WASHINGTON -- A group of senators reached a bipartisan agreement Wednesday aimed at balancing Democrats' fight to offer citizenship to the so-called Dreamer immigrants with President Donald Trump's demands for billions of dollars to build a wall on the border with Mexico, lawmakers said.
But though the measure sprang from 16 senators with centrist views on the issue and was winning support from many Democrats, it faced an uncertain future.
While not specifically mentioning the bipartisan pact, Trump in a White House statement urged lawmakers to oppose any plan that doesn't meet his more stringent demands, which include curbs on legal immigration and the abolition of a visa lottery. The Senate's No. 2 Republican, John Cornyn of Texas, warned that lawmakers need to address Trump's entire proposal, saying, "We need to take the president seriously."
There were also qualms among Democrats. The party's No. 2 Senate leader, Dick Durbin of Illinois, said some Democrats had "serious issues" with parts of the plan. Those concerns focused on its spending for Trump's wall and its provision that would prevent Dreamers, young people who came to the U.S. as children but who now live here illegally, from sponsoring their parents for legal residency.
[U.S. immigration: Data visualization of selected immigration statistics, U.S. border map]
"We're not there yet," Durbin said of the 60 votes the proposal would need for approval.
So far, none of the other competing immigration proposals from either side seems able to do that. Republicans control the chamber 51-49, though Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., has missed the past several weeks while battling cancer.
The bipartisan measure's sponsors included eight GOP senators, meaning just three more Republicans would be needed for it to prevail if it were backed by all 47 Democrats and the two independents who usually support them.
The bipartisan proposal was emerging as senators spent a third day of debate largely as they spent the first two -- with the chamber floor mostly empty. Other than an initial roll call allowing formal debate to begin, there have been no other votes while party leaders talk behind the scenes about scheduling votes on specific proposals.
Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., has said he wants the Senate to finish considering immigration legislation this week. Final showdown votes are possible today.
A growing sense of diminishing urgency set in as top leaders signaled that ongoing court challenges may give Congress more time than Trump's deadline of March 5 to replace the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, which was established under former President Barack Obama and shields hundreds of thousands of young illegal aliens from deportation. On Tuesday, a federal court decision reinforced an earlier ruling that rendered the deadline all but meaningless.
In his White House statement, Trump urged the Senate to back a proposal unveiled this week by a GOP group led by Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, saying it accomplishes his vision for immigration. That measure, which is backed by McConnell, has been introduced and is expected to receive a vote.
Trump's demand that lawmakers oppose any deal that doesn't meet all of his previously stated criteria was released by the White House just minutes before the bipartisan group met to hash out its proposal.
Democrats were gauging support for that plan in their caucus late Wednesday, with the realization that Trump may reject it.
"He created this problem, and he's making it clear today he has no intention of solving it," Durbin said.
Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, a leader of the bipartisan group, was more hopeful.
"I know that the president wants a result, and my experience in the Senate is that you're more likely to be able to get a result when you have a bipartisan plan -- and that's what we're seeking," she said.
By the end of Wednesday, Collins' group was touting the Immigration Security and Opportunity Act. Sen. Mike Rounds, R-S.D., who has emerged in recent months as a bipartisan broker on several subjects, is lead sponsor of the bill, while its primary cosponsors are Collins and Sens. Angus King, I-Maine; Joe Manchin, D-W. Va.; Lindsey Graham, R-S.C.; and Tim Kaine, D-Va.
King, Manchin and Kaine are up for re-election this year.
'TWO-PILLAR BILL'
According to several senators, the centrist proposal would grant a 10- to 12-year route to citizenship for Dreamers, with Graham saying it would cover 1.8 million of them. That's the same number Trump has suggested helping with his own proposal.
The plan would provide $25 billion over a decade -- $2.5 billion annually -- for a wall and other border security measures, the same total Trump has requested. But it would bar Dreamers from sponsoring their parents for citizenship, far narrower than Trump's proposal to prevent all legal immigrants from bringing parents and siblings to the U.S.
"You're down to what most Americans would cheer: strong border security and fair treatment of 1.8 million DACA population," Graham said, referring to the deferred-action program participants. "It would be a two-pillar bill."
The moderates' measure does not alter a lottery that distributes about 55,000 visas annually to people from diverse countries. Trump has proposed ending it and redistributing its visas to other immigrants, including some who are admitted based on job skills, not family ties.
"The diversity lottery is kind of toxic politically because of some of the things said by the president," Graham said. Trump used a vulgar description to refer to African countries during a discussion of immigration earlier this year.
Trump, in the White House statement, urged senators to back his proposals and "oppose any legislation that fails to fulfill" his demands. But the statement does not say Trump would veto a bill that fell short of them.
House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., who is gauging support for a House immigration bill that is much more restrictive than Trump's proposal, told reporters that the White House plan "should be the framework through which we come together to find a solution."
Few lawmakers said they expect Trump's proposal to attract 60 votes, but Rounds said he believed the bipartisan proposal could.
If that happens, Rounds said, "We'll allow the president to determine whether or not it moves in the direction that he wants."
Other options remained, including a plan by McCain and Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., and supported by Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer, D-N.Y. It would let many Dreamers qualify for permanent residence and direct federal agencies to more effectively control the border by 2020. But it doesn't offer a special citizenship pathway for Dreamers, raise border security funds or make sweeping changes in legal immigration rules.
In another statement, the White House said it opposes the McCain-Coons plan, arguing that it would "increase illegal immigration" and cause other problems.
On a conference call with reporters, senior administration officials said the president had made significant concessions to Senate Democrats. Last fall, Trump moved to end the deferred-action program, which had provided temporary work permits to about 690,000 dreamers. White House officials emphasized that Trump's proposal allows far more Dreamers to pursue the path to citizenship.
They added that the plan's border security provisions and the cuts to legal immigration channels are required to stem unauthorized immigration, reduce a lengthy backlog in the green-card process and reduce immigration levels that, the White House argues, have harmed American workers.
At the Capitol, the president's allies echoed the administration officials.
"President Trump has crafted a deal that is tough but more than generous," said Sen. David Perdue, R-Ga., an ardent Trump defender and sponsor of the Grassley plan.
The president "wants this solved," Perdue added. "And he wants it ended right now."
At a House Budget Committee hearing, White House budget director Mick Mulvaney stated several times that the administration's fiscal 2019 budget proposal presumes Congress will strike a deal.
"We assume that an agreement is reached on immigration, on DACA, between Republicans and Democrats," he said.
Information for this article was contributed by Alan Fram, Kevin Freking and Andrew Taylor of The Associated Press; by Laura Litvan and Anna Edgerton of Bloomberg News; and by Ed O'Keefe, David Nakamura, Mike Debonis and Erica Werner of The Washington Post.
A Section on 02/15/2018