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May 27, 2006

Hot Story: Border Brawl

Beltway Boys

FRED BARNES, "WEEKLY STANDARD": Coming up, on THE BELTWAY BOYS, the Senate passes a massive immigration bill but is it DOA in the House? The politics are shifting. We'll tell you what changed.

MORT KONDRACKE, "ROLL CALL" We'll tell you why Mexico is not always the good neighbor its president says it is.

BARNES: The first of many stories about the state of Bill and Hillary Clinton's marriage hits the newsstands.

KONDRACKE: And Thursday night's news conference with President Bush and Tony Blair could be their last.

BARNES: BELTWAY BOYS are next right after the headlines.

(NEWSBREAK)

BARNES: I'm Fred Barnes.

KONDRACKE: And I'm Mort Kondracke. We're the BELTWAY BOYS.

Well, the hot story of the week is border brawl. As expected, the Senate passed a Bush-style comprehensive immigration bill but your pals, the House conservatives are having none of it and are pretty adamant about it, even if it means humiliating their own president. Here's John Shadegg of Arizona talking about this, watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. JOHN SHADEGG, (R) AZ: I think there is strong sentiment in the House that passing a bad bill, a bill that sets policies that will hurt America, that haven't been fully thought through, that Americans aren't aware of will be worse than passing no bill at all.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KONDRACKE: The risk to the Republican Party is that the Republican Senate and the Republican House will checkmate each other and no bill will pass this year and I think that would be a disaster for the Republican Party and one of the people who put this best was actually one of the smartest of all Republican pols, Tom Davis of Virginia, who said, quote, "If you get no deal, you get no agreement and the borders remain porous, you get no progress. And it certainly doesn't help Republicans. It is a test for voters. Are Republicans capable of governing? We've got to get a resolution," unquote.

And you know, the stupidity, political stupidity of the House Republican hot dogs, they have been stirred up by the radio talk show hosts and there is a base out there, that is furious about this whole problem but the Gallup Poll showed that when asked what comes closer to your view of about what should be done to illegal immigrants already in the country, 21 percent say that they should be deported and 15 that they should be allowed to remain in the united states in order to work but only for a limited period and 61 percent say allow illegal immigrants to remain in the United States and become U.S. citizens if they meet certain requirements which is the essence of the Senate bill.

In addition to that 63 percent said that they are very or somewhat sympathetic toward illegal immigrants and only 34 percent are somewhat or very unsympathetic and the Republican National Committee put out a poll, that was overseen by Matthew Dowd, the White House pollster, which showed Republicans shared those sentiments.

So what the talk show hosts managed to inculcate and stir up the -- base voters doesn't represent what the American people want.

BARNES: Yeah. The Matthew Dowd is not at the White House anymore and is not a pollster but I agree .

KONDRACKE: He is a strategist.

BARNES: I'm very critical of polls but all the polls show the same thing and pretty much what Gallup shows, both earned citizenship and border security and -- are very popular and you want both in a bill.

Look, the real problem for the House Republicans who have an enforcement-only bill is it can't pass the Senate and Democrats will filibuster it and even some Republicans would be against it. But the truth is and I agree with you, Mort, the Republicans need a bill. I mean, there is -- one thing these conservative Republicans have done in the House and I don't think they are the majority in the House, but they have informed the country that there is a border crisis. Illegals are streaming across the country in record numbers and no president really, of the last four or five acted boldly to stop that and something needs to be done about it.

Look I prefer the Senate bill as you do. But the truth is you can't just expect House Republicans to make concessions. Those in the Senate, including liberal Democrats are going to have to make some concessions if we wind up with the bill and I think for one thing where they need to start is in the requirement under earned citizenship by illegal immigrants already living in this country, learning English. And you can't just say - - no, but you can't say as I think is in the Senate bill, well they have to be doing OK in a program for learning English. You have to say they have to learn English.

