Radical immigration activists have been pushing Joe Biden and the Democrats to use their majority in Congress to pass unprecedented immigration “reforms” that would overthrow the concept of “citizenship” and change the face of immigration in America forever.
Democrats in Congress have been trying to oblige. In fact, they’ve tried twice before to attach their immigration revolution to spending bills, each time running afoul of the strict rules governing what can be put into reconciliation bills and what can’t.
Democrats in the Senate thought that this time, they could succeed. Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough, the umpire in disputes about what can be included in reconciliation bills, had carefully laid out conditions that needed to be met for the Democrats to be able to include the changes to immigration law in the Build Back Better bill.
Democrats wanted to print up to eight million green cards, change the registration date for illegals and some humanitarian parole programs, and allow about 6.5 million illegals to apply for up to two five-year work permits. It would also protect most illegals from deportation.
One item left out of this version of the Democrats’ immigration proposal was a path to citizenship. The parliamentarian had previously said it was inappropriate to include that proposal in a spending bill.
MacDonough’s decision was short and sweet.
Chief among reconciliation’s restrictions is that measures in the bill must relate directly to the federal budget. In a brief finding, Ms. MacDonough objected to multiple aspects of the immigration proposal, including that it would allow some immigrants under the program to become eligible for green cards, and that the government wouldn’t have leeway to turn down some immigrants if they met the standards for the program.
She also said the measure covered substantially the same population as previous proposals that she rejected.
“These are substantial policy changes with lasting effects, just like those we previously considered, and outweigh the budgetary impact,” she wrote, according to a copy of her ruling reviewed by The Wall Street Journal.
In other words, Congress should proceed carefully on immigration reform and in “regular order.” This means that the bill would have to go through the entire legislative process — hearings, amendments, and votes.
Democrats obviously didn’t like that idea — too hard, would take too much time. At heart, Democrats are lazy beasts and if they can’t find a shortcut either through the courts or reconciliation, it’s the same as supporting racism — or something.
Many progressives and migrant supporters have long urged Democrats to vote to overrule the parliamentarian, whose opinion is advisory and whose decisions senators seldom overturn. Advocates resumed pressuring the party to do so after MacDonough’s ruling.
“This is a fight about racial justice,” said Greisa Martinez Rosas, executive director of United We Dream, an immigrants’ rights group. Citing the strong support Democrats usually receive from Hispanic voters, she said advocates would accept no excuses for inaction.
“It’s time for Democrats to deliver on their promises; they must disregard today’s recommendation” by the parliamentarian and add citizenship provisions to the bill, she said.
Democrats are reminiscent of little kids who are turned down by mom for ice cream and then go to dad looking for a second opinion. And then when neither parent grants their wish, they go behind their back and get ice cream anyway.
MacDonough’s decision is not binding — except as a matter of history and tradition. But that doesn’t matter because “racial justice” for millions of people who brazenly and deliberately violated the law by sneaking across the border is at stake.
Legalizing people who took a shortcut to legality is a towering injustice to the 5 million people around the world — people of all colors, faiths, ethnic backgrounds — who are jumping through all the hoops put in their way by U.S. immigration law to come to the United States. These are people who are doing it the right way and being punished for it.
Funny that Democrats never mention them.
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