Bills, Rules & Politics

[Turbulent_Dragonfly]

https://www.politico.com/news/2021/0...on-bill-462479

This is a good development. Comprehensive Immigration Reform has no choice, piecemeal is what the Rs are going to agree to. Let's see what happens.

[Turbulent_Dragonfly]

This is from an article a week or more earlier: https://www.politico.com/news/2021/0...n-plans-459766

It looks like the Hispanic Caucus have all the clout now. There is literally not a single thing about high skilled legal immigrants in that entire article. Just a complete travesty.

[bookworm]

https://www.politico.com/news/2021/0...on-bill-462479

This is a good development. Comprehensive Immigration Reform has no choice, piecemeal is what the Rs are going to agree to. Let's see what happens.

Its a good development only if it can attract the votes... in the congress and in the mid terms. Which D or R wants to go to their constituents and boast that they made life easier for folks who are making more than the median income?

In our passion for an argument we are forgetting that our fortunes are tied to the undocumented/illegal immigrants. Smart thing to do here is to align with the folks whose voice is the loudest.

Either we accept the fact that every 10 years there will be movement of PD by 3 months and in between we will be retrogressed OR we play it smart & become part of the global problem (& solution).

[abcx13]

https://www.politico.com/news/2021/0...on-bill-462479

This is a good development. Comprehensive Immigration Reform has no choice, piecemeal is what the Rs are going to agree to. Let's see what happens.

From the article: "That’s because those advocates are eyeing a ticking clock: Bills that were passed last Congress can be moved to the floor directly without having to go through committee if they are voted on before April 1."

So they could pass S386 now without any issues, but of course they won't. Must hold legals hostage for votebank politics!

[Turbulent_Dragonfly]

Its a good development only if it can attract the votes... in the congress and in the mid terms. Which D or R wants to go to their constituents and boast that they made life easier for folks who are making more than the median income?

In our passion for an argument we are forgetting that our fortunes are tied to the undocumented/illegal immigrants. Smart thing to do here is to align with the folks whose voice is the loudest.

Either we accept the fact that every 10 years there will be movement of PD by 3 months and in between we will be retrogressed OR we play it smart & become part of the global problem (& solution).

Comprehensive Immigration Reform is dead on arrival, period. It's just not going to happen, it was always and will always be a pipe dream. Who knows maybe Mike Lee will negotiate with Durbin and they will pass two compromise bills, one for high skilled and other for DACA in a quid pro quo.

[bookworm]

Comprehensive Immigration Reform is dead on arrival, period. It's just not going to happen, it was always and will always be a pipe dream. Who knows maybe Mike Lee will negotiate with Durbin and they will pass two compromise bills, one for high skilled and other for DACA in a quid pro quo.

We can call it whatever we want - Fact is if immigration reform gets chopped up then nothing will pass. I have philosophical differences with Q but I think he is right. Only one bill will be passed (if any).

Choice is a watered down version that doesn't satisfy all immigrant groups OR status quo for next 10 years.

[alpha0]

We can call it whatever we want - Fact is if immigration reform gets chopped up then nothing will pass. I have philosophical differences with Q but I think he is right. Only one bill will be passed (if any).

Choice is a watered down version that doesn't satisfy all immigrant groups OR status quo for next 10 years.

Question is what democrats can pass using budget reconciliation process. Can they pass legalization of DACA + Covid frontline workers with 51 votes? I read articles that they are exploring options.

No matter what, republicans will try to offset number of greencards given to this population somewhere else - mostly family based categories and diversity lottery which democrats will not agree, so getting 60 votes is out of question.

I hope whatever bill is drafted has country quota removal embedded. Since this is not going thru UC this time, it wont need too many carveouts etc.

[srimurthy]

I hope whatever bill is drafted has country quota removal embedded. Since this is not going thru UC this time, it wont need too many carveouts etc.

