06/12/13 Earlier today, as we noted, Majority Leader Harry Reid said: I am concerned that some who oppose the very idea of reform see these triggers as a backdoor way to undermine the legislation. And I believe some Republicans with no intention of voting for the final bill – regardless of how it is amended – [...]
Read More »

06/12/13 The following is a press release from Bibles, Badges and Business, a project of the National Immigration Forum: Today, just a day after the Senate started debating the immigration reform bill on the floor, over a hundred Bibles, Badges and Business leaders from across the country are descending on Capitol Hill to urge their Senators [...]
Read More »

06/12/13 The following is a press release from AFCSME: Working men and women and people of faith across Illinois are calling on their elected representatives in Washington to pass commonsense immigration reform that includes strong worker protections and creates a road map to citizenship for more than 11 million aspiring citizens. At a rally in Springfield, [...]
Read More »

06/12/13 By Yoli Navas: This week United We DREAM leaders are busy rallying support for the bipartisan immigration reform bill being debated on the Senate Floor.  They began yesterday by flooding the halls of Congress to ask their Senators to vote for a bill that will keep families together and create a clear path to citizenship. [...]
Read More »

06/12/13 Nevada Senator Harry Reid spoke on the Senate floor today regarding border security and the importance of bipartisan immigration reform. Below are his remarks as prepared for delivery: (emphasis ours) Last night the United States Senate advanced a bipartisan immigration reform bill that will be good for national security and good for our economy. It will [...]
Read More »

06/12/13 NBC Latino: Senate votes yes to proceed with immigration bill – what’s next By Sandra Lilley Yahoo News: Rubio introduces amendment to toughen English requirement for immigrants By Liz Goodwin Huffington Post Latino Voices: Marco Rubio English Amendment Would Tighten Language Requirements In Immigration Reform NBC News: Aiming to build opposition, foes liken immigration to [...]
Read More »

06/12/13 The critics of the Gang of Eight immigration reform bill incessantly – and mistakenly – claim that the proposed legislation doesn’t have enough teeth, doesn’t guarantee border security and won’t work to stop a new wave of unauthorized immigration.  Well, today, they were schooled by Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY). He took to the floor and [...]
Read More »

06/12/13 U.S. Sen. Robert Menendez, member of the “Gang of Eight,” delivered the following remarks on the Senate Floor regarding comprehensive immigration reform. Below are his remarks as prepared for delivery: “As a member of the Senate bipartisan Gang of 8, I believe we come to this floor, if not in complete harmony, at least on [...]
Read More »

06/11/13 This afternoon, the Senate voted by a 82-15 margin to invoke cloture on the motion to proceed to the immigration bill, S. 744.  Compared to the 2007 immigration debate, when the similar procedural vote only advanced by a 64-35 margin, today’s vote is a promising sign.  It is expected that another bipartisan majority will vote [...]
Read More »

06/11/13 View the roll call here: YEAs —82 Alexander (R-TN) Ayotte (R-NH) Baldwin (D-WI) Baucus (D-MT) Begich (D-AK) Bennet (D-CO) Blumenthal (D-CT) Blunt (R-MO) Boxer (D-CA) Brown (D-OH) Burr (R-NC) Cantwell (D-WA) Cardin (D-MD) Carper (D-DE) Casey (D-PA) Chambliss (R-GA) Chiesa (R-NJ) Coats (R-IN) Cochran (R-MS) Collins (R-ME) Coons (D-DE) Corker (R-TN) Cornyn (R-TX) Cowan (D-MA) [...]
Read More »

06/11/13 The day after Senator Kelly Ayotte’s (R-NH) endorsement of the immigration reform bill gave the effort a momentum boost, the Huffington Post reports that Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) is encouraging Republican Senators to hold back support for the bill until it takes on “a more conservative bent.” Elise Foley and Sam Stein of the Huffington [...]
Read More »

06/11/13 Yesterday Sen. Kelly Ayotte (R-NH) came out in favor of the Gang of 8 Senate immigration bill, making her the first non-Gang of 8 Republican to do so.  Today, the Chicago Tribune has a great editorial calling out its junior Senator, Republican Mark Kirk, for not yet taking a similar stance.  Illinois’ senior Senator Dick Durbin [...]
Read More »

06/11/13 Watch this morning’s speech below: Here’s the transcript of the President’s remarks on immigration reform: 10:38 A.M. EDT THE PRESIDENT:  Good morning, everybody.  Welcome to the White House.  It is a pleasure to have so many distinguished Americans today from so many different walks of life.  We’ve got Democrats and Republicans; we’ve got labor and [...]
Read More »

