The Washington Times writes that the one significant piece of legislation likely to get through the new Congress in short order is the Democrats’ proposal for citizenship for the millions of illegal aliens now in the U.S.:
Congress will approve an immigration bill that will grant citizenship rights to most of the 12 million to 20 million illegal aliens in the U.S. after Democrats take control next month, predict both sides on Capitol Hill.
While Republicans have been largely splintered on the issue of immigration reform, Democrats have been fairly unified behind the principle that the illegals currently in the country should get citizenship rights without having to first leave the country.
Some Republicans remain hopeful that they might be able to team up with newly-elected “conservative” Democrats in the House to block the worse features of any bill the Democratic leadership will endorse. Personally, though, I won’t believe in the existence of conservative Democrats post-election day until I see it. In any event, it appears that the border fence that was approved earlier this year is a certain casualty of the Democrats’ return to power.
I never quite understood why the immigration issue hurt the Republicans as badly as it did, when it was the Democrats who were just about unanimously on the more controversial side of the issue. We’ll find out now, I guess, what the political fallout will be when the Democrats have to actually take responsibility for an immigration policy.
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