H4-EAD Revoke has been withdrawn by Biden admin.
https://www.reginfo.gov/public/do/eoDetails?rrid=128849

Congrats everyone.

[alpha0]

H4-EAD Revoke has been withdrawn by Biden admin.
https://www.reginfo.gov/public/do/eoDetails?rrid=128849

Congrats everyone.

This is good news. It shows either DJT admin was incompetent who could not kill rule in 4 years or they never intended to remove it and this was all a show to charge up the base during election time.

[idliman]

Murthy.com says (29Jan2021):

President Biden is expected to sign an executive order (EO) on Tuesday, February 2, 2021 to modernize the U.S. immigration system. No further details on the forthcoming executive order have been provided.

The President had been scheduled to sign this EO today, but delayed it until after the Senate?s confirmation vote for Alejandro Mayorkas, who is Biden?s nominee for the Director of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Mayorkas is expected to be confirmed by the Senate on Monday evening.

The confirmation vote has been pushed to Tuesday because of the snow storm. The last time Pres. BO tried to modernize the system and we all know what happened. I am not hoping for bread loafs, but even breadcrumbs will do for us.

There may be some hope for us after Mayorkos takes over. According to CNN:

"You can tell that we are in a semi-holding pattern at the very top until Mr. Mayorkas is confirmed as Secretary and starts giving more clear public direction and more specific leadership effort," one department official said.

Looks like USCIS is in a honeymoon period after the election. Hoping for things to speedup.

[qesehmk]

The 1.9T bill is certainly going ahead. Dems are going to use the reconciliation bill that is exempt from filibuster.

Anybody knows if immigration is part of the reconciliation bill?

[Zenzone]

The 1.9T bill is certainly going ahead. Dems are going to use the reconciliation bill that is exempt from filibuster.

Anybody knows if immigration is part of the reconciliation bill?

Not as far as I'm aware.

[idliman]

The 1.9T bill is certainly going ahead. Dems are going to use the reconciliation bill that is exempt from filibuster.

Anybody knows if immigration is part of the reconciliation bill?

They cannot include immigration measures in reconciliation bill as it will violate Byrd rule. Even the $15 minimum wage raise is iffy. See the quote from The Hill :

Once authorizing committees draw up legislation based on the budget?s reconciliation instructions, Republicans will have another change to challenge aspects of the bill for so-called Byrd Rule violations.

The rule stipulates that the fast-track process cannot be used for issues that do not directly affect deficits, among other things. Democrats have recently argued that their inclusion of a $15 minimum wage bill should comply given its effects on welfare spending, but the Senate Parliamentarian will have the final say.

[Turbulent_Dragonfly]

David Bier summary of Immigration Bill (US Citizenship Act):

https://twitter.com/David_J_Bier/sta...41643760160769

Tweet captures (he has copied and pasted text in his tweets, so some context will be realized only by going to his tweet thread):

Increases the family-sponsored cap from the FB floor of 226,000 to the cap of 480,000 by ending the requirement to deduct immediate relatives from the cap.

It also increases the EB cap, though not by nearly as much, from 140K to 170K and recaptures the 225K unused EB green cards since 1992. That would help with backlog reduction, but not dramatically. Demand would still far exceed supply

It removes from the FB cap the F2A category for spouses and minor children of LPRs by classifying them as immediate relatives, freeing up almost 90K additional green cards for family members of U.S. citizens and legal permanent residents.

This is only the outline text. But I don't see anything in here that would preclude all backlogged legal immigrants in the US from qualifying for the pathways to citizenship for Dreamers, farm workers, and others.

Biden bill will end EB country caps and increase family based country caps to 20%. There's a typo that says that EB would go to 20%, but they are clearly repealed later.

Spouses and children of H-1B workers could receive employment authorization and most children would be protected from aging out while the petition is pending.

This is nearly as important as the V visa for family-sponsored applicants. Guaranteeing that students on OPT don't lose their status makes the H1B cap far less important. That's huge!