06/11/13 Wall Street Journal: Immigration Bill Faces Early Tests By Sara Murray and Corey Boles Washington Post (Blog): Marco Rubio’s careful immigration dance By Greg Sargent MSNBC (The Cycle): Is compromise near on immigration reform? New York Times: Immigration Legislation Draws Many Amendments as It Heads to Floor By Ashley Parker Politico: Immigration flash points test [...]
Read More »

06/10/13 On CBS’s “Face the Nation” yesterday, Senator Kelly Ayotte (R-NH) announced her support of the Senate’s immigration bill, including its path to citizenship provision.  Now according to Chuck Todd and the NBC News Political Unit, “There are at least 60 votes for the bill.” The developments of recent days show that there is a right [...]
Read More »

06/10/13 Nevada Senator Harry Reid spoke on the Senate floor today regarding immigration reform. Here’s the video and his remarks as prepared for delivery are below: For most of her life Anna Ledesma has been afraid. She was a model student at Centennial High School in Las Vegas – an artist and a member of Key [...]
Read More »

06/10/13 A number of print outlets ran great pieces this weekend on the need for immigration reform, from the New York Times to USA Today to the Washington Post.  One of them was the New Hampshire Union Leader, which ran an op-ed from five former chairmen of the state Republican Party entitled “Why Republicans Should Support [...]
Read More »

06/10/13 Once again, Senator John Cornyn (R-TX) is leading the charge to undermine immigration reform. As our Executive Director here at America’s Voice Frank Sharry has noted, Cornyn has played that role before, the last time immigration reform legislation was debated in 2006-2007. This time, Cornyn is planning to introduce a “poison pill” amendment that would undermine [...]
Read More »

06/10/13 The Hill: Immigration reform hinges on Rubio proposals for border security By Alexander Bolton National Journal: The Two Faces of Marco Rubio By Rebecca Kaplan Bloomberg: Top Democrats Ready to Oppose Views to Save Immigration By Kathleen Hunter Talking Points Memo: GOP In A Bind As Dems Reject Cornyn’s Immigration Trigger By Sahil Kapur Daily [...]
Read More »

06/08/13 In this week’s address, President Obama talked about the Gang of 8 immigration bill, which hit the Senate floor yesterday.  The President urged the Senate to act quickly to pass the bill in order to fix our broken immigration system. Watch the video here.  Transcript is below: Remarks of President Barack Obama The Weekly Address [...]
Read More »

06/07/13 Today, America’s Voice Education Fund alongside other immigration advocates, policy experts and labor leaders held the fifteenth in a series of weekly “Office Hours” press briefings.  Each week, a different and diverse group of speakers from a range of backgrounds shares the latest information on the players, politics, legislation and developments as the debate in [...]
Read More »

06/07/13 The weeping family members of deportees met with Rep. Gutierrez and other Congressmembers this week, and President Obama is facing protests in California today over his deportation policies, but apparently Jeff Sessions actually believes that “nobody” is being deported from the US anymore. “The federal government has reached a point now where virtually no one is [...]
Read More »

06/07/13 There’s been a lot of news about Senator John Cornyn’s plans to introduce a poison pill border security amendment when the Gang of 8 immigration bill hits the floor next week. This afternoon, Greg Sargent reports on a very important development: Senate Democrats aren’t going along with Cornyn. They will not accept language that undermines [...]
Read More »

06/07/13 By Yoli Navas: Every day, families are being torn apart by the deportation of undocumented parents of US-citizen children. Human Impact Partners estimates that in the past year anywhere between 60,000 and 150,000 children have been separated from either one parent or both by the nation’s “heartless detain-and-deport immigration laws.” This week, Rep. Luis Gutierrez [...]
Read More »

06/07/13 Bloomberg: Rubio Balancing U.S. Immigration Plan With Fragile Support  By Kathleen Hunter The Atlantic: How the GOP Can Screw Up Its 2016 By Garnace Frank-Ruta NBC: Immigration proponents get new data to support reform cause By Carrie Dann and Alexa Dragoumis NBC Latino: Attention Congress: Immigration top Latino voter priority among all parties By Sandra [...]
Read More »

06/07/13 Update: Right now, Sessions and Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) are tag-teaming about the virtue of legal immigrants versus those who are undocumented immigrants.  Funny, because earlier this week a Sessions staffer, Danielle Cutrona was on a NumbersUSA call where a speaker came out against LEGAL immigration.  It looks like we’re in for a lot of [...]
Read More »

06/06/13 The same day that Karl Rove published an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal warning Republicans about the need to better shape Latino perceptions of the GOP, and the same day that John Boehner penned a Spanish-language op-ed in La Opinion entitled “Protecting the American Dream,” almost every House Republican voted with Steve King and in [...]
Read More »