Salon.com > gang of eight

Poll: Support dropping for pathway to citizenship

Thu, 02 May 2013 13:23:00 +0000

A new poll from Quinnipiac shows that support for a pathway to citizenship has dropped by 7 points in just one month, with 23 percent saying their stance on immigration reform has changed since the attacks in Boston.

Fifty-two percent of voters surveyed said that they support allowing a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants. When the same question was asked on April 4, 59 percent said they supported it.

From the poll:

Illegal immigrants should be required to leave, 30 percent of voters say, up from 25 percent four weeks ago.

Creating a path to citizenship for illegal aliens would increase the likelihood of terrorism, 22 percent of voters say, while 66 percent say it will not make a difference. And 23 percent of voters say that the Boston bombing has changed their mind on whether there should be a path to citizenship for such immigrants.

“Gang of Eight” freezes out gay immigrants in reform bill

Wed, 01 May 2013 13:09:00 +0000

Much has been said about the 844-page bipartisan immigration reform package introduced in April. Some Republicans have called it "amnesty," while many immigrant rights groups view it as unnecessarily punitive. But no one on either side of the debate has called it "gay friendly" -- because it isn't.

The measure excludes a provision to allow American citizens to sponsor their same-sex partners for legal permanent residency. To do so, Republicans among the "Gang of Eight" allege, would be legislative suicide.

“There’s a reason this language wasn’t included in the Gang of Eight’s bill: It’s a deal-breaker for most Republicans,” Senator Jeff Flake (R-AZ) told the New York Times. “Finding consensus on immigration legislation is tough enough without opening the bill up to social issues.”

Flake's "social issues" refer, more directly, to the very existence of gay immigrants and their families, a reality that many Republicans and Democrats seem eager to overlook in the name of political expedience.

How sincere is Democrats’ new commitment to gay rights?

Mon, 22 Apr 2013 17:12:00 +0000

When President Barack Obama first introduced his principles for immigration reform a little over two months ago, one notable point of differentiation from the Senate’s framework was that he chose to include same-sex couples and their kids in his plan.

As Stephen Colbert noted on "The Colbert Report," the president’s plan said it would treat “same-sex families as families.”

“What’s next, Mr. President,” Colbert jested, “treating gay people as people?”

But now that the Senate’s Gang of Eight has introduced its immigration bill and it notably excludes the provision that would allow U.S. citizens to sponsor their same-sex partners for residency, the White House appears to be wavering.

When asked last week whether the president was willing to “let that provision go” at a White House briefing, press secretary Jay Carney responded, “It is certainly the case, as the president said in his statement, that not everything in the bill reflects how he would write it, but it broadly is consistent with his principles.”

Immigration: The latest watered-down compromise GOP hates anyway

Thu, 18 Apr 2013 15:12:00 +0000

The road to citizenship isn’t exactly shovel ready. In fact, even calling it a road might be a stretch. It’s more like a long on-ramp. With a tollbooth. And potholes. And a guard station. And a giant electrified fence.

In their desire to find a compromise acceptable to the chronically short-sighted and self-destructive Republican Party, Democrats have crafted an immigration bill that is for the most part as unobjectionable as it is uninspired. The bill cobbles together a series of pragmatic concessions that, while perhaps sufficient to overcome conservative objections, will likely prove wholly insufficient at actually addressing the problem it was designed to solve — that is, fixing our broken immigration system. The tangle of hurdles and exclusions, loopholes for businesses and pitfalls for immigrants, is precisely the mess we should be cleaning up, not making worse.

Sunday show roundup: Marco Rubio goes “full Ginsburg,” talks tough on immigration

Sun, 14 Apr 2013 16:18:00 +0000

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) joined the ranks of famous artist George W. Bush, marathon sprinter Michelle Bachmann and others by going "full Ginsburg" on Sunday to promote the Gang of Eight immigration reform proposal. ("Full Ginsburg" is a reference to Monica Lewinsky lawyer William Ginsburg, who was the first to appear on all five of the major network shows on the same day.)

But Rubio did Ginsburg one better during his immigration reform-themed media blitz. Two better, actually.

In addition to appearances on NBC's "Meet the Press," CBS' "Face the Nation," ABC's "This Week," CNN's "State of the Union" and "Fox News Sunday," Rubio stopped by Univision and Telemundo to promote a bipartisan package and swear up and down that he was really, really not offering amnesty to more than 11 million undocumented immigrants.

A roundup of Rubio's tough talk on immigration.

Rubio boasts to "This Week" that his reform package still makes it pretty hard to be an undocumented immigrant in America