the courthouse did not hear her cries for help that night, or any of the next three days.

According to the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund, Torres-Flores was trapped in a cell measuring nine feet by 10 feet, where she drank her own urine and used a shoe for a pillow. She finally was discovered on Monday, March 11.

Washington County is one of several local jurisdictions that have entered into an agreement with the Department of Homeland Security. In a letter to the department, MALDEF President John Trasviña is asking Secretary Michael Chertoff to suspend all such agreements pending a “thorough examination” of their impacts on “the civil rights of all individuals” – citizen and immigrant, legal and illegal.

by Frank James

What could stir up illegal immigration hardliners as much as the word amnesty? Try the idea that Illegal immigrants could get rebate checks through the economic stimulus plan now being considered in Congress.

Conservative bloggers and others who want more cracking down on illegal immigration have been riled up in recent days by the notion that people illegally in the U.S. could receive some of those rebate checks President Bush and most in Congress are determined to send out to get consumers spending again in order to keep the economy from slowing any further.

Illegal immigration hardliners have accused the House legislation which was passed earlier this week of containing a loophole that would allow the undocumented to receive rebate checks. That's because the House bill doesn't require a valid Social Security number for someone to receive a rebate.

The Senate, which is now working on its own economic-stimulus package, has included a requirement for valid Social Security numbers.

To quell the controversy, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and House Minority Leader John Boehner issued a joint statement this morning meant to reassure illegal immigration hardliners that the federal government won't be sending free money to illegal immigrants:

“The legislation that we authored, and which passed the House Tuesday with overwhelming bipartisan support, would not allow any taxpayer funds to be distributed to illegal immigrants. In fact, the bill includes language similar to the provisions included in the 2001 and 2003 tax relief bills to prevent illegal immigrants from receiving any benefits. We will take legislative action to clarify and underscore this prohibition so we can expedite the rebates to millions of eligible Americans.”

by Frank James

Arizona's get-tough approach on illegal immigration is being watched closely around the nation, and here in Washington, by federal immigration enforcement officials, policymakers, lawmakers immigration advocates and opponents, just about anyone with any interest in the issue.

What they're seeing so far is that in advance of a new Arizona law cracking down on the hiring of illegal immigrants that is set to take effect Jan. 1, employers are firing undocumented workers and illegal residents are also leaving the state, some saying they're departing for good.

The Arizona Republic, the Wall Street Journal, the Associated Press and others, have all produced stories recently looking at what's occuring in Arizona.

The Republic story, by reporter Daniel González, which ran earlier this week, starts this way:

NOGALES, Sonora - It's a common scene this time of year: streams of overloaded cars, pickups and vans with U.S. license plates crossing into Mexico for the holidays.

Most are filled with Hispanic families from Arizona and other states on their way to visit relatives south of the border for a few weeks before heading back to the U.S. But this year, the holiday travelers are being joined by scores of families such as Jorge and Liliana Franco, who are driving to Mexico not to visit but to stay - permanently.

Congress' failure to pass comprehensive immigration reform, immigration crackdowns, Arizona's new employer-sanctions law and a sluggish economy have combined to create a climate that undocumented families such as the Francos no longer find hospitable.

The number returning to Mexico is difficult to calculate, but there is no question that many families are leaving, according to Mexican government officials, local community leaders and immigrants themselves.

"The situation in Arizona has become very tough," Jorge said minutes after driving into a Mexican immigration and customs checkpoint south of the border on Mexico 15.

by Frank James

We reported back in September about a lawsuit the Homeland Security Department filed against Illinois to stop the state from interfering with the use by employers in Illinois of the E-Verify system to check workers' legal status to work in the U.S.

Homeland Security and the state have reached an agreement that will permit employers in Illinois to use the Internet-linked federal database to check to see if their workers are legally in the U.S. and allowed by law to work.

Here's a press release from the federal agency.

Statement by Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff on the E-VERIFY LAWSUIT WITH ILLINOIS

In September, we filed a lawsuit in federal court to declare invalid an Illinois statute that effectively forbids Illinois employers from enrolling in the department’s E-Verify system. The statute was to become effective on January 1, 2008, but in papers filed with the court yesterday, the state agreed not to enforce it until the department’s lawsuit against the state is resolved. It also disclosed that the Illinois legislature is considering a bill to address the legal issues raised in the suit.

The department will communicate with each of the Illinois employers enrolled in E-Verify to let them know that they may continue using E-Verify without fear of a state enforcement action on January 1. The state’s decision also allows employers planning to enroll in E-Verify to do so without the threat of state enforcement against them. Illinois employers will now have the ability to verify the legality of their workforce without interruption or fear of reprisal by the state.

by Frank James

If a candidate wants to potentially lose a lot of Hispanic votes, then he or she should focus on cracking down on illegal immigrants.

That's one important take-away message from a new Pew Hispanic Center poll released today. The survey suggests that when politicians, particularly Republicans, try to outcompete each other on immigration enforcement, many Hispanics take such talk personally.

This is from the center's summary of the poll's results:

...Just over half of all Hispanic adults in the U.S. worry that they, a family member or a close friend could be deported, a new nationwide survey of Latinos by the Pew Hispanic Center has found. Nearly two-thirds say the failure of Congress to enact an immigration reform bill has made life more difficult for all Latinos. Smaller numbers (ranging from about one-in-eight to one-in-four) say the heightened attention to immigration issues has had a specific negative effect on them personally. These effects include more difficulty finding work or housing; less likelihood of using government services or traveling abroad; and more likelihood of being asked to produce documents to prove their immigration status...

by Frank James

Gov. Mike Huckabee's increasingly hawkish view on immigration is drawing the ire of immigration advocates who criticize the Republican presidential candidate for going from a relatively humane position on dealing with illegal immigrants to a get-tough approach that would give the undocumented four months to exit the U.S., period.

Huckabee recently introduced his "Secure America" plan which includes a proposal that, if enacted, would require the estimated 12 million to 20 million illegal immigrants in the country to immediately register with the Customs and Immigration Enforcement agency, then give them 120 days to voluntarily leave the country. His plan suggests this approach is the only way to prevent an amnesty.

Those who failed to leave would be face deportation if arrested and would be barred from re-entering the U.S. for 10 years. The dislocation the sudden "voluntary' exit of 12 million to 20 million people would cause to communities across the U.S. isn't dealt with in Huckabee's proposal.

