Democrats Recruiting GOP Senators for Amnesty Deal

Their targets include Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), Sen Susan Collins (R-ME), Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC), and Sen. Rick Scott (FL).

TheHill.com reported Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Il), the leading Democratic advocate for greater migration, working with Graham to draft a bill that would provide citizenship and work approval to younger migrants who were brought into the United States by their illegal-migrant parents.

If we can reach an agreement soon, very soon, we will have the base bill reintroduced and then that will be our starting point to build support as well as consider any additions, too,” Durbin, the incoming chairman of the Judiciary Committee, told reporters.

Durbin, who also serves as Senate majority whip, said that the forthcoming bill “will resemble our similar efforts in the past.”

The “efforts in the past” include the disastrous “Gang of Eight” amnesty, which cost the Democrats five Senate seats in 2014 and the White House in 2016.

According to the TheHill, “Graham stressed that he views the bill with Durbin as a ‘starting point’ for negotiations and a ‘good way …to get more people involved.’”

Collins is also being targeted by Democrats — and she has declared she wants to get more season wor-permit for the state’s tourist industry. She told Newsweek.com:

“The immigration bill proposed by the Biden Administration includes several provisions that I have long advocated for, such as establishing a path to citizenship for Dreamers who were brought to the U.S. as children and who know no other country as their home, deploying new technology to prevent illegal border crossings, and improving the employment verification process,” Maine Senator Susan Collins told Newsweek. The Republican, long considered a moderate voice in the upper chamber, is the kind of senator the White House must get to support their bill with the Senate split 50-50.

But Collins continued that “the proposal falls short in several areas,” such as failing to increase the cap on the number of H-2B visas that support Maine jobs and businesses. She added that Biden’s plan should serve as a framework that can bring both sides together to improve the immigration system.

Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL), signaling his interest in an amnesty deal in a January 26 statement:

I’ve been very clear as a member of the committee what is important to me when it comes to the position of DHS secretary: It is securing the border, fixing our long-broken immigration system by prioritizing legal immigration, and finding a permanent solution to DACA and TPS … Florida is an immigration state. We love immigration, but it has to be legal …

If Congress wants to find genuine consensus and permanent solutions, we have to start with securing the border, protecting American workers, and implementing safeguards against bad actors and those seeking to break our laws. I cannot support nominees and policies that will erase the gains we have fought for when it comes to securing the border.

The Biden administration released its wish-list amnesty and cheap-labor bill but is signaling that it would cooperate to push through a series of smaller amnesty bills. Newsweek reported:

One of the White House sources said they know Congress is the one that passes legislation, not Biden, but said if Congress is able to put together a package with a path to citizenship for essential workers, Dreamers, temporary protected status holders, and agricultural workers “that’s something the White House would give a good look at.” The source was not authorized to speak publicly on the administration’s plans.

In early 2018, the Senate went through a tangled immigration debate where Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) helped groups of Senators to sequentially posture as pro-employer and pro-employee.

For years, a wide variety of pollsters have shown deep and broad opposition to labor migration — or the hiring of temporary contract workers — into the jobs sought by young U.S. graduates.

The multiracial, cross-sex, non-racist, class-based, priority-driven, and solidarity-themed opposition to labor migration coexists with generally favorable personal feelings toward legal immigrants and toward immigration in theory.

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