Secret Deals And Trial Balloons

Selective leaks about details of a secret agreement being hammered out between Republicans and Democrats of Capitol Hill are being floated as trial balloons. The first headline about the secret negotiations appear to be heading in a direction I predicted last year: first secure the border, then a lot of other things become possible. But hardliners - from the left - appear to be getting help from Harry Reid to derail any potential deal.

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration and key senators are struggling to agree on draft legislation to secure the U.S.-Mexico border before putting millions of illegal immigrants on a path to citizenship that could take 13 years.

Even then, immigrants would have to leave the country and pay large fines before gaining legal status.

Officials familiar with the discussions say that despite concessions by both Republicans and Democrats, a final agreement may not come before the Senate opens debate on the issue next week — if at all.

Still, the outlines of a possible deal have taken shape in almost daily secret talks attended by two members of President Bush's Cabinet. As contemplated, the proposal would bar undocumented immigrants from gaining legal status until the administration beefs up border security and implements a high-tech identification system for temporary workers. The same trigger would apply to new immigrants seeking temporary visas as guest workers. Such measures are expected to take up to two years.

Even after that, officials said it could take more than a decade before the 12 million men, women and children estimated to be in the U.S. illegally could get permanent legal status, or green cards. First the government would clear an existing legal immigration backlog, a task estimated to take eight years. Then the government would begin processing green cards for the 12 million here illegally, expected to take another five years.

Sen. Edward Kennedy, has been leading negotiations with Republican senators and White House officials in hopes of cutting a bipartisan deal on the issue before the Senate wades into an explosive immigration debate. But some Democrats are hesitant to embrace conditions they successfully opposed when the Senate debated the issue last year.

To jump-start debate, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said he will move Wednesday to bring up a measure from 2006 — either a Senate-passed bill or one approved by the Judiciary Committee. Both are regarded as much more liberal than the one being forged in the current round of bipartisan talks.

Open border activist elements of the left stand a fair chance of completely scuttling any chance for an agreement by getting Reid to force the issue before a draft can be hammered out. And so the citizens of this country will have to put up with more illegal immigrants with potentially lethal intentions getting past a wide-open border. Reid's tenure in the leadership of the Senate will not be remembered fondly by the Democrats in the very near future. The vast majority of voters in this country want the borders secured before anything else is even discussed. Even the NPR poll released today states quite clearly where the voter's sentiment's are. By pandering even further to the far left, Reid is running the Democrats up onto the rocks.

But immigration is also a difficult issue for the Democratic leadership in Congress. Like the president, the business community and their Hispanic constituents, Democrats favor an earned path to legalization.

But that's not where most voters stand. When given a choice, 57 percent of poll respondents favored requiring illegal immigrants to re-enter the country legally; only 39 percent favored a path to citizenship. Those numbers included a majority of both Democrats and independents.

Reid's continued push to the left will bite the Democrats in 2008. By all means, carry on.