The position is clearly an attempt by Huckabee to accomplish two things. The mood is such in much of the nation, particularly among many Republicans who will vote in the Iowa caucuses and early primaries, to crack down on illegal immigration, and Huckabee is trying to synchronize his view with those voters.

by Frank James

You may have heard of the E-Verify system the federal government wants employers to use to establish that workers are in the U.S. legally and thus eligible to work.

The Homeland Security Department is so serious about employers using it, it's suing Illinois because the state has thrown up a roadblock to keep employers in the state from using the system which, Illinois says, is flawed.

Given how determined the federal government is about employers using the Internet-based system, you would think the federal government would itself be uniformly relying on it to make sure the contractors it hires aren't using illegal workers. You would be wrong.

This irony hasn't escaped the attention of Sen. Charles Grassley who is calling on the federal goverment to practice what it preaches.

Grassley sent letters today asking the relevant officials to change this curious lack of urgency on the federal government's part to make comprehensive use of its own E-Verify system.

Here are letters he sent today to Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff and Jean Manning, Chief Cousel for Employment in the Senate's Office of the Secretary:

New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer, center, walks with fellow Democatic New Yorkers Rep. Nita Lowey, l, and Rep. Carolyn Maloney, r, to a drivers-license news conference on Capitol Hill. Wednesday, Nov. 15, 2007 (AP Photos/Susan Walsh)

by Glenn Thrush, Carol Eisenberg and James Madore

A humbled New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer — facing a near-insurrection from New York Democrats — is ditching his controversial plan to grant drivers’ licenses to illegal immigrants that provoked a massive national backlash.

Spitzer will announce he’s “scrapping the plan” after a meeting of the state’s congressional delegation on Capitol Hill this morning, according to his spokeswoman, Christine Anderson.

The license proposal had proven to be a political albatross for Democratic supporters, especially Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, who was grilled on the issue during a debate in Philadelphia late last month.

Democrats and New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg had pressured the governor to drop the proposal, which garnered the support of only one-third of New Yorkers, according to polls.

“The heat was rising on Eliot, and he reacted,” said one Spitzer ally, among a handful of Democrats the governor reached out to last night

By Matthew Hay Brown

Praise for a white Department of Homeland Security employee who dressed for an office Halloween party as a dark-skinned, dreadlocked prisoner could cost the the official who oversees Immigration and Customs Enforcement her Senate confirmation.

President Bush used a recess appointment to install Julie Myers as assistant secretary of homeland security in January 2006 after her nomination stalled in the full Senate. Bush renominated her in January 2007, but the Senate has yet to vote on her confirmation.

Now one senator has placed a temporary block on that vote, and Majority Leader Harry Reid is saying that the White House may want to reconsider its support for the embattled administrator.

“I believe that people who serve in government should be sensitive to religious issues, racial issues – personal issues,” Reid told reporters today. “And from what I know about the Halloween party, this woman was involved in awarding a prize to something that I think was very insensitive to what our country’s trying to work through.

“I personally would take a real close look at that before we are able to go the mat,” he said. “I think the White House should really take another look at this person.”

by Frank James

Sen. Richard Durbin’s legislation called the DREAM Act failed to gain the needed 60 votes in the Senate to move forward today and thus gets shelved.

The legislation, which failed on a 52–44 vote, would have granted legal status to young undocumented immigrants so long as they came to the U.S. before age 16, lived here for at least five years and finished two years in of college or served the same amount of time in the military.

The legislation’s opponents called it amnesty and, as members of Congress have learned the hard way over the past two years, any legislation that can be so branded ignites the ire of millions of voters and thus is doomed to death on Capitol Hill.

The bill’s supporters were concerned before the vote that they might not reach the magic 60 votes because some senators who are also presidential candidates might be away campaigning. Sen. Barbara Boxer was also in California to be with her wildfire-harried constituents during their moment of need.

But only four senators missed the vote, not enough to matter. Besides Boxer fellow Democratic Senators Edward Kennedy and Chris Dodd, a presidential candidate, missed it as did Republican presidential candidate John McCain.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents raid, January 2007. Credit: Mark Avery/AP Photo.

by Frank James

Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff and members of his department have reason to be more frustrated today. A federal district court judge in San Francisco placed a temporary injunction on the department's effort to crack down on employers who employ illegal workers.

The injunction freezes the federal government's efforts to use so-called no-match letters in which employers are informed that workers' Social Security numbers don't jibe the government's records.

After being informed of an inconsistency, workers have a chance to show that the government's records are wrong. If they can't, employers are bound by law to fire those workers or face federal fines and even criminal sanctions

Labor groups, the American Civil Liberties Union, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and immigration groups joined together to sue the federal government, claiming that mistakes in the federal database would penalize workers legally entitled to work in the U.S.

U.S. District Court Judge Charles Breyer essentially said that not issuing an injunction would cause more harm to employers and workers than to the federal government.

by Kirsten Scharnberg

Everything about Rosa screams overachieving high school senior: Her 3.7 grade point average, her hectic schedule of cross-country practices and community theater rehearsals, her hopes of working her way through college to become a registered nurse.

But Rosa, 17, a soft-spoken honors student, worries every day about something the typical American teenager never has to think about: Being deported because she is an undocumented immigrant.

"Some days I feel overwhelmed by it -- just hopeless," said the young woman who came to Chicago with her parents at age 7. "But other days I have a lot of hope that things will be OK, that everything will work out somehow."

Under new and controversial legislation championed by Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill., shown at left), Rosa's dreams -- graduating near the top of her class and attending college -- could change her status as an illegal immigrant. The Tribune is not publishing her surname because she is a dependent minor.

Known as the Dream Act, or Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors Act, the legislation would provide hundreds of thousands of undocumented immigrants a path to citizenship if they were brought to the U.S. as children, are younger than 30, have graduated from a U.S. high school and either enroll in college or enlist in the military.

See the rest of the story in today's Tribune:

by Frank James

The Homeland Security Department is suing Illinois to undo a new state law the federal agency says would make it more difficult to enforce the nation's immigration laws.

The law is an amendment to Illinois's “Right to Privacy in the Workplace Act" which would make it impossible, says Homeland Security, for employers to participate in a voluntary federal program many currently use to verify whether new employees are legally entitled to work in the U.S.

Called E-Verify, the Internet program allows employers to transmit to the federal government certain identity information which permits immigration officials to confirm (or not) whether the employees can be legally employed.

