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Redstate
A
Guide to Wednesday’s Immigration
Conference Meeting
By Daniel Horowitz
July 9th, 2013
On
Wednesday, House Republicans
will finally confront leadership on the issue of immigration. In reality, the issue is
not too complicated.
There
is an enormous bifurcation
between the public and the political class over the issue of amnesty. Following passage of the
amnesty bill in the
Senate, the political class in both parties thinks this is the most
pressing
issue for the House to consider before the August recess. Senate GOP leadership is
working overtime to
beg House members to send something over to conference.
The public, on the other hand, couldn’t
care
less about the issue, and in fact, is against amnesty.
Moreover, they are distracted with the
scandals, Egypt in turmoil, and summer vacations.
As such, there is no reason the House
should
take up immigration legislation before August.
Nonetheless,
the forces at be that
have the ear of GOP leadership are working indefatigably to pass some
form of
amnesty. To that
end, conservatives have
set up a conference with leadership and all GOP House members on
Wednesday. Here are
the following concerns
conservatives must address with leadership:
A
shell game for conference
committee: The biggest concern of conservatives is that leadership will
take
any bill, even a good enforcement bill, and go to conference with the
Senate. We all know
that this will not
end well. Leadership
must commit to not
conferencing any enforcement bill with the Senate as a means of
dropping in
amnesty provisions behind closed doors.
If they decline to make that commitment,
conservatives must vote down
any bill, even a good one, and take down the rule to consider the bill.
Citizenship
is a red herring: There
is concern that some Republicans will focus too much on citizenship,
and
ultimately agree to an amnesty bill that either delays or eliminates
the path
to citizenship. The
main concern with
the Senate bill is not the path to citizenship; it is the path to any
legal
status before implementation of enforcement.
Once the legal status is granted, there
is no way to permanently hold
off citizenship. It’s
just not going to
happen. That’s why
any bill which grants
legal status before enforcement is worthless...
Read
the rest of the article at Redstate
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