NYT: Parts of Failed Immigration Bill Showing Up in Senate

[babylonsister]

In Increments, Senate Revisits Immigration Bill


By JULIA PRESTON
Published: August 3, 2007

WASHINGTON, Aug. 2 — When a broad immigration bill failed in the Senate in June after a vitriolic national debate, many legislators said the issue was dead, perhaps until President Bush left office. But already some of the less contentious pieces of the bill are returning to life.

Last week, the Senate approved $3 billion for border security as part of a Homeland Security Department spending bill. Democrats and Republicans have also begun laying ground for a bill to create a new temporary immigrant worker program for agriculture.

Another bill, also with bipartisan support, would give a path to citizenship to high school graduates who are illegal immigrants if they complete two years of college or military service. Senator Richard J. Durbin, Democrat of Illinois and a sponsor of the bill, attached it as an amendment to the military authorization legislation that the Senate last month put off until September. Mr. Durbin said he would seek to move it again then.

The agriculture and student measures “have a decent chance of passing this Congress because they have strong champions, broad bipartisan support and they have been around for a long time,” said Frank Sharry, executive director of the National Immigration Forum, which supported the broad bill. But he cautioned that they would have to overcome a “toxic” atmosphere on immigration in the wake of the defeated bill.

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http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/03/washington/03immig.html?_r=2&adxnnl=1&ref=todayspaper&adxnnlx=1186136964-GP16x5Zw0apwA5VF+hNwqw&oref=slogin&oref=slogin