About 93 percent of such queries come back either immediately or, if a manual check is necessary, the next day, confirming that an employee is eligible to work in the U.S. The rest are categorized as "tentative non-confirmations."

The employee can decide not to contest the non-confirmation. If he does contest it, Homeland Security will further investigate the matter, but that can take weeks.

Here's where the new Illinois law comes in. It essentially says that until Homeland Security can conduct 99 percent of those investigations within three days, it's illegal for all businesses operating in Illinois to participate in the E-Verify program.

Thus the lawsuit which was filed by the Justice Department on behalf of Homeland Security today. It's the first such lawsuit the federal government has filed since no other state has taken on the federal program as frontally as Illinois has.

It would seem that Illinois will have a challenge in persuading a federal court to see things its way since the Constitution's "supremacy clause" generally gives federal law the upper hand over state laws.

In an interview with me, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said:

"The state of Illinois has now made it illegal to comply with federal law. That's not acceptable as a matter of the Constitution and it's not acceptable as a matter of our discharging our federal obligation to enforce the immigration laws."

by William Neikirk

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich says he is "sickened" that President Bush and Congress went on vacation "while young Americans in our cities are massacred by people who should not be here."

In a newsletter released today, Gingrich cited the recent execution-style murders of three college-bound students in Newark as evidence that "there is a war here at home, and it is even more deadly than the war in Iraq and Afghanistan." Another student survived a gunshot wound.

Two of four suspects in that case are illegal immigrants "or aliens," as Gingrich called them, who had been charged with other crimes in the U.S. but yet were not detained by authorities. One is from Peru, the other from Nicaragua.

The Georgia Republican, now with a conservative think tank in Washington who still has his eye on the presidency, called on Bush and Congress to come back to town in a special session for three days to deal with the problem by passing a bill to identify illegal immigrants who have committed crimes. He first mentioned this case in Ames, Iowa, where he spoke at a Republican gathering Saturday night.

Homeland Security Sec'y Michael Chertoff: Striking at the job ''magnet.'' (Photo by Getty Images/Brendan Smialowski)

by Mark Silva

The Bush administration, which for several years has failed to win any reform of the nation's immigration laws, spelled out a lengthy agenda for enforcement of existing laws today aimed at cracking down on illegal immigration.

In the absence of a new, more welcoming law -- which the president has sought with proposed guest-worker and temporary-worker programs that might bring more specialized workers into the United States temporarily and also acknowledge the millions already here illegally -- the White House is turning to tough tactics with existing laws.

The president last year had announcedt he would increase the size of the Border Patrol by 6,000 agents, doubling the size of the patrol during his presidency -- taking it to 18,000. Today, the administration announced an increase of 1,700, aiming for 20,000 in 2009.

"We all know a critical part of immigration enforcement is effective interior and worksite enforcement,'' Homeland Security Sec'y Michael Chertoff said today, "because the magnet that brings most economic migrants into this country is work. If we have worksite enforcement directed at illegal employment, we strike at that magnet.''

For the president's party, the quest for immigration reform has sparked a political backfire, with conservatives revolting over the notion of legal recognition for the millions of undocumented workers already living in the United States. Enforcement of the border laws, however, is music to the ears of those who have criticized the administration for getting soft on immigration.

by Andrew Zajac

The United States is actually encouraging illegal and life-threatening illegal immigration by slowing down visa applications from Cubans seeking to legally migrate to the U.S. according to Cuba's chief diplomat in the U.S.

Dagoberto Rodriguez, chief of the Cuban Interests Section in Washington, also rejects the State Department's explanation that Cuba is stalling matters at the U.S. Interests Section in Havana.

"There have been any number of instances over the last few months where vital equipment and supplies, personnel needed to repair some of our-some of the things in our Interests Section have been blocked or prevented from entry by the Cuban Government,” State Department spokesman Tom Casey said.

For more, see the story in today's Tribune:

by Karoun Demirjian

A group of Republican Senators introduced a strict, enforcement-only measure to address lingering questions on immigration late this week, the latest of several measures put forward to address piecemeal components of reform in the wake of the failed comprehensive legislation in June.

The bill is backed by what would have been an unlikely fraternity of senators a month ago, partnering two of the failed Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act’s biggest detractors-Sens. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) and John Cornyn (R-Texas)-with Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.), Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.), and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.)-three of the legislation’s most stalwart supporters.

Critics say the move is a political one for the former advocates of compromise reform, who had to endure a deluge of criticism from conservative colleagues and constituents for advocating a temporary guestworker program and a pathway to citizenship for illegal aliens-programs favored by most Democrats and President Bush, but that the growing anti-reform bent of the Republican party is “silly and dangerous.”

“We’ve always approached this debate in a studiously bipartisan fashion,” said Frank Sharry, director of the National Immigration Forum, a pro-immigrant advocacy group. “But we’re growing increasingly concerned at the direction the Republican Party is taking on this.”

by Frank James

Gallup has a new poll result that's not surprising, given the tenor of much of the recent immigration debate here in Washington--Americans are a lot more negative about immigrants' impact on the U.S. than they were earlier in the decade.

As Gallup's report puts it:

PRINCETON, NJ -- Americans have become more negative about the impact of immigrants on various dimensions of life in the United States than was the case in the earlier years of this decade. Americans continue to believe that immigrants to the United States have improved food, music, and the arts, although less so than in 2001 and 2002. Americans say that immigrants have had little net impact on taxes either way. On the other hand, Americans believe that immigrants have tended to make crime, the economy, social and moral values, and job opportunities worse rather than better. The perceived impact of immigrants on all of these except job opportunities has become more negative this year.

This raises the question of whether major immigration reforms will have to wait until these attitudes take a more positive shift. A more fundamental question is: what could change these attitudes, if anything?

By Christi Parsons

ORLANDO, Fla.--Rep. Joe Baca (D-Cal.) was clearly angry.

"Some would have us rewrite the inscription on the Statue of Liberty," he said. "'Give me your skilled, your highly educated, your English-speaking masses . . . Give me your temporary workers from the Rio Grande shores.'"

The sarcastic suggestion was a prelude to a question Baca posed at a forum with Democratic presidential candidates on Saturday, which took place at a conference of Latino politicians going on at Disney World this weekend.

And it left no question about Baca's opinion about the current state of the public debate over American immigration laws. Like many others at the meeting of the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials here, he is mad that the Senate failed last week to pass a plan creating a path to citizenship for immigrants now living in the country illegally and sees a negative tone to the larger discussion.

