Washington (CNN) – Undocumented immigrants would be able to seek legal status without first going home under a compromise framework floated Monday by a bipartisan group of senators, according to a source familiar with the plan.
The outline for a possible immigration reform bill reflects a mainstream Republican willingness to compromise on what President Barack Obama calls a top priority of his second term.
However, conservatives immediately voiced their opposition to providing undocumented immigrants a path to legal status, especially in the Republican-led House.
One House Republican labeled the senators’ plan as “amnesty” — a politically loaded word that seeks to ensure conservative rejection.
Obama won re-election in November with strong support from Latinos, the fastest-growing demographic.
That has caused GOP leaders to seek a deal with Democrats that would provide a path to legal status for many of the nation’s 11 million undocumented immigrants — an outcome long opposed by conservatives as amnesty.
“There is a new, I think, appreciation on both sides of the aisle — including maybe more importantly on the Republican side of the aisle — that we have to enact a comprehensive immigration reform bill,” Sen. John McCain, R-Arizona, said Sunday.
“We are losing dramatically the Hispanic vote, which we think should be ours, for a variety of reasons, and we’ve got to understand that,” McCain told ABC’s “This Week.”
McCain is one of the eight senators proposing the compromise. Four are influential Democrats, while Republicans joining McCain in the effort include tea party backed newcomers Marco Rubio of Florida and Jeff Flake of Arizona — two states where immigration is a major issue.
House Speaker John Boehner’s office was non-commital, saying he looked forward to learning more about the senators’ plan, while conservative Rep. Lamar Smith, R-Texas, rejected it.
“When you legalize those who are in the country illegally, it costs taxpayers millions of dollars, costs American workers thousands of jobs and encourages more illegal immigration,” said Smith, who serves on the immigration subcommittee in the House. “By granting amnesty, the Senate proposal actually compounds the problem by encouraging more illegal immigration.”
NumbersUSA, a group seeking to reduce U.S. immigration, called the Senate plan an attempt to “out-amnesty Obama” and said it was activating its 1.3 million members to push for congressional opposition.
The senators will announce their plan a day before Obama speaks in Las Vegas on immigration reform, signaling a major push by both sides to focus on the contentious issue in the new Congress.
Aides say the president’s remarks on Tuesday will touch on the blueprint he’s detailed in the past: improving border security, cracking down on employers who hire undocumented workers, and creating a pathway to “earned” citizenship for undocumented immigrants.
Those provisions align closely with what the eight senators laid out in a framework of their legislation, which was obtained by CNN on Sunday.
The legislators based the proposal on four “pillars.” These include:
– A “tough but fair” path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants already living in the United States, after bolstering the nation’s border security;
–Overhauling the country’s legal immigration system, including attaching green cards to advanced degrees in science, technology, engineering, or math from U.S. universities;
–Establishing an employment verification system that holds employers accountable for hiring undocumented workers;
–Creating a guest worker program for positions that Americans are either unable or unwilling to fill.
Democratic senators backing the plan include Chuck Schumer of New York, Dick Durbin of Illinois, Robert Menendez of New Jersey, and Michael Bennet of Colorado. Republican Lindsey Graham of South Carolina rounds out the overall group.
Menendez said the time was right for pushing major immigration reform through the Senate.
“First of all, Americans support it in poll after poll,” he said. “Secondly, Latino voters expect it. Thirdly, Democrats want it. And fourth, Republicans need it.”
A source familiar with how the eight senators came up with the plan told CNN that Graham called Schumer after the November vote to restart work on an immigration bill that broke down in 2010.
Soon, a core group of six senators formed and met five times in the following weeks in the offices of Schumer and McCain, the source said, adding that Flake and Bennet also took part in some of the meetings and were the last to agree to the proposal.
An initial timetable by the senators called for a framework by the end of January, the text of a bill to to the Senate Judiciary Committee by March, and Senate passage by the end of July, according to the source.
The group last met on Wednesday, then worked through some details before Schumer called Obama on Sunday to tell him of Monday’s planned announcement, the source said.
