Plenty of Blame to Go Around

NO matter the pointed fingers, there is plenty of blame to go around between Republicans and Democrats on the failure of the Senate immigration bill to pass last week.

Fully 61% of the public believed that the joint bill was a fair compromise, according to a Washington Post/ABC Poll taken this week. With that level of public support and both the Senate majority and minority leaders in favor, it seems incredible that it failed to pass.

However, there are those on both sides with conflicting interests other than just passing the bill.

On the Republican side it appears that Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist did not nail down his support and that the entire set of negotiations were done by a handful of Republicans who were close to him.

Once the deal became public, outraged conservatives such as Senator Jon Kyl of Arizona demanded the right to change the bill via amendments on the floor. Frist was unable to head their demands off.

On the other side, Senate leaders such as Minority Leader Harry Reid and Senator Chuck Schumer of New York also view the immigration debate as one that is trending overwhelmingly in the Democrats favor — a point of view borne out by the Washington Post poll which shows Democrats with a 12 point advantage on the issue.

It appears some Democrats were reluctant to let the Republicans off the hook by agreeing to a bipartisan bill, and when Frist made demands that a number of amendments be allowed they dug in their heels.

It is believed that the bill’s primary advocates, Republican John McCain and Democrat Edward Kennedy, had assurances that they would be able to vote down any amendments that threatened to destroy the bill, but Democrats were having none of it, arguing that the deal reached earlier that day precluded any amendments.

Tension After the Vote

LITTLE wonder that there was ill-disguised tension between leading Democrats after the vote. Kennedy barely referred to Reid in his remarks, merely stating that politics got in the way of policy and had brought the final deal down.

Some believe that Kennedy thought that Reid had deliberately allowed the bill to fail because he saw a huge electoral advantage in November in sticking it to Republicans on the issue. It is also believed that the AFL/CIO union had many objections to the final version, especially the expanded guest worker program which they believed could cost many members’ jobs.

On the other side of the aisle, many senators were shaking their

heads at the inexperience of Frist, who had announced a deal before the whole world in front of the live television cameras on Thursday, and later stepped back from it when he could not sell it to his own side.

That led to the ridiculous spectacle of Republicans voting against their own bill when it came to the floor, and left Frist, who has 2008 presidential ambitions, in the absurd position of scuttling legislation that he helped to create.

No doubt it if it comes back up on the floor again any deal will be watertight before the final version is agreed.

Conference Committee-A Deal Breaker?

ANOTHER deal breaker was the make up of the Senate conference committee which would meet their House counterparts to work out a final bill to present to the White House.

Democrats wanted Judiciary Committee members who voted out the bill in the first place to the floor of the Senate to be on the conference committee. The Senate Judiciary is composed of many moderates on both sides, headed by Senator Arlen Specter who has been a tireless advocate of passing new laws.

However, Frist would not agree to that demand and stated that it was up to the majority to decide who was on the House/Senate committee.

Democrats rightly feared that they could be set up if Frist named only the most right wing members to the conference group and refused to name any leading Democrats which is within his authority.

Without that assurance Democrats balked at voting for the new bill, but Republicans claimed that a deal could easily have been reached on who went to the conference and that it would have been agreed well beforehand.

What Happens Next?

THE big question of course is what happens next — if anything.

Specter has stated that he intends to bring the bill back up in the Judiciary Committee on May 4 in hopes of reporting a new bill to the floor within a short time period.

However, because Frist reserved the right to bring the bill back up again on the floor, he could actually bypass the committee and bring the bill back up for a full vote.

Such a scenario could only happen, however, if a deal had been reached between both sides as to what exactly the legislation would consist of. However, in terms of speed and getting the deal done, going straight to the floor in an agreed deal would be the best of all possible worlds.

A Nightmare Scenario

OF course, the nightmare scenario is that nothing happens next and that the bill is shelved by Frist, who does not bring it up before the elections in November if at all.

Such a course, however, would be very risky for the majority leader, as the push for reform this year is a very loud and public one.

Then the House may refuse to meet the Senate until after the November elections so the conference would not take place in an election environment, which is another grim possibility.

Again, however, the pace may well be ordained by what is happening on the streets.

The huge countrywide demonstrations are clearly having a massive impact, and it remains to be seen how quickly both sides react to them. Passing no bill, however, might be the riskiest tactic of all. The huge Hispanic vote would not be pleased, and Republicans would surely pay the price at the polls.