In public addresses and informal conversations held here this week, the constant theme has been about the failed reform package – and about what many see as an anti-immigrant and even anti-Latino undercurrent to the talks surrounding it.

There is unmistakable disdain for Republicans who didn't support the plan and who declined the invitation to address the organization. The only Republican to accept an invitation to all of the GOP presidential candidates was Rep. Duncan Hunter of California.

In his luncheon talk about the political power of Latino voters on Saturday, Sen. Bob Menendez (D-New Jersey) referred to the Republican candidates as the people "who would not give you the respect of attending" the week's events.

The ballroom clattered with the sound of people hastily putting down their forks and knives to give Menendez a hearty round of applause for the remark.

by Frank James

The Senate's attempt to keep the controversial immigration-reform bill alive failed minutes ago, with 46 senators voting to keep it going, and 53 against, well short of the 60 needed to keep going.

This was the second time in as many months that the bill, which would have given a path to citizenship to the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants while strengthening border security and enforcement, was declared dead. But this time it looked like it would stay dead.

Sen. Harry Reid, the Senate Majority Leader, said he was disappointed but, ever the optimist, added that a lot of new friendships were made as a coalition of Democratic and Republican senators worked together on the bill, so it wasn't a total loss.

He predicted Congress wouild return to immigration again. But no one expects that to be any time before the next election.

For President Bush, who invested much of what little political capital he had remaining in the effort to get the bill through the Senate, it was perhaps his last chance of his presidency for a significant domestic legislative accomplishment, further accentuating his lame duck status.

Here's the way the Associated Press reported on the legislation's demise:

By CHARLES BABINGTON, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Senate drove a stake Thursday through President Bush's plan to legalize millions of unlawful immigrants, likely postponing major action on immigration until after the 2008 elections.

The bill's supporters fell 14 votes short of the 60 needed to limit debate and clear the way for final passage of the legislation, which critics assailed as offering amnesty to illegal immigrants. The vote was 46 to 53 in favor of limiting the debate.

by Frank James

As expected, the Senate immigration debate this morning has been passionate, with senators' voices raised on both sides of issue.

Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) accused the opponents of cynicism because of the way they've used Senate procedure to kill the bill.

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) paced the floor as he said that the 12 million illegal immigrants aren't going to disappear and as he urged his fellow senators to vote for continuing the immigration-bill debate and to spend less time worrying about their personal political futures.

Meanwhile, Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), a caustic opponent of the legislation, lashed out at the "masters of the universe" (the bill's supporters in the Senate) who only gave critics 10 minutes of debate time versus the 50 minutes supporters received.

Sessions minutes ago recently announced that the Senate's sergeant-at-arms has announced that the Senate's phone lines are down because of all the phone calls coming in.

Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) is channeling Martin Luther King Jr. in shouting "now is the time" again and again in saying that the Senate should vote this morning to continue the debate, not end it.

Meanwhile, weighing over the debate is the darkside of American life. As reported by Jeff Zeleny, our former Tribune colleague who writes now for the New York Times, a number of senators have received ominous threats, death threats apparently, from those opposed to the legislation.

by Frank James

Here's the schedule for this morning's Senate immigration debate, courtesy of Joe Shoemaker, press secretary to Sen. Richard Durbin (D-Ill.) the Senate Majority Whip, the second in command for the Senate's majority.

Based on this schedule, we should know by 11 or so whether or not the immigration bill is dead or alive.

Thursday, June 28, 2007

· The Senate will convene at 9:30am.

· No morning business.

· The Senate will resume consideration of a bill to provide for comprehensive immigration reform and for other purposes (S. 1639).

· There will be one hour for debate only, with 25 minutes under the control of Senator Kennedy, 25 minutes under the control of Senator Specter, and 10 minutes under the control of Senator Sessions.

· Upon the use or yielding back of this hour, the Republican Leader may be recognized to speak for up to 10 minutes, to be followed by the Majority Leader for up to 10 minutes.

· Upon the use or yielding back of this time, the Senate will proceed to a roll-call vote on the motion to invoke cloture on S. 1639.

by Frank James

Here's a pdf (Download file)
with the 373 pages of amendments to the Senate immigration bill. Unfortunately, I deleted the e-mail from a congressional staffer which gave a thumbnail for each of the 24 amendments. Maybe an immigration expert out there can tell us what's in here.

by Frank James

Senators voted 64-35 to reconsider the immigration-reform bill that looked dead only a few weeks ago but is not enjoying a Lazarus-like resurrection.

While a few Democrats like Sens. Byron Dorgan of North Dakota and Matt Baucus of Montana voted against reconsidering the controversial legislation, the vast majority of Democrats and enough Republicans banded together to push the vote beyond the 60 needed to take up the bill again.

Today's crucial test vote represents a victory for the president at a time when there has been precious little to celebrate.

But the bill isn't out of the woods yet since deliberations could still break down in the next few days during the debate that will take place in the Senate, a debate in which the Senate will use arcane procedures in an attempt to get the bill to a final-passage vote on Friday.

by Frank James

President Bush gave a speech earlier today at the Old Executive Office Building that was meant to give a boost to today's Senate vote on whether to proceed with the controversial immigration-reform bill.

It wasn't one of the president's better efforts, containing a few of those Bushisms, those manglings of words, that are the president's trademark.

For instance, the president said:

You know, I've heard all the rhetoric -- you've heard it, too -- about how this is amnesty. Amnesty means that you've got to pay a price for having been here illegally, and this bill does that.

Actually, amnesty means you don't pay a price. And the president didn't really mean to call the Senate bill an amnesty, did he? That's what the bill's opponents call it.

Here's his entire speech:

THE PRESIDENT: Thank you all. Please be seated. Thanks for coming. Thanks for working on an immigration bill that's important for this country. I appreciate your efforts and I appreciate your time.

I do want to thank Secretary Gutierrez and Secretary Chertoff for their hard work. And one of the things I told members of the Senate, that the administration is going to be involved in crafting a comprehensive bill that's good for the country. And I said we're going to be more than just giving speeches, or using the microphone to proclaim the need for a comprehensive bill. I would send two members plus our staff up to -- two members of my Cabinet plus our staff up to work the -- to work with the senators.

by Frank James

Joe Shoemaker, press secretary to Sen. Dick Durbin, the Senate Majority Whip and second top Democrat in the Senate, e-mailed a helpful and entertaining press release in the form of an FAQ to reporters following the planned revival of the immigration-reform legislation in the Senate today. It's worth sharing.

