House Republican leaders are ignoring President Trump’s advice to give up on immigration reform until the next Congress and will push for a vote next week on a bill they think is just a few votes away from passing.
Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., said Friday the House GOP will “forge ahead” on an immigration bill, even after Trump tweeted Friday that there’s no point in trying until more Republicans are elected. Trump stressed that Democrats in the Senate will block whatever the House passes, but Republicans said that reality won’t stop the House.
“I don’t think you should ever condition what you do in the House on whether it can pass the Senate,” said Rep. Tom Cole, R-Okla. “If we pass it, then they have to do something. I think we have to prove we can do something.”
The GOP postponed a Friday vote on an immigration reform bill because it lacked enough support to pass.
Republicans say negotiations now center on whether to add E-Verify and an immigrant agriculture program into the legislation, and many are hoping for a vote next week. Many conservatives have been clamoring for the bill to include a provision mandating employers use E-Verify to ensure new hires are legal.
“It might be a difference maker,” Cole said. Meanwhile, an agriculture or “guest worker” program would attract votes from lawmakers whose districts rely on immigrant farm workers.
“I don’t think you have to make a lot of tweaks here,” Cole said. “We can get this done.”
Lawmakers canceled a vote this week on a bill authored by Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., that sought to bridge conservative and moderate immigration reform priorities. McCarthy said on Friday the House will try again next week, but he did put the legislation on the official floor schedule.
Conservatives are urging Ryan to maintain the provisions in a conservative immigration reform bill that lawmakers voted on this week.
The bill failed, but garnered 193 GOP votes, fewer than two dozen shy of the number needed to pass the measure. The 41 GOP “no” votes were cast mostly by moderates who wanted a more inclusive and easier pathway to citizenship for Dreamers, who came illegally as children.
The measure was authored by House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte, R-Va. It would provide legal status for about 700,000 Dreamers and offered a much more difficult pathway to citizenship.
Conservatives say the leadership should simply take the Goodlatte bill and make a few changes to attract moderates, such as expanding the pathway to citizenship to all 1.8 million people who fit the Dreamer category.
The Goodlatte measure, which is co-authored by Homeland Security Committee Chairman Michael McCaul, R-Texas, includes both E-Verify and a guest worker program. It ends chain migration, the diversity visa lottery program, and authorizes border wall funding.
“They need to go from the bill that has the most votes,” said Rep. Scott DesJarlais, R-Tenn., who backs the Goodlatte bill.
A key moderate negotiator, Rep. Jeff Denham, R-Calif., said E-Verify and a guest worker program are on the table.
“We are going to negotiate through the weekend on those two issues,” Denham told reporters Friday as he left Ryan’s office near the House chamber.
But Trump did identify a major problem for the Republican Party: the Senate. House Republicans have long been frustrated with Senate filibuster rules that now allow minority Democrats to block GOP legislation, and Trump predicted a similar fate for the bill even if it passes the House.
The immigration stalemate was further complicated Friday when Trump tweeted: “Republicans should stop wasting their time on Immigration until after we elect more Senators and Congressmen/women in November. Dems are just playing games, have no intention of doing anything to solves this decades old problem. We can pass great legislation after the Red Wave!”
While some GOP lawmakers defended Trump’s tweet and said it reflects reality, others found it confusing. Trump made a rare visit to the Capitol last week to urge lawmakers to pass a bill, but with that tweet, he appears to be telling them to give up.
“It doesn’t help, I’ll be honest,” said Rep. Joe Barton, R-Texas. “What we wanted was for the president to say vote yes next week on the compromise bill.”
