Ruth Ellen Wasem
Specialist in Immigration Policy
Leaders in both chambers of Congress have listed immigration reform as a legislative priority in the 113th Congress. Most policymakers agree that the main issues in “comprehensive immigration reform” (CIR) include increased border security and immigration enforcement, improved employment eligibility verification, revision of legal immigration, and options to address the millions of unauthorized aliens residing in the country. These elements were among the features that President Barack Obama emphasized when he called for the 113th Congress to take up CIR legislation.
Similar to President Obama’s recent statements on CIR, former President George W. Bush stated that comprehensive immigration reform was a top priority of his second term. President Bush’s principles of immigration reform included increased border security and enforcement of immigration laws within the interior of the United States, as well as a major overhaul of temporary worker visas, expansion of permanent legal immigration, and revisions to the process of determining whether foreign workers were needed. Then—as well as now—the thorniest of these issues centered on unauthorized alien residents of the United States.
During the 109th Congress, both chambers passed major overhauls of immigration law but did not reach agreement on a comprehensive reform package. In the 110th Congress, Senate action on comprehensive immigration reform legislation stalled at the end of June 2007 after several weeks of intensive floor debate. The House did not act on comprehensive legislation in the 110th Congress.
The three major CIR bills in the 109th and 110th Congresses were the Border Protection, Antiterrorism, and Illegal Immigration Control Act of 2005 (H.R. 4437 as passed by the House in 109th Congress), the Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act of 2006 (S. 2611 as passed by the Senate in 109th Congress), and the Comprehensive Immigration Reform (S. 1639 as considered by the Senate in 110th Congress). All three of the major CIR bills had provisions that would have
- increased resources for border security,
- expanded employment eligibility verification,
- increased the worksite enforcement penalties,
- broadened inadmissibility grounds pertaining to national security and illegal entry and added a ground for gang membership,
- expedited the implementation of the automated entry-exit system known as USVISIT (United States Visitor and Immigrant Status Indicator Technology),
- broadened the categories of aliens subject to expedited removal,
- increased the criminal penalties for immigration and document fraud, and
- expanded the categories of aliens subject to mandatory detention.
Despite these similarities, there were substantial differences between the chambers regarding the treatment of unauthorized aliens as well as allocations of visas across family and employment categories for future flows of legal immigrants. The House-passed bill in the 109th Congress would have criminalized unauthorized presence. In contrast, the Senate bills in the 109th and 110th Congresses would have created avenues for unauthorized aliens who met a set of criteria and paid prescribed penalties to acquire “earned legalization.” The Senate bills also had provisions that would have made substantial revisions to legal permanent admissions, notably revising and expanding the employment-based permanent and temporary visa categories.
The failure of these substantial efforts to enact CIR in the 109th and 110th Congresses has prompted some to characterize CIR as a “third rail” issue that is too highly charged to touch.
Date of Report: February 27, 2013
Number of Pages: 31
Order Number: R42980
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