Warning: It contains a lot of arcane Senate jargon understood by Senate insiders, and to varying degrees the reporters who cover Capitol Hill. But the gist is that it's a complicated procedure that's about to unfold with no guarantee of success.

Here’s a little background on the process on the immigration bill and some answers to more frequently asked questions:

This morning, following the cloture vote on the motion to proceed to the Employee Free Choice Act – regardless of the outcome – the Senate immediately will proceed to a cloture vote on the motion to proceed to the new immigration bill (S. 1639). This bill is the original Kennedy-Specter substitute amendment, plus all of the amendments that were adopted during consideration of the immigration bill the first time around, and $4.4 billion in direct spending for border security/to meet the trigger requirements.

by Frank James

Citizens United, a conservative group, has a new ad featuring former House Speaker Newt Gingrich that opposes what it calls the "McCain-Kennedy" immigration-reform bill that has gained new life in the Senate after appearing virtually dead last week

Here's a link to the ad.

And here's the ad's script:

“Mohammad Atta and several other 9/11 hijackers were in the United States illegally.”

“Today, more than 5 years since that tragic day, our borders remain open to gangs, drug dealers, and terrorists. But instead of protecting the borders, the new McCain-Kennedy immigration plan will instead put millions of people who are in our country illegally, including potential terrorists and gang members, on a path to US Citizenship. The bill does not even allow convicted criminals to be deported.”

“This is wrong…”

The argument about the proposed legislation allowing terrorists and gang bangers to gain legal status is arguably extraneous to Gingrich's argument since those who oppose the legislation, like Gingrich and Citizens United, are fundamentally against giving people who broke the law by entering the country without proper documentation a path to citizenship, period.

So it doesn't really matter, in this way of thinking, if the illegal immigrant is a violent criminal, a would be Mohammed Atta or a benign landscaping-company worker. But it does add an extra rhetorical punch to Gingrich's assertion.

by Frank James

If anyone is getting that Yogi Berra sense of the action on immigration reform being “deja vu all over again,” it’s probably because what Americans have witnessed the Senate and White House go through in recent weeks follows the pattern of what happened last year.

Here are some Chicago Tribune headlines from last year’s effort ill-fated effort to get legislation passed. We could have reused the same headlines this year.

Maybe instead of resembling a giant wedding cake, the Capitol really ought to be in the shape of a very large hamster wheel.

Senators iron out immigration deal. Friday, April 7, 2006

Immigration deal falls apart. Partisan wrinkles delay vote in Senate. Saturday, April 8, 2006

Critics: Immigration bill bordering on unrealistic. Are added `get-tough' measures merely tools to get Senate's OK? Monday, April 17, 2006

Bush pushes immigration bill. Bipartisan Senate delegation backs him. Wednesday, April 26, 2006

President calls for balance on border. Seeks more security, guest-worker program. Tuesday, May 16, 2006

Immigration bill has `ways to go.' Wednesday, May 17, 2006

Border-control technology has a long way to go. Sunday, May 21, 2006

by Mark Silva

At prayer breakfasts, "we set aside our politics,'' said President Bush, who went on this morning to stump for his immigration reforms at the National Hispanic Prayer Breakfast.

"We must meet our moral obligation to treat newcomers with decency and show compassion to the vulnerable and exploited, because we're called to answer both the demands of justice and the call for mercy,'' Bush said.

With hope of reviving the stalled immigration bill in the Senate, Bush also acknowledged the presence this morning of a couple of senators with "corazones grandes'' (great compassion, or generosity) -- Sens. Ted Kennedy (D-Mass.) prime mover of the immigration bill, and Mel Martinez (R-Fl.), the Republican National Committee general chairman who came to the U.S. from Cuba as a teenager in the "Peter Pan'' airlifts of the 1960s.

by Frank James

Some of the Senate's most conservative Republicans who oppose the immigration-reform bill in its current state, sent President Bush a letter before today's lunch meeting with Senate Republicans.

It asked him to put in place already authorized border security measures, regardless of what happens with moribund bill put on ice last week after its supporters couldn't muster enough votes to end debate. In otherwords, they were asking, just like the women in the Grassfire.org advertising campaign, "Where's the fence?"

The letter and it's timing is what's normally called a pre-emptive strike.

Here's the press release containing the letter:

by Frank James

by Frank James

A poster asked why we had nothing on the Wednesday night spat between senators Barack Obama (D-Ill.) and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) over the dead (or not quite dead depending on whom you believe.) He was right, it's actually worth noting, especially since many may not know about it.

They exchanged words when Obama tried to weaken one of the most controversial parts of the bill, a point system for would-be immigrants into the U.S. that would place more emphasis on education and other skills needed by the U.S. workforce than family reunification.

The point-system is fiercely opposed by those who say the primacy immigration policy now gives to family reunification shouldn't be changed.

by Frank James

Anyone who saw Sen. Bernie Sanders, the gruff-voiced Vermont independent and socialist, and Sen. Jeff Sessions, the wry conservative Republican from Alabama inveigh against the immigration bill within a few minutes of each other yesterday should've known the legislation was a goner.

Whenever you can make two lawmakers usually as far apart on the issues as those two join in vehement opposition, it suggests opposition is deep and wide.

by Frank James

It says something about the state of the White House's political antenna at this point in President Bush's second term that he was surprised by the fierce negative reaction within Republican Party's conservative circles to the way he criticized their opposition to the immigration compromise bill now before the Senate.

According to a Washington Times report today:

President Bush did not intend to single out his conservative supporters for criticism in a speech on immigration reform last week and was "surprised" that his remarks angered Republicans, White House spokesman Tony Snow said yesterday.

"He was surprised by the reaction," Mr. Snow said of Mr. Bush's speech in Glynco, Ga., last week. "The speech in Georgia was, 'We've got a serious problem, and we need to fix it.' It was not in any way designed to be pointed at Republicans."

by Frank James

The Washington Post on Monday carried a front-page story about congressional supporters of the immigration agreement being more optimistic about the bill's prospects, based on the slow-down in calls and e-mails to their offices. They took that as an indication that opposition was slackening.

"You just have to recognize you will get 300 calls, you'll get conflicts at town hall meetings -- all of them negative," said Rep. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.), who consulted with (fellow Arizonan Sen. Jon,) Kyl and hopes to carry a similar deal through the House in July. "The last few days have really turned things around."

