Immigration reform loses “illusion” of bipartisanship

I’m not overly offended by the loss of Lindsay Graham as a player in the political debate over immigration reform. I never expected his involvement to bring significant Republican support to any reform measure.

So when I learned that he was taking offense that the immigration reform measure was being considered more important that the climate and clean energy jobs bill that he has put partisan work into, I figured it was inevitable.

THE SENATOR FROM South Carolina would have found an excuse eventually to walk away from it.

Besides, the rhetoric I hear coming from Congress makes it clear that Graham’s presence doesn’t change the way the Senate is determined to approach this measure – appease the people who think of reform as getting more people OUT of this country, then figure out a way to keep some of the people already here.

The bill is being put together in the Senate with Sens. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., and Robert Menendez, D-N.J., as its sponsors. So instead of being led by a northerner and a southerner, an urbanite and a rural guy, and a Democrat and a Republican, we now get the bill that sounds like it was put together by a pair of people from “The Sopranos.”

Schumer of the Brooklyn burough and Menendez from Jersey (specifically, Hoboken).

BUT IF ASSOCIATED Press reports about a preliminary version of the bill are any indication, the change (not even the inclusion of a Latino politico among the people helping to draft the measure) makes a difference.

For it seems that they are going under the premise that there should be increases in law enforcement initiatives meant to remove people from this country before any measure meant to keep people in this country who are making a contribution to our society.

Those include more officers for the Border Patrol and the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, along with more federal funds for prosecution of drug and human smuggling, and to cover the costs of deportations.

Does this mean that if our economic status continues to struggle and funding has to be cut for something, these will be the areas that get cut? Which would mean that a program that eventually allows people who currently have no legal status could live openly in this country would have to wait for whenever the powers-that-be get their act together and get around to the issue.

THERE IS ONE part of the Schumer/Menendez measure that addresses the part of the issue that ought to be the focus – the immigrants themselves.

The Department of Homeland Security would be given the authority to register, fingerprint and screen people currently living in this country without a valid visa, thereby taking care now of much of the paperwork that would have to be done some day when federal officials do get around to making legitimate U.S. residents out of the undocumented.

Why do I get the sense that all this provision would do is create a backlog of people waiting for the day when they become legitimate? Would we get the sight someday of an elderly man who finally gets his “papers,” even though he submitted his information and fingerprints back when he was a teenager?

All of this is going to be brought up across the United States in the countless rallies and protests that will take place on Saturday.

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF that date this year is that many of the activists who are most concerned about immigration reform were threatening to step up their expressions of outrage if no bill was introduced in Congress by that date.

So the fact that Schumer/Menendez is the closest we will be to having a bill to consider on that date is something that the activists with an interest in immigration reform will express outrage over.

Rep. Luis Gutierrez, D-Ill., has been pushing this issue for months, but political people have made it clear they want the Senate to act first – even though some activists believe that a victory in the House of Representatives first would provide the impetus for the Senate to get off its collective duff and act upon the issue.

Plus, there is the fact that Gutierrez has never shown any interest in the so-called law enforcement-oriented reforms – which is why many people also want to diminish the significance of the representative, even though many Latinos seriously believe his measure should be the one that is used to lead the reform effort.

FOR HIS PART, Gutierrez has criticized Graham, saying he is single-handedly trying to kill off immigration reform at a time when it is obviously needed, calling his actions, “very unreasonable and illogical.”

Truthful, or reactionary? That is an answer we’re going to get in coming months as we learn whether or not our political people are capable of taking the legislative action required to make needed changes now.

For I still believe that, long-term, immigration reform WILL happen. It’s all in the demographics. Delaying it is merely postponing the inevitable.

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EDITOR’S NOTES: Whether or not Robert Menendez’ involvement with the politically partisan battle to reform the nation’s immigration laws will be successful is questionable. But the senator from New Jersey did come up with a cute line, saying that Arizona has now become the “Show Me Your Papers state.”