WASHINGTON — Failure of a measure pushed by Arkansas’ Rep. Tim Griffin that would expand immigration for high-tech graduates means the issue is dead until after Election Day.
Instead of attempting to deal with the broader issue of illegal immigration, the bill attempted to slice off a small component of the immigration debate where the two parties could find agreement. But even that proved too difficult.
Some immigration experts said the bill’s demise made it unlikely Congress will take another swing on immigration next year, unless a single political party controls both chambers of Congress and the White House.
The bill would have allowed up to 55,000 students with advanced degrees in science, technology, engineering and math - referred to as the “STEM” fields - legal permanent resident status in the United States.
The bill, which was not formally considered in committee, was ushered to the floor by Judiciary Committee Chairman Lamar Smith for a late-session vote last Thursday, where it failed to get a required twothirds majority on a 257-158 vote. Thirty Democrats voted for it, and five Republicans crossedthe aisle to vote against it. Each of Arkansas’ House members voted for it, with the exception of Democratic Rep. Mike Ross, who was in Arkansas caring for a sick relative.
The last major immigration legislation to get a vote on Capitol Hill was when the Senate considered the DREAM Act in December 2010. The measure, which failed, would have given children who entered the country with their parents illegally a chance for citizenship.
Kristen Williamson, spokesman for the Federation for American Immigration Reform, a Washington group seeking to reduce immigration, said politicians on both sides of the issue have shied away from the topic, fearful of political repercussions.
She said Republicans apparently lost interest in the issue. While enforcement of immigration laws was a major theme during the Republican primaries, she said presidential nominee Mitt Romney had not pressed the issue.
“Since the primary, we haven’t heard a lot of details from Romney. And there doesn’t seem to be any interest from [House] Speaker [John] Boehner in tackling this at all,” she said.
Griffin said the bill was narrow in scope, and would have at least started the broader debate on immigration.
“The United States has got to do what’s in our national interest. We need people with master’s [degrees] and Ph.D.s. We don’t have enough Americans with these degrees,” Griffin said.
Griffin had pushed the idea last December, saying he was on the verge of introducing a bill.
But he never filed it.
Over the months that followed, Griffin said he began talking to constituents, including Caterpillar Inc. and University of Arkansas, Little Rock about what they wanted to see in a bill.
“I was doing the legwork,” he said.
During the spring, Smith, a Texas Republican, approached Griffin in a hallway at the Capitol and told him he had been in discussions with Senate Democratic leaders about moving forward on a bill.
“He said, ‘I think we may have an opportunity here,’” Griffin recalled.
After that point, Griffin said he was not involved in talks on the bill. But he said he remained a big supporter. Training highly skilled foreign students and then forcing them to leave the country, he said, is like inviting football players to Arkansas, teaching them the Razorbacks’ offense “and then sending them back to compete against us.”
Smith’s bill would not have increased immigration levels. His approach would have cut the Diversity Visa Program, which allows 55,000 immigrants from countries with low immigration rates to come to the United States. These applicants apply for immigration and are selected randomly.
A 2007 Government Accountability Office report said the diversity program was subject to fraud committed by and against applicants.
Also, about 9,800 immigrants from countries designated as sponsors of terrorism have entered the U.S. through the program. The Government Accountability Office report said it found no evidence those immigrants posed a terrorist threat.
Democrats on House floor pushed a bill sponsored by Rep. Zoe Lofgren of California, and a companion bill in the Senate sponsored by Sen. Charles Schumer of New York, that would have increased STEM numbers while keeping the diversity program intact.
“We need scientists and engineers and mathematicians, but we need other workers, too - landscapers, construction workers, machinists, chefs, entrepreneurs,” Rep. Luis Gutierrez, an Illinois Democrat, said during floor debate last week. “On our side of the aisle, we respect all immigrants.”
Michael A. Olivias, a law professor at the University of Houston, said he thought the STEM issue “should have transcended partisanship.”
Republicans could have held hearings on the bill and attempted to rally people, he said. Instead, it was rushed to the floor in the final hours before Congress went into recess, without committee hearings or consideration of amendments.
The tactic almost guaranteed the bill would be defeated because it required a two-thirds vote instead of a majority vote to advance.
“It wasn’t serious,” Olivias said. “They don’t want to give President Obama any legislative satisfaction he could use as bragging rights.”
Olivias said that if Barack Obama wins the election, Republicans will need to address immigration or risk losing voters in the future. But he said he hasn’t seen any indication Republican lawmakers want to take on the issue.
Griffin sees it differently. Predicting a Romney victory and Republican victories in the House and Senate, he said the House-passed bill will serve as a starting point next year.
“Republicans wanted to get whatever bipartisan support we could in the House and move it forward and say ‘This is where we stand,’” Griffin said.
Front Section, Pages 3 on 09/27/2012