CQ TODAY ONLINE NEWS
Feb. 16, 2012 – 11:14 p.m.
Brown’s Bill on Irish Work Permits Encounters Intraparty Resistance
By David Harrison, CQ Staff
Sen.
Brown’s idea — creating 10,500 new work permits each year for people from Ireland — was “about to pop,” the first-term Republican told the Boston Herald on Feb. 8, thus raising expectations among his state’s sizeable Irish-American community.
But Brown’s legislation (
“I’m trying to get some type of closure so we can move forward in some way, shape or form,” Brown said Feb. 9.
The measure’s foundering is a significant setback for Brown, and it suggests that many Senate Republicans’ commitment to a tough immigration policy trumps their desire to help one of their own win an election — even in a year when the GOP believes it has a chance to regain control of the Senate.
The Irish-American community in Massachusetts is frustrated. “As registered voters, to back Brown in his coming election for the Senate, we would need to have him deliver on this, not just propose it,” said Francis J. Gallagher, an Irish-American advocate from Massachusetts.
Brown’s best hope now is a broader immigration bill (
A Republican-sponsored bill (
Aides to Grassley and Schumer have been talking, and Grassley has also been working with Brown to see whether they can find common ground on Irish visa language, according to a Republican aide.
Schumer is a long-time immigration advocate and has worked with the Irish community to help increase legal immigration from Ireland. His bill would allow Irish immigrants living in the United States illegally to apply for a visa, but Republicans consider that amnesty. Brown’s bill does not include such a provision.
Schumer also proposes to create 10,500 new work visas a year for Irish people with a high school diploma or two years of work experience. The visas would be renewable indefinitely.
Anti-immigration groups say they have no strong feelings about the House-passed legislation because it would not increase the overall number of work authorizations. But they are lobbying against the Irish visas.
“We don’t need additional low-skilled workers in this country,” said Rosemary Jenks, director of government relations for Numbers USA, which supports tighter immigration restrictions. “There is no justification whatsoever for creating a program specifically designed to benefit one nationality.”
Brown’s Bill on Irish Work Permits Encounters Intraparty Resistance
Even if Brown gets his Irish visa language through the Senate, its prospects will be uncertain in the House. Republicans there are cool to loosening immigration policy.
Gallagher said he hopes Congress will be spurred to act by the approach of St. Patrick’s Day. The legislation’s demise, he warned, “would be detrimental to Scott Brown’s re-election.”
Jenks said the senator may have overpromised. “It seems that Brown got a little ahead of himself,” she said.