Shamnesty on the Senate floor: Allard amendment rejected, Durbin amendment passes, Reid, McConnell spar on amendment limits
Please keep checking ‘Shamnesty on the Senate floor
Update: Allard amendment rejected
Update: Durbin amendment passes
Update: Reid, McConnell spar on amendment limits’ from Michelle Malkin, for the best live coverage. Here is what she has so far, and it is not looking good:
Debate on S. 1348, the shamnesty bill, has resumed on the Senate floor. Numbers USA sums up the upcoming action:
Members will consider an amendment sponsored by Sen. Wayne Allard (R-Colo.) that would ensure that green card applicants who entered the country illegally are not given preference under a merit-based processing system over those who have waited outside the country for their immigration status to be approved.Members also will consider an amendment sponsored by Assistant Majority Leader Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) that would eliminate provisions authorizing the Department of Labor to waive requirements that employers in “labor shortage areas” offer jobs to U.S. workers before seeking to import foreign workers.
The bill’s proponents hope to finish work on it by June 7 or 8, but for a vote on final passage to occur, however, Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) must first call for a vote on a motion to proceed (cloture), which would cut off debate and prevent a filibuster. In order for cloture to be invoked, 60 senators must vote “yes” on it.
Several amendments will be considered this week that could pull apart the coalition supporting the so-called “Grand Bargain.” Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) will sponsor an amendment adding 833,000 green cards for family reunification. Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.), the lead Republican negotiator on the “compromise” bill, was quoted in the June 4 edition of The Washington Post as saying that he will withdraw his support for the bill if that amendment passes or if another Menendez amendment is adopted that would more than double the number of green cards available under the bill for the parents of U.S. citizens. Democrats supporting the “compromise” are adamantly opposed to amendments that would expand the list of crimes making illegal aliens ineligible for legalization {Sen. John Cornyn (R-Tex.)} and that would prohibit illegal aliens who are legalized under the law from obtaining the earned-income tax credit {Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.)}.
Proponents of the “compromise” have yet to substitute its text for that of the underlying bill (last year’s amnesty-laden S. 2611 has been the placeholder text).
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Sen. Sessions has posted his “List of 20 Loopholes in the Senate Immigration Bill” here.
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3:53pm Eastern. The Allard amendment was voted down.
Allard SA 1189: Eliminates the preference given to formerly-illegal Z visa holders applying for green cards over those seeking to enter the country legally through the bill’s merit-based system by striking the provision that awards Z visa holders extra points specifically because they broke the law.
Nay – 62
Yea – 31
4:00pm Eastern. Voting now on the Durbin amendment.
Durbin SA 1231 (for himself and Sen. Grassley): Eliminates provisions authorizing the Department of Labor to waive requirements that employers in “labor shortage areas” offer jobs to U.S. workers before seeking to import foreign workers.
4:12pm Eastern. The Durbin amendment passes.
4:16pm Eastern. As I understand it, Sen. Reid wants to limit amendments and push toward his cloture vote. He is laying out a schedule to vote on pending amendments.
4:18pm Eastern: Reid complains: “When is enough enough?”
McConnell: “The minority is simply not going to be shut out here.”
Reid wants a cloture motion filed today that would “ripen” by 6pm Eastern, June 7.
June 5, 2007 - 08:54 PM on June 5th, 2007
Grassfire.org is sponsoring petitions and ads against this debacle. They are also coordinating a number of anti illegal alien rallies around the country on the 16th.
This is a disastrous plan and the amount of money that it is going to cost US Taxpayers will bankrupt the economy. If the senators want to push the US into a third world economy with the corruption and crime that will go with it, this is the way to do it. Import poverty and crime while driving your own citizenry into poverty as well by depressing their wages with below market alien labor. I understand that the third world economy sucks, that diesn’t mean we need to drive ours down to that level as well.
June 5, 2007 - 09:39 PM on June 5th, 2007
This is history in the making.
And guess what? You’re on the wrong side of History.
This is the new America. Accept it. Get used to it.
By the way – do you think these people and their family members (present and future) will vote for conservative republican candidates after the way you people are treating them?!
The “great” conservative-american political powerhouse is at an end.
