The U.S. Senate has killed an overarching amendment to the Gang of Eight’s immigration bill, but a new amendment that would double the size of the U.S. Border Patrol and require 700 miles of fencing along the border is in the works. NBC News reports:

By a vote of 54-43, the chamber voted to table — or effectively kill — the legislation by Republican Sen. John Cornyn of Texas that would have instituted new border metrics and required those goals to be met before undocumented workers can apply for green cards.

The vote came as a bipartisan group of senators have reached an alternative agreement to strengthen border security, a breakthrough agreed to both by Republicans seeking more border security and the bipartisan “Gang of Eight” that originally drafted the legislation. Democratic leaders had said after Cornyn introduced his amendment that that measure was a “poison pill,” and Vice President Joe Biden told attendees at a Hispanic prayer breakfast Thursday that the Cornyn measure was “one of the meanest amendments that will come up in the Senate.”

Sen. John Cornyn, pushing for his border security amendment Wednesday, compares the Gang of Eight’s immigration plan to an illegal immigrant amnesty ruling from 1986.

The senators involved in the new compromise — Republicans John Hoeven, N.D., and Bob Corker, Tenn., who have been working with Gang of Eight members Sens. Chuck Schumer, Bob Menendez, John McCain and Lindsey Graham — have dubbed it the “border surge” plan; they’re preparing a Thursday announcement.

Senate aides from both parties told NBC News that the agreement would double the size of the border patrol and require 700 miles of border fencing. The group has also compromised on a series of other issues, including the E-Verify program for businesses and benefits.

The New York Times has more details here.

This article appears in Jun 20-26, 2013.

Getting hassled by The Man Mild-mannered reporter

10 replies on “Immigration Reform Update: Cornyn Amendment Killed But New Border Security Compromise on Horizon”

  1. Because that fence has been so effective thus far… Yes, the ‘metrics’ included in the bill are a joke, but making a bigger joke isn’t the answer. Get the NSA to spy on the border instead of citizens.

  2. There will never be an effective fence or any meaningful reform as long as left wing politicians continue to undermine border security legislation. There is too much money flowing under the table from the drug cartels to the crooked public officials on this side of the border.

  3. What is driving this bill? It’s my understanding that if Romney had received 70% of the Hispanic vote, he’d have still lost. So it’s not the Hispanic vote. What is it?

  4. Would Roadrunner care to offer substantiation of his gratuitous assertion: “There is too much money flowing under the table from the drug cartels to the crooked public officials on this side of the border.”?

  5. Let’s get real about our immigration reform. 40% of the “illegal population” has nothing to do with our Southern border. People entered the country legally then have gone underground when their visa time was up. This country needs to revisit the “Good Neighbor Policy” as offered by President Roosevelt March of 1933. Eighty years ago FDR set down a program to improve relations with Central and South America. We need to add Mexico and totally revamp our relationship not just with the government but the Mexican people.
    We need to recognize some simple facts, Mexico is part of North America just as is Canada, which is treated much differently. Mexico has the 14th largest Gross Domestic Product in the world. Mexico is the sixth largest oil producer in the world. Mexico is the ninth largest holder of United States Debt. Mexico is the largest “auto-producing” country in North America recently surpassing Canada and the United States.
    Whose real interest is served by our continued bashing our fellow North Americans, certainly not those of us in Arizona? Our economy depends upon the soon to be 2 million people in the Sonora region, Tucson and Nogales.
    A short twenty years from now, will folks look back and a declare how intelligent we were to pursue a new sensible immigration policy recognizing the roots put down by millions of undocumented people many too young to have made their own choices about living here. They are not people from around the world who came to this country for a limited time and purpose but stayed to enjoy what we want to deny our North American family members.
    We here in Arizona should be leading the fight for Immigration reform doing otherwise just doesn’t make sense. One last thought, without cheap underground labor where would our local economy be today?

  6. I heard ALL about the Hoeven, Corker Amendment last night.

    They are a couple of republicans who are willing to piss away another $30 billion (on the FEDERAL Credit Card – add to the Debt) on “beefing up the border” when the net “illegal” migration count is presently at ZERO. And all of that just to placate their xenophobic “base”.

    Fiscal conservatives? NOT!!!

    Hypocrites, YOU BET!!!

  7. Lets face the real issue, Republicans do NOT want an immigration bill. The only reason they need one is to stay elected. This country fully understands the Republican agenda, at the state level and nation level. It is to take away citizens rights and destroy this nation. The Tea Party is really the TERRORIST party. They slapped Boehner in the face on the Farm Bill defeat. The Tea Party will not be happy until everyone has starved to death and living in the streets. We just need to look at all the Republican controlled states and see how they have declined.
    Yet many brainless people are voting for them. It is like an abused woman, who cannot let her abusive partner go.

  8. I laugh that the Republicans will spend tens of billions on more fencing and border guards, knowing that our debt is high and Obama is trying to reduce the debt. This truly shows us that Republicans don’t care about the debt level.
    And the real issue is that illegal border crossing are at a low level, but Republicans continue to ignore the real facts.

  9. Anyone struggling to understand why this effort is called “immigration reform” should not worry that it breaks no new ground. To understand it, just follow the billion$. The Democrats are playing “Good cop” to the Republicans’ “Bad cop” in order to pass along billions of dollars to their defense contractor constituents to make up for the lessened spending on two wars. Don’t be surprised if Ron Barber votes with the Republicans again on this one.

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