US immigration bill attacked from left and right

Washington, May 19: The fate of the immigration deal between President George W Bush and a group of US senators appeared uncertain as it drew heavy criticism from both the right and the left.

With the Senate to debate the highly divisive issue next week, the immediate reaction to the plan to grant legal status to some 12 million illegal immigrants suggested it could face an uphill battle even there, where passage was considered more likely than in the House of Representatives.

The House last year declined to even take up comprehensive legislation.

Conservative Republicans were quick to criticise the plan's main provision for illegal immigrants who arrived in the country before January 2007, even though Bush hopes the plan's passage would provide an elusive legislative victory. They view granting the right to stay as rewarding those who broke US law.

''I don't care how you try to spin it, this is amnesty,'' said Sen Jim DeMint, a South Carolina Republican yesterday.

Complaints came from Democrats as well.

''This amnesty plan is no fairy tale it is a bad dream,'' Sen Robert Byrd of West Virginia said.

Democrats' major concerns include that the temporary worker programme does not provide a path to permanent residence and new limits it would place on migration to reunite families.

Despite the apparent obstacles, lawmakers and administration officials who helped broker the deal are optimistic that deep partisan divisions that doomed legislation in the past can be overcome and Congress will send a bill to Bush for his signature by the end of the year.

'A Very Good Chance'

''I think it has got a very good chance,'' Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez, one of the administration negotiators, said in an interview. ''The more time goes by, the more people realize that if we don't have this bill we have nothing and nothing means the status quo.'' White House spokesman Tony Fratto said Bush would keep up efforts to push the immigration bill through Congress.

''It's no secret that the president's personally very committed to this issue,'' he said. ''There's a long way to go and we hope we can get there.'' The proposal ties border security and work place enforcement to plans to give the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants legal status, creation of a temporary worker program and a new merit-based system for future newcomers.

AFL-CIO President John Sweeney objected to proposed limits on family-based migration and said the temporary worker program that would force labourers to return to their home countries after working in the United States amounts to ''virtual servitude, where workers' fates are tied to their employers and their workplace rights are impossible to exercise.'' The Service Employees International Union and some Hispanic groups called the final deal ''flawed,'' but said they would not abandon the process. They vowed to push for legislation more to their liking during the upcoming debate.

''The deal even with its problems represents enormous improvement over the status quo,'' said Frank Sharry, executive director of the National Immigration Forum.

House Majority Leader Nancy Pelosi, a California Democrat, said the House would consider its own version of immigration legislation that gives greater weight to family ties.

Sen Byron Dorgan, a North Dakota Democrat, said he would seek to eliminate the temporary worker provision that would make at least 400,000 work visas available per year.

''America's workers have enough downward pressure on their wages because of unfair trade deals and corporate outsourcing of millions of jobs every year,'' Dorgan said. ''The last thing they need now is to have an inflow of millions of more immigrants competing for their jobs at substandard wages.''

Reuters>