June 6, 2007 - 05:54 AM on June 6th, 2007
SFL, you are one confused jerk. This is not history. It is an impending disaster. If this passes and you start suffering from its effects, don’t expect any sympathy for your plight.
June 6, 2007 - 06:55 AM on June 6th, 2007
Re 2:
“The “great”conservative-american political powerhouse is at an end. “
You do understand that this Democratic led Congress’ approval rating is now at the same level as it was before the elections when they took power and the Republicans were in contriol, right?
If I were you, I would be hesitant to toot that horn. It seems folks are realizing that The Democrats suck just as much as the Republicans- that there is no real difference between them at all.
It is my opinion that middle America, where all of the common sense and wisdom really resides, is hetting fed up with the radicals on both side of the isle that have hi-jacked the respective parties.
This bill represents nothing more than slavery of latinos and corporate interests in bed with poltical motivations of power.
Anyone, and I mean ANYONE who supports this bill supports those concept.
“This is the new America. Accept it. Get used to it.”
No it isn’t- this is the old America, pre-civil war to be exact. Slavery for the benifit of business- nothing more.
June 6, 2007 - 07:45 AM on June 6th, 2007
No amnesty for illegal aleins any politician who supprts this amnesty should be voted out of office:mad:
June 6, 2007 - 07:12 PM on June 6th, 2007
For those of the left who think that to make this country great we must share the misery of poverty must be endured by the greatest number of people possible, this bill will achieve that. For anyone who wants to live in a poverty stricken, crime ridden third world cesspool with an oppressive governmental taxation system, this bill will achieve that. This bill as it currently sits will allow criminals and terrorists free reign to enter this country at will.
It will permit every country on the planet to dump the contents of its prison system on our doorstep with bogus id and affidavits and have them given a life time visa within 24 hours. And all the home country has to do beside provide bogus affidavits is to deny our government access to their criminal records system for a week. Considering it takes our government 2 weeks to do a background check for a concealed carry permit on someone with proper id, SSN, fingerprints, and previously a security clearance, what are the odds of actually being able to do so on someone from Mexico in 24 hours?
BTW an amendment that would prohibit deported felons from receiving a Z visa was defeated in favor of one that only prohibited certain felons. I guess car jackers, car thieves, burglars, drug dealers and other violent offenders are okay as long as they supposedly aren’t affiliated with a gang. Of course child molesters will be banned under Ted Kennedy’s plan. What other felonies are prohibited I have yet to hear, but it’s supposedly a short list because “we mustn’t discriminate against thousands of “immigrants”" just because they’ve been arrested, convicted and jailed for committing felonies (maybe Teddy feels they’re his homeboys) other than just entering the country illegally frequently multiple times. Can someone PLEASE shut this fat drunk up, or at least take him for a drive off a bridge?
June 9, 2007 - 12:37 AM on June 9th, 2007
Foks on this bill we will need to keep up the pressure on our senators to stop it. I don’t know what I can do here in Phoenix as our two senators have completely lost touch with what their voters are telling them. This bill is not dead as much as in a coma and if W’s visit pulls the stake from its heart next week, it will rise again like the blood sucking vampire that it is. Allowed to go through, this bill will suck the very life out of the US economy and the citizens who live here. It will bankrupt a rapidly failing social security system. It will cause even more overcrowding in our jails as the criminals from around the world will flock here for new identities. It will depress wages even further and lower the standard of living accordingly.
June 9, 2007 - 02:06 AM on June 9th, 2007
4. This bill represents nothing more than slavery of latinos and corporate interests in bed with poltical motivations of power.
7. It will depress wages even further and lower the standard of living accordingly.
I’m basically in agreement with these statements.
The fact that so many democrats and Bush (and other republicans) could come together on this amnesty bill suggests to me that it has little or nothing to do with courting potential voters. The only group that I can imagine having a real (economic) interest in this bill is big business. Why bother moving american jobs south of the border if you can just eliminate the border altogether? Why offer your employees higher wages or health insurance if a few hundred thousand laborers (who barely know the language, much less their rights) are being dropped on your doorstep? What worker would dare ask for a raise knowing that a innumerable immigrants were willing to do his job for half the pay? Liberals and conservatives need to look before they leap on this one.