Public opinion polls seem to support Kyl's contention that Americans are far more open to the deal than the voices of opposition would indicate. In a Washington Post-ABC News poll released today, 52 percent of Americans said they would support a program giving illegal immigrants the right to stay and work in the United States if they pay a fine and meet other requirements. Opposition to that proposal was 44 percent.

That seemed like a misreading of the public mood. What would have turned things around so quickly? was an obvious question.

Yes, President Bush had gone to some lengths to market the compromise to the public. But could he have turned things around so dramatically? Doubtful.

But Flake, a well-respected lawmaker from a state that borders Mexico, is on the front lines of the problem so his opinion is certainly as valid as anyone else's, perhaps moreso.

A new Gallup Poll suggests, however, that the opposition to the compromise bill in the Senate is anything but diminishing.

by Frank James

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) kept up his line of attack today against fellow Republicans who oppose the immigration compromise before the Senate, especially his fellow presidential candidates like Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney who have criticized the legislation though he didn't mention them by name.

In a speech before the Greater Miami Chamber of Commerce, clearly an immigration-friendly audience, McCain said he hoped some of his rivals didn't have crass political motives in opposing the bill. Of course by saying this, he wanted to raise the possibility in voters' minds that this was exactly what his opponents had in mind.

Thus McCain could take the high ground as the rock-ribbed patriot concerned about his country and willing to stand on principle even if it's unpopular while raising the prospect that his opponents were tawdry politicians unfit to hold the nation's highest offiice.

Posted by William Neikirk at 12:01 p.m. CDT

President Bush has many missions on his European trip next week--not the least of which is to assure Albanians that Americans know that Albania exists. Bush said it in an interview with an Albanian television reporter. It's right there in the transcript released Friday.

Asked why he is including Albania in his trip, Bush said, "That is a fascinating question. First of all, I want to make sure the Albania people understand that America knows that you exist and that you are making difficult choices to cement your free society."

He didn't mention that Albania traces its history back to a thousand or so years B.C., a tad more than the first settlement on this continent. But he could be right in implying that many Americans don't know Albania exists. Possibly these are the same Americans who can't find Canada on the map.

Reading the transcripts of several interviews Bush did with correspondents from countries he will visit can be revealing. For instance, it is clear that he is on a first-name basis with German Chancellor Angela Merkel. In an interview with a German correspondent, he refers to her as "Angela" several times as a partner in dealing with Russia and that both of them see each other a lot.

Posted by Frank James at 10:03 am CDT

Here's yet another reason why the immigration-reform legislation being debated in the Senate (when it's not in recess as it is now) has a high probability of winding up where last year's effort did--on history's scrap heap.

It's a House procedure called the "blue-slip" which House conservatives are very likely to use to throttle the legislation. As The Hill publication reports:

House conservatives are ready to stop the Senate immigration bill in its tracks with a potent procedural weapon should the contentious measure win passage in the upper chamber.

The trump card conservatives may hold is a constitutional rule that revenue-related bills must originate in the House. The Senate immigration measure requires that illegal immigrants pay back taxes before becoming citizens, opening the door to a House protest, dubbed a “blue slip” for the color of its paper.

House Republicans used the same back-taxes mandate for a blue-slip threat that derailed last year’s immigration conference. The new Senate bill still must survive two more weeks of voter scrutiny and contentious amendments, but several conservatives already are lying in wait for the Senate to “make the same mistake twice,” as one House GOP aide put it.

Posted by Mark Silva at 2:20 pm CDT

"I'm deeply concerned about America losing its soul,’’ President Bush said today, during a newspaper interview en route to delivering a speech about immigration reform in Georgia.

“Immigration has been the lifeblood of a lot of our country's history," Bush told Ron Hucheson, a Washington-based reporter for McClatchy Newspapers. The president said: "I am worried that a backlash to newcomers would cause our country to lose its great capacity to assimilate newcomers."

Acknowledging that the immigration reform he is seeking faces long odds in the Congress, Bush said: “I understand it's going to require a lot of work because this is a very emotional issue.

Suddenly sounding a bit like Democrat John Edwards, Bush said: “There is an element of our society that is worried about two Americas. My argument to them is: We've had this debate in our country for years.

“And yet our ability to welcome newcomers and the system's capacity to assimilate them has been one of the great powerful traditions of America,’’ Bush said. “It works, and it will work this time. People shouldn't fear our capacity to uphold our motto: E Pluribus Unum."

Posted by Frank James at 1:40 pm CDT

Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) has an amendment to the immigration bill now before the Senate that sounds eminently reasonable. Matter of fact, it’s such a sensible sounding piece of legislation the way he explains it, that one thinks only a dolt could be opposed to such legislation.

His bill would end judicial review of visas revoked by the U.S. government.

The way Grassley explains it, under present law, if the government learns that someone already in the U.S. with a visa has some nexus to terrorism, the government can revoke that visa, but the recipient can ask for court review before they’re removed.

Posted by Jim Tankersley at 6:30 am CDT.

Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) is set to wade into the Senate's high-stakes debate on a delicate immigration compromise plan, offering amendments that, if adopted, may or may not be enough for him to support the bill.

Got that?

Obama's first amendment, which his Senate office says he will offer today along with Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.), would boost the importance of uniting families across borders in the new "points system" that would prioritize candidates for citizenship under the compromise plan announced last week. A second amendment would sunset that points system after five years.

Posted by Frank James at 3:58 pm

Foreign Policy magazine has an interesting web article by Philippe Legrain in which he argues that as imperfect and contradictory as the immigration-reform bill now before the Senate is, it's better than the current system.

That’s because, for all the bill’s flaws, they pale in comparison to one thing: the proposal to allow the nation’s 12 million illegal residents to obtain legal status. It’s a victory for common sense that recognizes that these hard-working people, on whom Americans rely to pick fruit, clean dishes, and look after their children as well as their elderly parents, are here to stay, and that it is in everyone’s interests that they come out of the shadows and into mainstream life.

It can be argued that it's actually not in everyone's interest that illegal immigrants leave the shadow world they now occupy. The human traffickers who move them across borders obviously benefit from the current system as do the employers who exploit illegal workers whose undocumented status makes them easy to take advantage of.

And it's not just those employers but everyone who purchases the services of those firms, which would be millions of Americans who get cheap lawn care, car washes and restaurant meals because of the supply of such labor.

