Senate Takes Up Immigration Debate

WASHINGTON (CNN, March 22) -- In a debate that could have implications for the fall presidential campaign, the Senate today begins considering House-approved legislation to crack down on illegal immigrants.

Both Sen. Robert Dole and remaining rival Pat Buchanan scheduled stops at the U.S.-Mexico border this week while campaigning in California, and immigration -- legal and illegal -- has been a key issue in the '96 presidential campaign so far. It's a particularly volatile concern in California, vital to President Bill Clinton's re-election hopes.

On Thursday, the House approved stricter rules to crack down on illegal immigration, the first major congressional action on immigration in a decade. The vote was 333-87.

Among its provisions, the House bill would:

Add 5,000 Border Patrol agents over five years.
Crack down on people who smuggle aliens over U.S. borders and forge documents to sneak them in.
Bar members of international terrorism organizations.
Document illegal aliens who overstay their temporary visas.
Establish a toll-free number for employers in five states to call to verify the legal status of prospective employees. Use of the verification system would be voluntary.
Prevent illegal immigrants from applying for permanent residence or receiving public benefits.

The bill's most controversial component lets states deny public education to youngsters who are illegal immigrants. Critics argue this punishes children and promises to trade schools for prisons. The Supreme Court found a similar Texas law unconstitutional in 1982, and a comparable California law, Proposition 187, was passed in 1994 but was largely overturned in court.

A provision that would shrink current annual limits on legal immigration was lost to the crossfire, with the House voting 238-183 to delete most references to legal immigration. Like other aspects of the bill, legal immigration issues, such as proposed reforms in the numbers categories of people who are permitted to enter the country, were hotly debated.

Rep. Lamar Smith, R-Texas, lamented the platform's removal.

"We have a broken legal immigration system that depresses wages and costs jobs," he said. "This amendment ignores the wishes of a vast majority of American people; 83 percent want us to control (legal) immigration."

But Rep. Patrick Kennedy, D-Rhode Island, agreed with the majority who supported removing legal immigration from the bill. Leaving it in, he maintained, would have meant treating legal immigrants as if they were illegal aliens. "To me this is no more than policy by prejudice, and analysis by anecdote," he said.

His remark alluded to passionate speeches by other congressmen of their heritage. Among them, Rep. Brian Bilbray had spoken of his mother, "the first Australian war bride." Rep. Richard Neal, D-Massachusetts, urged his colleagues to think, as they voted, about Mary Ward from County Down, Ireland.

"Mary Ward was my grandmother," Bilbray said.

Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-Florida, found the issue struck even closer to home for her -- as a "former immigrant and naturalized citizen" from Cuba.

Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich did not escape the issue's heat. On the first day of the two-day debate, Rep. Gingrich proclaimed, "Do not come to America to live off the law-abiding American taxpayer."

Rep. John Bryant, a Texas Democrat, retorted, "I say shame on you, Mr. Speaker!"

Earlier Thursday, the Senate agreed earlier to handle legal and illegal immigration issues separately, as did the House. The Senate is expected to take up its immigration proposal some time next month.

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Senate Takes Up Immigration Debate

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