While specifics on border security and legal status for undocumented immigrants need to be worked out, the framework lacks any requirement for people in the United States illegally to return to their home countries before getting a shot at legal status, according to the source.
Obama came under criticism from Latino activists for failing to deliver on 2008 campaign promise to make immigration reform a priority of his first term.
Last year, as his re-election campaign heated up, the Obama administration announced a halt to deportations of some young undocumented immigrants in a move that delighted the Latino community.
Exit polls in November indicated Latino voters gave overwhelming support to Obama over GOP challenger Mitt Romney, who had advocated a policy that amounted to forcing undocumented immigrants to deport themselves.
Since the election, mainstream Republican leaders and some conservatives such as Rubio, a child of Cuban immigrants and considered a rising star in the party, have called for addressing the immigration issue instead of ceding the Latino vote to Democrats.
McCain, a veteran of failed attempts to address the issue during the George W. Bush administration, said the senators’ proposal wasn’t “that much different from what we tried to do in 2007.”
Obama met behind closed doors Friday with members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and vowed to “move the debate forward,” the White House said in a statement. Rep. Xavier Becerra , D-California, who was at the meeting, said that Obama had indicated that immigration reform “is his top legislative priority.”
Eight senators, four from each party, have unveiled a bipartisan blueprint for reform. House lawmakers are also said to be working on a bipartisan immigration plan.
34 Comments to “Senators Reach Bipartisan Plan on Immigration”
January 27, 2013 at 11:08 PM
That's the stupidest s**t i ever heard of in my f*****g life!…….wonder if mexico and other countries are gonna do this also?………see you complete idiots,this is the only reason these spanish speaking common criminals voted for obama!…….what i wonder is,WHY DON'T WE JUST ALLOW EVERY MONGROL RACE OF CRIMINAL PEASANTS AROUND THE WORLD COME HERE & DESTROY OUR COUNTRY,THAT WANTS TO COME HERE?…..WHY JUST COMMON CRIMINAL 3RD WORLD MEXICANS?…….THERE IS NO MEXICANS IN AMERICAN HISTORY,THERE IS NOTHING AMERICAN ABOUT THESE CREATURES……THEY HOLD ALEGENCE TO MEXICO 1ST AND FOREMOST!…….MEXICO HAS NEVER EVER BEEN A FRIEND OF AMERICA!………..OUR GOVT NEEDS TO NUKE MEXICO AND IRAN……….NOT A THING GOOD IS COMING FROM THESE COWARDS THAT FLEE THEIR NASTY FILTHY FREAKSHOW COUNTRY TO COME TO A COUNTRY THAT DOES NOT WANT OR NEED THEM!……
January 28, 2013 at 12:35 AM
And NATURALLY Obama will sign it and throw America under the bus. Get ready for more traffic and anchor babies!!
January 28, 2013 at 7:40 AM
Dude, don't you ever shut up
January 28, 2013 at 11:30 AM
relax, you're going to give yourself a stroke.
January 28, 2013 at 2:49 PM
thats what mark needs to shut his pathetic life up
January 28, 2013 at 12:09 AM
Cool, soon the cartels will be dumping our citizen's bodies on our own streets just like our old buddy Mexico does down there on their streets. Just a matter of time, thanx Obama.
January 28, 2013 at 12:25 AM
I wonder when one of the America haters will show up and say it's a good idea and tell us their B.S.
sob story. Everybody get your handkerchiefs out for their touching stories.
January 28, 2013 at 1:04 AM
They're here to do the jobs Americans won't do because all the Americans starved to death from unemployment.
January 28, 2013 at 6:54 AM
How can we expect other countries to respect our laws when we don't do the same. Every country, including our neighbors Mexico and Canada, have strict immigration laws that they enforce with a vengeance. This is about votes. The Democrats want the Hispanic vote so if they let everyone south of the Rio Grande River into the U.S., they'll get more votes. There are no reasons why we need to change our immigration laws…we just need to enforce them.