Posted by Mark Silva at 9:38 am CDT

In the growing chorus of criticism for the proposed immigration reforms coming from conservative Republicans, is the White House starting to face "a Harriet Miers moment?" This was a question posed today, alluding to the defection of conservatives from the White House's erstwhile Supreme Court nominee.

No, the White House said, dismissing criticism that the president and a coalition of Democrats and Republicans in the Senate are offering "amnesty'' for some 12 million undocumented workers already living in the United States. "I think when people finally get past the slogan stage and start looking at the real provisions, they're going to find that this is the most serious effort to address their concerns,'' said Tony Snow, the White House press secretary.

"There is no amnesty,,'' Snow said, adding: "It is important that mischaracterizations of the bill… do not harden into a gospel.''

Posted by Mark Silva at 9:06 am CDT

Now that Democratic and Republican Senate leaders have reached an agreement with the White House on an immigration reform bill, the real debate begins.

The provision that enables millions of undocumented workers already working in the United States to "come out of the shadows'' and eventually seek citizenship is particularly controversial and faces rough going in the House, where conservative Republicans have opposed the idea from the start.

"This legislation will also help resolve the status of illegal immigrants who are already in our country without amnesty,'' President Bush said in his weekly radio address today, noting that the undocumented face a long road of fines, criminal record checks and other demands before they can seek citizenship. "Those who come out of the shadows will be given probationary status.''

Posted by Frank James at 8:53 am CDT

During yesterday's White House press briefing on the new immigration deal reached by a bipartisan group of senators, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff was attempting to make the point that the proposed legislation was exceedingly tough.

"When the law is enacted, we will begin the process of enrolling people who are here illegally on a probationary basis. Now, if you're here illegally and you've committed a crime, you're out. If you're here illegally and you've committed -- and you're a gang member, you're out. If you're here illegally and you're a terrorist, you're out."

Actually, that's the law now, a law which is being enforced more than it has been but certainly not in all cases.

Also, it's not clear how someone here illegally but with no terrorist background recorded in U.S. databases, the case with many of the 9/11 hijackers including leader Mohammed Atta, would be identified for removal from the U.S.

Still, Chertoff should probably get credit for his enthusiasm.

Posted by Frank James at 1:37 pm CDT

Senate negotiators have reached an agreement on what they said was a new and improved immigration-reform bill about a year after a previous agreement, which died when the then-Republican controlled House refused to take up the Senate legislation, deriding it as an amnesty for illegal immigrants who broke the law.

At the press conference this afternoon, the senators said the agreement is perhaps the last chance for a long time for a reform bill to be passed because the political stars are aligned now. It would probably be impossible, they said, for the legislation to be passed next year because it will be an election year.

One notable aspect of today’s press conference was that Sen. John McCain, (R-Ariz.) was front and center at the press conference.

In recent days there had been questions concerning whether McCain was keeping some distance from the negotiations because of how adamant many conservatives, and not just conservatives, are oppose giving illegal immigrants any pathway to legalization.

Posted by Mark Silva at 9:06 am CDT

After several years of proposing and sometimes actively promoting "immigration reform,'' President Bush will see his proposal reach a crucial debate of the Senate in the weeks ahead.

The timing is critical, because this may well be the last window of political opportunity that the president has to muster support for a bill that not only enforces the nation's borders but also acknowledges millions of undocumented workers already living in the United States -- offering some paths to citizenship.

Come fall, the election campaign underway will start reaching fever pitch as the winter primaries and caucuses approach. And by next spring, the president's lame-duck status will be crowding out any domestic agenda. Yet even now, the issue is so divisive -- with a Senate which already has endorsed a version of the president's plans and a House whose conservative Republicans want nothing to do with it -- that this may be a fleeting window indeed. The Senate is preparing to debate a new bill next week.

"Democrats and Republicans agree that our current immigration system is in need of reform,'' Bush said today, in his weekly radio address. "We agree that we need a system where our laws are respected. We agree that we need a system that meets the legitimate needs of workers and employers. And we agree that we need a system that treats people with dignity and helps newcomers assimilate into our society.''

Posted by Frank James at 12:23 pm CST

The U.S. Dept of Justice Inspector General issued a report today which concludes that various parts of the agency inflated their anti-terrorist arrests and prosecutions during the years between 9/11 and 2005.

This finding probably won't come as a surprise to many Americans. The Justice Department's approach has frequently seemed to be to arrest as many suspects as possible under the banner of anti-terrorism and let the courts sort them out.

Posted by Frank James at 12:33 pm CST

During last year’s immigration debate (seems like a long time ago, doesn’t it?) supporters of immigrant-rights frequently claimed that illegal immigrants took jobs Americans didn’t want.

Meanwhile, those who wanted significantly greater enforcement of the nation’s immigration laws and no path to legal status for legal immigrants, argued that low-wage Americans were indeed hurt by undocumented workers.

The Wall Street Journal (subscription required) has an excellent story today which provides anecdotal support for the latter camp, that illegal-immigrant workers do hurt low-wage American workers who evidently will work in some of the economy’s least-appealing jobs if given a chance.

Posted by William Neikirk at 11:55 p.m. CST

Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Ill.) called on President Bush today to denounce a Virginia congressman who criticized a newly elected Muslim Democrat for wanting to bring the Koran to his swearing-in.

Rep. Virgil Goode, a Republican, set off a firestorm when he sent a letter to constituents lamenting the fact that Rep.-elect Keith Ellison (D-Minn.), scheduled to be the first Muslim congressman, would bring the Muslim holy book, and not the Bible, to ta private swearing-in ceremony.

Goode also said that immigration laws should be tightened to prevent more Muslims from coming to America and being elected to Congress. He refused to apologize.

Emanuel, who gave strong support to Ellison as head of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee during the mid-term elections, criticized Goode at a Chicago press conference on Thursday. He upped the ante today by calling for Bush to step in.

Posted by Frank James at 2:27 pm CDT

Congressional Republicans, especially those in the House, wanted a photo op of President Bush signing the “Secure Fence Act of 2006” and today they got it.

With illegal immigration being a major issue for many voters, and not just conservatives, House Republicans badly wanted the fence legislation heading into the mid-term elections.

Posted by Frank James at 3:09 pm and updated at 8:10 pm CDT

The Congress and the White House haven’t been on the same wavelength when it comes to how and when President Bush should sign the legislation to authorize the 700-mile fence on the nation’s border with Mexico, a barrier meant to slow down illegal immigration.

