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发帖数: 126 | 1 House Immigration Group Reaches Agreement
By ERICA WERNER 05/16/13 07:03 PM ET EDT AP
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WASHINGTON -- A bipartisan band of House members working on a comprehensive
immigration bill has reached an agreement in principle, lawmakers said
Thursday, after talks dragged on for months and appeared stalled earlier in
the day.
The lawmakers did not provide details as they left a two-hour meeting
Thursday evening, but said they would be working to write the measure.
"We have an agreement in principle. We're now going to work on finishing up
the drafting of the bill," Rep. John Carter, R.-Texas, a member of the group
, said Thursday.
Group members had been saying for months that they're close to a deal, but
they'd yet to deliver. Other lawmakers and outside advocates fear they would
lose their window to have a voice in the debate if they didn't soon produce
something. Attention in the immigration debate has focused on legislation
released last month by leading senators, which is currently before the
Judiciary Committee for amendments and votes.
The House group met Thursday to decide whether to split up or salvage a deal.
Carter said earlier in the day the group couldn't reach agreement on the
question of health care coverage for immigrants living in the country
illegally who would gain legal status under the bill. He said one
possibility was the issue would be left out of the bipartisan bill entirely,
allowing Republicans and Democrats in the group to offer their own plans on
that aspect of the legislation.
A similar approach could be taken on a new lower-skilled worker program that
's also caused a problem for the eight lawmakers in the group, aides said.
The members of the group have struggled to come up with a plan that could
have a possibility of passing the Republican-controlled House while also
satisfying Democrats in the group. They had discussed a path to citizenship
that would take 15 years for the estimated 11 million people living here
illegally, two years longer than contemplated by the Senate bill, which is
backed by President Barack Obama.
But a few final details, including health coverage and temporary workers,
have eluded resolution in recent weeks and threatened to block any final
deal.
"I am concerned that the bipartisan group has been unable to wrap up their
work," House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, told reporters Thursday. "And I
know that there are some very difficult issues that have come up. But I
continue to believe that the House needs to deal with this and the House
needs to work its will. How we get there, we're still dealing with it."
Overall, the legislation would share the same goals as the Senate plan:
boosting border security, an increased focus on workplace enforcement, new
means to allow workers to enter this country legally and the eventual
prospect of citizenship for millions.
As the House group has bogged down, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob
Goodlatte, R-Va., separately has moved forward with individual, narrowly
focused bills on immigration, including one on workplace enforcement that
was discussed at a hearing Thursday.
Meanwhile, the Senate Judiciary Committee held its third work session
Thursday to plow through some 300 amendments to the Senate immigration
legislation. The committee voted down an amendment by Sen. Chuck Grassley, R
-Iowa, that would have required the implementation of an electronic employer
ID verification system in 18 months, instead of the four years contemplated
by the bill.
Republican Sens. Jeff Flake of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina
– two of the bill's Republican authors – voted with Democrats against the
amendment, which was defeated 13 to 5. So did Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, a
potential swing vote on the bill.
Thursday's committee action was low-key, but behind the scenes efforts were
underway to reach a deal on a series of amendments by Hatch that would
benefit the high-tech community by making it easier for companies to access
and use H-1B visas, which go to highly skilled workers. The bill increases
the supply of these visas but also adds in protections aimed at ensuring U.S
. workers get the first shot at jobs, and tech companies have objected to
some of those provisions, which have been championed by Sen. Dick Durbin, D-
Ill.
Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., a principle author of the bill, was working with
Hatch to try to find a compromise but the issue was unlikely to be resolved
before next week.
Republicans in the House group are Reps. Mario Diaz-Balart of Florida, John
Carter and Sam Johnson of Texas and Raul Labrador of Idaho. On the
Democratic side are Reps. Luis Gutierrez of Illinois, Zoe Lofgren and Xavier
Becerra of California and John Yarmuth of Kentucky. | r******d
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