January 28, 2013 at 8:09 AM
MAN ALLL OF YALLL ARE LAMEEEEE. DONT BE HATING CUS POOR CHILDREN (who by the way it wasnt their fault when they were brought here when they were younger) ARE GONNA GET LEGALIZED.. YALL NEED TO SHUT THE HELL UP .
January 28, 2013 at 1:07 PM
Oh they'll boot your illiterate a ss out soon enough loser.
January 28, 2013 at 8:27 AM
Aubrey. I agree that Norma`s bl0g is unimaginable… last thursday I bought a new Citroën DS after I been earnin $8901 this past five weeks and in excess of $10k last-month. without a question it is the best job I have ever had. I began this 5 months ago and practically straight away got me at least $74 p/h. I went to this website, jump15.comCHECK IT OUT
January 28, 2013 at 9:09 AM
WTF?
January 28, 2013 at 10:03 AM
Too late to close the border….that would be like closing the barn gate after the cattle have already scattered all over the open fields like the illegals have already spread and laid their spawn all over the states : (
January 28, 2013 at 10:14 AM
How about this for reform…. No more handouts to illegals. All 11 million will be gone two weeks after their last welfare check.
January 28, 2013 at 11:10 AM
Samuel. I can see what your saying… Peter`s posting is flabbergasting… on friday I bought a great Volkswagen Golf GTI from earning $6538 this – 4 weeks past and-in excess of, ten grand this past month. this is really the most-comfortable job I've had. I began this 9-months ago and almost immediately brought home minimum $86… per/hr. I follow instructions here,, http://xurl.es/6vycz
January 28, 2013 at 12:57 PM
This is only the start of many things to come from our government (city,county,state and federal).
Our country is running on borrowed money/time from countries that will enjoy seeing us fail.
The fact is, it's not if the United States of America fails. It's when.
For those that turn the other way on illegal's entering our country and not enforcing the laws on the books. You are to blame!
Good luck my fellow American's, it's gooing to get ugly! Soon!
January 28, 2013 at 1:05 PM
McCain said they want to legalize them for their votes. What an arsehole he and all of them are.
January 28, 2013 at 3:38 PM
They want to legalize them for votes and for the tax Dollars there are millions the government will lose if they are all deported as they should be. The government just SOLD us out . wait till the terrorist come threw our open borders.It's all about money & power to hell with the American Citizens.We work for them and so to the Illegals.
January 28, 2013 at 4:36 PM
"Latinos, the fastest-growing demographic . . ."
True, but for all the wrong reasons; Illegal immigration and uncontrolled breeding has made them the fastest-growing group, so let's reward that?
What about the automatic citizenship to anchor-brats? No reformer will touch that one!
January 28, 2013 at 4:51 PM
Wonder why NONE of these lawmakers don't actually live anywhere near mexicans?………why don't any of the "so called" non-racist whites don't either?…..LMAO @ these phony's!
January 28, 2013 at 9:58 PM
They always see things differently when they don't have to call them neighbor.
January 28, 2013 at 5:52 PM
just as Bernard answered I'm taken by surprise that someone able to earn $8549 in 4 weeks on the computer. did you look at this link http://xurl.es/gwqu1
January 28, 2013 at 6:34 PM
Lame
January 28, 2013 at 9:22 PM
1. Secure the border.
2. Reevaluate the immigration needs of the country.
3. Determine how to address the legal status of persons already here illegally.
Personally, I don't think deportation on a grand scale is feasible, so some legal status is inevitable. I do NOT think that people who came here illegally should gain a "path to ctizenship" (maybe for children brought here under the age of, say, 12 or 14?), but legal residency is another matter.
Securing the border is the first step, though.
January 28, 2013 at 10:28 PM
The Communist's have taken over the website.
January 28, 2013 at 10:30 PM
Communist or Frikkin Illegal Alien administrator keeps deleting posts.
January 28, 2013 at 10:36 PM
And everyone of them will be able to buy AR15 rifles. Now that's and armey.