IMMIGRATION/POLITICS/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT: “The White House is dismissing an immigration deal brokered by a bipartisan group of lawmakers as a non-starter just hours before it is expected to be formally introduced in the Senate.
Arizona Republican Sen. John McCain and Delaware Democratic Sen. Chris Coons are slated to introduce a bill Monday [2-5-18] that would grant eventual citizenship to young undocumented immigrants who have been in the country since 2013 and came to the US as children, but it does not address all of the President’s stated immigration priorities, like ending family-based immigration categories — which Republicans call ‘chain migration’ — or ending the diversity visa program.
It also would not immediately authorize the $30 billion that Trump is seeking to build the border wall, instead greenlighting a study of border security needs. The bill would also seek to address the number of undocumented immigrants staying in the US by increasing the number of resources for the immigration courts, where cases can take years to finish.
The bill is a companion to a piece of House legislation that has 54 co-sponsors split evenly by party.
A White House official rebuffed the effort, telling CNN that it takes ‘a lot of effort’ to write up a bill worse than the Graham-Durbin immigration bill, but somehow ‘this one is worse.’
Trump tweeted about the latest immigration efforts Monday, writing, ‘Any deal on DACA that does not include STRONG border security and the desperately needed WALL is a total waste of time. March 5th is rapidly approaching and the Dems seem not to care about DACA. Make a deal!’ “
-Kaitlan Collins and Tal Kopan, “White House rejects bipartisan immigration plan pushed by McCain, Coons,” CNN Politics, CNN.com, Feb. 5, 2018 10:50am