A permanent end to endless wait times! Max wait time will be 10 years. It won't matter much for EB since all of those cases will disappear under the path to citizenship, but it will help many family-sponsored cases.

Exempting STEM PhDs is nice, but all this provision would do, if the cap is binding, is force immigrants to unnecessarily get PhDs. What's the point of that? Just make it a master's degree.

Flexible EB cap, yay, but wait... they can only *lower* the cap. No authority to *increase* it during times of low unemployment. Very bad. And it plays into the protectionist nonsense that Biden rejected just last year when he denounced the visa bans. Skilled workers create jobs!

Big oversights:

1) No exemption for derivatives of legal immigrants. The derivatives gobble up half the cap and will take half of it for FB now that F2A is uncapped. That was in some early reports about the Biden plan, who would oppose it?

2) Nothing improves the process at all for seasonal agricultural or nonagricultural workers on H-2A or H-2B outside of the Pacific territories. These programs are the main way for employment-based migration by lower-skilled workers.

3) This is the only provision for year-round lower-skilled workers. Employers already don't use all the EB green cards b/c the permanent labor certification process is horrible and far too expensive when you're hiring someone for $12.50/hour. Year-round work visas are needed.

Another positive: The diversity lottery would increase by 25,000. Why not more?

Overall, if the final text holds, the pathway to citizenship would benefit both illegal AND legal immigrants, clearing away the EB backlog. The V Visa changes and other FB reforms means that the FB backlog will not be a major issue going forward

Despite Biden saying he supports seasonal workers, there's no H-2B cap relief. There's no H-2A streamlining. There's nothing at all for year-round temporary workers. That's a big loss and a sign that they won't make it bipartisan.

[Turbulent_Dragonfly]

Here is another tweet summary from Doug Rand:

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1...708249090.html

[qesehmk]

Just an outstanding piece of article on how immigration is a strategic imperative for US, how EB immigration needs to increase, how trump has hurt overall immigration and economic security of US, how the politics is shaping the debate now and where it needs to focus.

By far the most comprehensive and excellent excellent grasp of the subject by the author - without any bias.

https://www.cnn.com/2021/02/23/polit...omy/index.html

[alpha0]

Just an outstanding piece of article on how immigration is a strategic imperative for US, how EB immigration needs to increase, how trump has hurt overall immigration and economic security of US, how the politics is shaping the debate now and where it needs to focus.

By far the most comprehensive and excellent excellent grasp of the subject by the author - without any bias.

https://www.cnn.com/2021/02/23/polit...omy/index.html

Dont you think article is biased? I did not know Ali Noorani is expert of social net @.

This is my 2 cents - idea is to balance ones contributions over working life against what they need to consume during retirement years. System should never be based on working people feeding benefits of elderly because you will need way more working people when these working people retire and apart from immigration lawyers whose lives run on that, everyone else can understand that is not viable option.

There is no talk about how will you stop another millions of undocumented from coming in. I read that this month, number of southern border crossings increased by 3 times.

There is no talk about changing family based immigration. Which country alllows people to immigrate just because they are brother/sisters or parents of citizens (who themselves are immigrants in most cases)?

[qesehmk]

Your point about social security's sustainability is true. But the author is not suggesting that immigration is a permanent fix. He is merely suggesting that immigration is a remedy. I do agree it is a temporary remedy. The real remedy is fiscal discipline. But America has forgotten fiscal discipline after Reagan declared "Deficits don't matter". But we digress.

The article is not really political in nature and that's why border control is not discussed and should not be discussed. He is simply stating that immigration in any form is good economics.

Dont you think article is biased? I did not know Ali Noorani is expert of social net @.

This is my 2 cents - idea is to balance ones contributions over working life against what they need to consume during retirement years. System should never be based on working people feeding benefits of elderly because you will need way more working people when these working people retire and apart from immigration lawyers whose lives run on that, everyone else can understand that is not viable option.

There is no talk about how will you stop another millions of undocumented from coming in. I read that this month, number of southern border crossings increased by 3 times.

