PenceBlog: <b><i>Mort Kondracke:</i> "Pence-Hutchison Bill Creates Hope on Immigration"</b> - U.S. Congressman Mike Pence : 6th District Of Indiana

Roll Call Executive Editor Mort Kondracke authored this column about Hutchison-Pence Plan today.

Here are excerpts:

Despite all this, there’s a glimmer of hope. Leaving a press club event Tuesday on a nonimmigration matter — his proposal for a shield law for journalists — conservative Rep. Mike Pence (R-Ind.) ran into two leading advocates of comprehensive reform, Frank Sharry of the National Immigration Forum and Tamar Jacoby of the Manhattan Institute.

Trading opinions, they seemed to narrow at least one gap, and Pence indicated that he thinks more convergence is possible.

Earlier in the day, Pence and Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Texas) unveiled their new proposal designed to unify House and Senate Republicans. Their idea is to toughen border security and employer sanctions for a two-year period before other measures kick in. Then, illegal immigrant adults from Latin American countries would return home for a brief period, undergo background checks, obtain legal work visas at privately run “Ellis Island Centers” and be eligible to return to the United States for up to six two-year employment periods.

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But during the conversation in the press club lobby, Pence said he favors a green card expansion and indicated that he thought House GOP leaders and most rank-and-file Republicans would follow their leaders in supporting a phased-in comprehensive bill.

Even though conservative hard-liners have referred to his bill as offering “amnesty,” Pence said that “if you leave the country and get right with the law — if you, in effect, reboot — it’s not amnesty if, 17 years later, you apply to be here permanently.”

He said he thought that, even though Republicans voted 203-17 in December for an enforcement-only immigration bill (one of which made being illegal a felony), only 20 to 30 of his colleagues would resist a properly constructed comprehensive bill.

And he indicated that a leading supposed hard-liner, House Judiciary Chairman Jim Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.), might well support such a bill. As evidence, he cited Sensenbrenner’s decision to lead opposition this month to an amendment by Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) that would have lifted a Voting Rights Act requirement that election ballots be printed in languages other than English.

Pence quoted Sensenbrenner as telling him that “the Republican Party is against illegal immigration and not against legal immigration,” and inferred that Sensenbrenner might support green cards for “rebooted” illegal immigrants.

posted by Pence Press Office # 6:24 AM