A sweeping US House of Representatives immigration overhaul yesterday teetered on the brink of collapse as lawmakers struggled to move past an issue that has become politically fraught amid the dire images of families being separated at the border.
US President Donald Trump’s sudden executive action over the border crisis stemmed some of the urgency for US Congress to act, but House Republican leaders were still pulling out the stops to bring reluctant Republicans on board in hopes of resolving broader immigration issues ahead of the November midterm elections.
Passage of the bill was always a long shot, but failure might now come at a steeper price as Republicans — and Trump — have raised expectations that, as the party in control of US Congress and the White House, they can fix the nation’s long-standing immigration problems.
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“This is a bill that has consensus. This is a bill that the president supports. It’s a bill that could become law,” House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy said.
The outcome remained uncertain, despite a frenzied effort to pull in the final votes.
House Speaker Paul Ryan took two dozen wavering lawmakers to the White House so Trump could cajole them into supporting the bill.
US Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen and US Attorney General Jeff Sessions trekked to the Capitol to meet privately with groups of Republican lawmakers.
Ahead of yesterday’s vote, the results of the outreach were mixed.
“We have a chance,” US Representative Carlos Curbelo said. “It won’t be easy.”
Another Republican, Representative Joe Wilson, announced he would support the legislation after meeting with Trump, who he said was persuasive.
US Representative Lou Barletta, who is running for the US Senate in Pennsylvania, told Trump at the meeting he would have to remain a “no” vote.
“I didn’t want my name attached to that,” he said of the bill he decried as an amnesty for immigrants who are in the US illegally.
The compromise bill is the product of hard-fought negotiations between the Republican conservative and moderate factions that dragged on for several weeks. The measure is unlikely to pick up much, if any, Democratic support.
The House was also to vote on a more hard-line immigration proposal favored by conservatives. It was expected to fail.
The nearly 300-page compromise measure creates a pathway to citizenship for young immigrants known as “Dreamers,” who have been living in the US illegally since childhood.
It provides US$25 billion Trump wants for his promised border wall with Mexico and it revises the longstanding preference for family visas in favor of a merit system based on education level and work skills.
When the crisis of family separations erupted at the border, Republican leaders revised the bill to bolster a provision requiring parents and children to be held together in custody.
They did so by eliminating a 20-day cap on holding minors and allowing indefinite detentions.
Even though Trump has acted unilaterally to stem the family separations, lawmakers still prefer a legislative fix.
The administration is not ending its “zero tolerance” approach to border prosecutions.
If the new policy is rejected by the courts, which the administration acknowledges is a possibility, the debate could move back to square one.
Senate Republicans, fearing Trump’s action will not withstand a legal challenge and eager to go on record opposing the administration’s policy, have unveiled their own legislation to keep detained immigrant families together.
Back in the House, despite Trump’s endorsement of the compromise bill, Ryan’s leadership team has been struggling to ensure passage on its own.
They have encountered persistent Republican divisions that have long prevented the party from tackling a broad immigration bill.
Taiwan is projected to lose a working-age population of about 6.67 million people in two waves of retirement in the coming years, as the nation confronts accelerating demographic decline and a shortage of younger workers to take their place, the Ministry of the Interior said. Taiwan experienced its largest baby boom between 1958 and 1966, when the population grew by 3.78 million, followed by a second surge of 2.89 million between 1976 and 1982, ministry data showed. In 2023, the first of those baby boom generations — those born in the late 1950s and early 1960s — began to enter retirement, triggering
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The National Development Council (NDC) yesterday unveiled details of new regulations that ease restrictions on foreigners working or living in Taiwan, as part of a bid to attract skilled workers from abroad. The regulations, which could go into effect in the first quarter of next year, stem from amendments to the Act for the Recruitment and Employment of Foreign Professionals (外國專業人才延攬及僱用法) passed by lawmakers on Aug. 29. Students categorized as “overseas compatriots” would be allowed to stay and work in Taiwan in the two years after their graduation without obtaining additional permits, doing away with the evaluation process that is currently required,
NO CHANGE: The TRA makes clear that the US does not consider the status of Taiwan to have been determined by WWII-era documents, a former AIT deputy director said The American Institute in Taiwan’s (AIT) comments that World War-II era documents do not determine Taiwan’s political status accurately conveyed the US’ stance, the US Department of State said. An AIT spokesperson on Saturday said that a Chinese official mischaracterized World War II-era documents as stating that Taiwan was ceded to the China. The remarks from the US’ de facto embassy in Taiwan drew criticism from the Ma Ying-jeou Foundation, whose director said the comments put Taiwan in danger. The Chinese-language United Daily News yesterday reported that a US State Department spokesperson confirmed the AIT’s position. They added that the US would continue to
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