There is no talk about changing family based immigration. Which country alllows people to immigrate just because they are brother/sisters or parents of citizens (who themselves are immigrants in most cases)?

[alpha0]

Your point about social security's sustainability is true. But the author is not suggesting that immigration is a permanent fix. He is merely suggesting that immigration is a remedy. I do agree it is a temporary remedy. The real remedy is fiscal discipline. But America has forgotten fiscal discipline after Reagan declared "Deficits don't matter". But we digress.

The article is not really political in nature and that's why border control is not discussed and should not be discussed. He is simply stating that immigration in any form is good economics.

Control healthcare costs. No country should spend 18% of GDP on healthcare, 2nd costly country spends about 10% of GDP, that should take care of lot of problems this country is facing.

And what about telling people to live within their means? Enough of taking money from someone else / your own future to spend in present. I paid off a car loan and my credit score went down, i am like which morons designed this system when you get penalized for paying your debt before time @.

[qesehmk]

Control healthcare costs. No country should spend 18% of GDP on healthcare, 2nd costly country spends about 10% of GDP, that should take care of lot of problems this country is facing.

And what about telling people to live within their means? Enough of taking money from someone else / your own future to spend in present. I paid off a car loan and my credit score went down, i am like which morons designed this system when you get penalized for paying your debt before time @.

Healthcare is a huge problem. A friend of mine worked for a healthcare company - his travel budget was more than most 6 figure salaries. Money flows in healthcare like water. Bigger than in technology. The car loan thing is funny but true. I have experienced that first hand. I have to say that I am fiscally conservative but socially liberal. And when those two worlds collide I am fiscally liberal too. In other words I agree with living within means but I see government as a force for good - like TDR and FDR saw it.

[alpha0]

I see house is planning to vote DACA/TPS and farm workers bill this month. I hope they add original version of country quota removal bill to the list and send all 3 to senate. Since this will go thru committee in senate, it would not need so many carve outs like last time. It would be interesting to see who will be democrat champion of country quota removal in senate this time.

[gs1968]

I see house is planning to vote DACA/TPS and farm workers bill this month. I hope they add original version of country quota removal bill to the list and send all 3 to senate. Since this will go thru committee in senate, it would not need so many carve outs like last time. It would be interesting to see who will be democrat champion of country quota removal in senate this time.

Dream Act passed 228-197 in the House. 9 Republicans joined with all Democrats to pass it and send it to the Senate. In the absence of any country cap removal Bills having been introduced this session, this might be the Bill to rally around as it offers protection to legal Dreamers

[alpha0]

Dream Act passed 228-197 in the House. 9 Republicans joined with all Democrats to pass it and send it to the Senate. In the absence of any country cap removal Bills having been introduced this session, this might be the Bill to rally around as it offers protection to legal Dreamers

Looking at recent comments by Graham and other republican senators, it seems they want to make border issue a huge weakness of Biden and charge up their base, so i doubt 10 repubs will agree to move that bill in senate in near future.

[qesehmk]

Dream Act passed 228-197 in the House. 9 Republicans joined with all Democrats to pass it and send it to the Senate. In the absence of any country cap removal Bills having been introduced this session, this might be the Bill to rally around as it offers protection to legal Dreamers

If I were involved in advocacy I would have made an effort to tag EB children onto this bill.

That would be non-controvertial, and in line with this bill's goals.

One has to be realistic and keep making progress inch by inch. Country caps will go when they will go but this to me has a real chance and if we can solve desi people's children's aging out problem, why not. Generally speaking - anybody who has this as a problem - I encourage you to organize and do something to add such provision in HR6 2021-2022.

[jimmys]

Looking at recent comments by Graham and other republican senators, it seems they want to make border issue a huge weakness of Biden and charge up their base, so i doubt 10 repubs will agree to move that bill in senate in near future.

First of all, I doubt all the 50 Dem senators will agree.