Democrats are striving to find a way they can introduce policies that will provide amnesty to undocumented immigrants through their budget proposal, sources familiar with the issue told The Washington Post.
According to the sources quoted in a Tuesday report from The Washington Post, two ideas are on the table in internal Democrat deliberations.
One is a protected status for undocumented aliens that “stops short of a path to citizenship.”
The other is a pathway to permanent residency for illegal aliens in the country before 2010. Getting permanent residency is a stepping stone for foreigners willing to naturalize as American citizens.
The sources described the intra-party discussions as “fluid, with no final resolution yet reached and failure to tackle immigration in the plan still possible,” according to the Post.
When President Joe Biden began his term, the Post reported, he threw his support behind a pathway for citizenship for illegal aliens and has expressed support for using his now $3.5 trillion social spending bill to achieve those goals.
However, as the outlet reported, Biden did not sufficiently lay out a pathway for this target’s accomplishment. This lack of clarity from the White House has reportedly angered activists who believe Biden is falling back on his campaign promises, the Post reported.
Disagreements between Republicans and Democrats — and among Democrats themselves — have kept the expensive bill still stuck in Congress as Biden, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer work to prune the bill to maximize support, according to the Post.
Senate Majority Whip Richard J. Durbin reportedly said Monday that Democrats have gained some progress in a plan that would ensure undocumented aliens get a protected status that will grant them the ability to “work legally, pay taxes and live without fear of deportation”
The second idea touted by Pelosi and her advisors would ensure that illegal aliens who came to the country prior to 2010 can sign up for permanent residency.
According to sources who spoke with the Post, the Democrats are going ahead with Pelosi’s idea because “they feel they need to reach an agreement on the larger social spending plan before the Senate parliamentarian rules on the plan Durbin touted.”
This proposal, called the “Registry” proposal, would ensure that the ability to get a green card “would apply to those with provisional immigration status, as well as undocumented immigrants,” according to reporting from the Post.
Based on the law at present, illegal aliens who came to the country prior to 1972 can sign up for legal status.
However, one major hurdle the Democrats face is the Senate parliamentarian who has previously expressed “that changing the registry date cannot be included under the budgetary maneuver known as reconciliation,” the Post report stated.
Democrats do not agree on whether the parliamentarian can be overridden.
“In order to overrule a parliamentarian, it is not just waving a magic wand,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki said, according to the Post, on October 8. “It requires a majority of votes in the Senate, and it requires the vice president. So, I would say that’s a legislative process. I would point to Leader Schumer and others to ask the question of whether there is the opportunity or the appetite to do that.”
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