Passing the border-fence legislation was one of Congress’s last, much ballyhooed acts before it adjourned to allow members to return to their states and districts to campaign.

Posted by Frank James at 9:55 am CDT

The Center for Immigration Studies, which favors limits on legal immigration and tougher enforcement against illegal immigration, is releasing a study today that would says that immigrants are taking away jobs from young, native-born workers.

In many places, jobs that American-citizen teenagers used to hold, like mowing grass, working in fast-food restaurants and summer construction jobs, are now not available to them, according to the study.

Here's the CIS press release:

Washington, DC (September 21, 2006) — A new study authored by economists at Northeastern University and published by the Center for Immigration Studies finds that young native-born workers are being displaced in the labor market by immigrants. Although one recent report by a Washington think tank found no relationship between immigration and native employment, that study did not focus on young workers who are often in direct competition with immigrants and are the ones most adversely affected.

Posted by Frank James at 4:55 pm CDT

The House passed today by a largely partisan vote of 228 to 196 the Federal Election Integrity Act of 2006 which would require anyone wanting to vote in a federal election to present polling place officials with a government-issued photo ID.

But according to the legislation, it can’t be any old government-issued photo ID. It must be one that proves its holder is a U.S. citizen.

Posted by Mark Silva at 3:28 pm CDT

President Bush, who repeatedly has insisted that he wants “comprehensive’’ immigration reform – recognizing many undocumented immigrants already in the United States as “temporary workers’’ as well better border protection – acknowledged today that he will accept, for now, simply a fence that congressmen want to build along the border.

The House already has approved a bill to build a 700-mile fence along the U.S.-Mexican border, and the Senate took that bill up today. The Senate had approved a more comprehensive bill, with a temporary worker program as well as border protection, but the House has refused to accept that. With fall recess nearing – and with it, fall elections – many Republican members are anxious to get a border protection bill on the president’s desk. And Bush says he will sign it.

Posted by Frank James at 6:11 pm CDT

There was more evidence today that immigration reform is as dead as any legislation can be yet still draw a standing-room-only crowd to a congressional discussion of it.

House Republicans had a “public forum” today to discuss their findings on the Senate’s immigration reform bill, after a series of hearings on illegal immigration Republicans held during the August recess.

Posted by Frank James at 6:50 pm CDT

For years, the federal government didn’t do as much as it could’ve to diminish the flow of illegal immigrants across the U.S.’s borders.

There was the infamous catch-and-release program wherein illegal non-Mexican immigrants caught by the Border Patrol were released from custody after being given a date to appear for deportation proceedings. That was because authorities didn’t have enough detention space to hold them.

Posted by John Crewdson at 4:04 pm CDT

News that the Senate has added a $1.8 billion amendment to the Defense Appropriations Bill, intended to pay for fencing off 370 miles of the U.S.-Mexico border, recalled something I wrote in my book, The Tarnished Door, published back in 1983:

Good morning.

Here are a few Washington events of note for Thursday, August 3, as collected by the Associated Press.

The Senate Armed Services Committee has a hearing on Iraq, Afghanistan and the global war on terrorism, with Gen. Peter Pace, chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff and General John Abizaid, Commander, United States Central Command. 8:30 a.m. Room 216 Hart Senate Office Building.

President Bush is touring the Rio Grande Valley border patrol sector at Anzalduas Park, Mission, Texas, this afternoon and shortly after speaking on immigration reform.

Good morning.

Here are a few Washington events of note for Tuesday, August 1, as compiled by the Associated Press.

President Bush is getting his annual physical at the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Md.

12 p.m. IMMIGRATION REFORM — The Cato Institute hosts a presentation, ``Comprehensive Immigration Reform for a Growing Economy,’’ with Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez.
Location: Cato Institute, 1000 Massachusetts Ave. NW.

Posted by Frank James at 5:19 pm CDT

If you're a foreigner seeking asylum in the U.S. it can make a huge difference which federal immigration judge gets assigned your case, according to a very interesting study out today.

The Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse at Syracuse University, examined federal data from fiscal year 1994 to fiscal year 2005 for 208 immigration judges.

Good morning.

Here are a few Washington events of note for Thursday, July 27, as compiled by the Associated Press.

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee is holding a confirmation hearing at 8:30 a.m. on the nomination of John Bolton to be UN Ambassador, a position he already holds by presidential appointment

President Bush is signing a 25-year extension of the Voting Rights Act.

The Senate Aging Committee is meeting to release results of its investigation into laboratories and companies involved in selling at-home DNA tests to consumers. Location: Room 106 Dirksen at 9 a.m.

Good morning.

Here are a few Washington events of note for Wednesday, July 26, as collected by the Associated Press.

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki is addressing a joint session of Congress at 10 a.m.

President Bush is attending a lunch with military personnel and their families, along with al-Maliki.

The House Education Committee is holding a hearing on making English the official U.S. language.

Posted by Frank James 3:00 pm CDT

Two conservative Republicans are trying to break the congressional impasse over immigration reform with a plan that would first tackle border security, then create a guest worker program.

The proposal by Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas and Rep. Mike Pence of Indiana would incorporate portions of the House immigration bill passed last year and the Senate bill passed in June. But it already has drawn criticism from illegal immigration hardliners as well as those who want to provide a path to citizenship. So don't spend too much time learning the details of this since it's unlikely to go very far.

Good morning.

Here are a few Washington events of note for Tuesday, July 25, as collected by the Associated Press.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice continues her journey through the Mideast seeking an end to the Israeli warfare with Hezbollah.

President Bush is meeting with Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki.

Good morning.

Here are a few Washington events of note for Thursday, June 29, as compiled by the Associated Press.

President Bush meets with Japanese Prime Minister Koizumi and later hosts an official White House dinner for him.

The Supreme Court is handing down more decisions.

The Commerce Department is releasing its revised first quarter report on the Gross Domestic Product at 8:30 a.m.

Good morning.

Here are a few Washington events of note for Tuesday, June 27, as compiled by the Associated Press.

The Senate may vote today on whether to approve the 28th Amendment to the Constitution, which says in its entirety: "The Congress shall have power to prohibit the physical desecration of the flag of the United States." If the amendment wins a two-thirds vote in the Senate it would be sent to the 50 state legislatures, at least 38 of which would have to ratify it before it became part of the Constitution.

President Bush is speaking this morning on the line-tem veto he wants Congress to give him the right to use to stem federal spending.