It's as simple as that. And that is important and you need tough requirements and I think most of these illegal immigrants will want to do that and now one other thing, remember the Johnny Isakson bill, senator from Georgia, or amendment that was voted down in the Senate, I think if it's resurrected and I know the White House likes the idea, it could be appoint of compromise, what he has is the sort of phased-in approach, where right away you get more border security and after you have control of the border in a couple years then you move to the guest worker plan and a year or so later move to your earned citizenship plan, that might appeal to many of these House conservatives, I mean, you're never going to get the Tom Tancredos and J.D. Hayworths but you can get some of them, I think, with a program like that.

KONDRACKE: Well, I think there are some Senate Democrats who would consider toughening up the border enforcement stuff in order to get a bill .

BARNES: They'd better.

KONDRACKE: . in order to get a bill but what they won't do is give up on earned legalization. That is what they would filibuster over and also, I think ultimately the temporary worker program.

But on another point, it is interesting that four out of the five Republican potential presidential candidates in the Senate voted for the comprehensive bill. Bill Frist changed his mind to do that, to his credit and John McCain and Chuck Hagel and Sam Brownback were always onboard and all of the Democratic presidential candidates voted for the comprehensive bill, leaving outlying there with the House hot dogs, only George Allen of Virginia .

BARNES: It may help him in a presidential run.

KONDRACKE: Unless .

BARNES: Distinguishing him from the other candidates .

KONDRACKE: Look, the big question is whether the House Republicans are willing to join with House Democrats in order to pass a bill the way it happened in the Senate.

In the senate, a majority of the Republicans did not vote in favor of the bill. But the best commentary I've seen in this subject anywhere is actually in a "Weekly Standard" editorial. Your very own magazine, called, "How to lose the House."

I quote, "For Republicans to prevent a bill now would be political suicide. It would all but guarantee Democratic capture of the House on November 7th. It would mark the end of the Bush presidency as an effective political force. Bush would become the lamest of lame ducks. His final two years in the White House would be painful."

Let me see who wrote that. It was you! Fred Barnes, congratulations. Well said.

BARNES: I did write it. But let's get back to the House/Senate conference that is going to take place, I assume starting in June, where they're coming in with very different bills, now, those on the Senate side, they are going to be dealing with very tough-minded Republicans. Like Jim Sensenbrenner the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, he is going to be one of them and we know from the get-go he's for stepped-up border enforcement and would agree to a guest worker plan and he hates the idea of earned citizenship. You have -- he's a guy you're going to have to appeal to.

That's why I go back to the point where senators are going to have to yield in a number of areas, in order to get, if they really want a bill, if these liberal Democrats want a bill, Harry Reid would probably not like to have one. Obviously Teddy Kennedy does want one and I think most of them do. But they're going to have to be in a compromising mood because the Republicans are going to be some real hard-liners there.

But I think of the 230 Republicans, in the House of Representatives, 130 to 150 of them are getable. If they handle it the right way.

KONDRACKE: Well, look, it remains to be seen and I don't think Jim Sensenbrenner. If Jim Sensenbrenner sets the standard for this it is never going to happen.

BARNES: He's going to be there.

KONDRACKE: He's going to be there but if he's the standard that the Democrats in the Senate have got to yield to and people like McCain and the rest of them, it is never going to happen and Bush is going to suffer as you pointed out in that editorial.

BARNES: The Harry Reid standard, if Harry Reid is the standard among the Senate Democrats then you'll never get a bill that way, either, but look, you have the Republican leadership, you have Hastert onboard, you have Boehner onboard. Roy Blunt is a hold out right now and Sensenbrenner is obviously a holdout but there are plenty of Republicans -- if the senators will play their cards right.

KONDRACKE: The president .

BARNES: Wait, a minute, Mort, everybody seems to think the only compromising has to be done on the part of the House.

KONDRACKE: I don't agree with that but what the president has to do ultimately is convince Denny Hastert to get off the majority of the Republicans have to agree with the bill before he'll bring it to the floor. If that is the rule it is never going to happen and this is going to have to be a bipartisan solution, as I have been saying, most American problems, big problems have to be solved on a bipartisan basis and this is a big test case.

BARNES: I agree with you.

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