Report: Senate group close to reaching deal on path to citizenship

A bipartisan group of senators working on immigration reform
is close to a deal that would create a pathway to citizenship for illegal
immigrants, according to a report in the Los Angeles Times.

{mosads}While senators must still negotiate many thorny details,
aides familiar with the talks and reform advocates expressed optimism that
lawmakers would be able to finalize an accord, the report says.

According to the report, the “Gang of Eight” senators
drafting immigration legislation have settled on a bill that would require
those here illegally to have a clean criminal record, register with the
Department of Homeland Security, pay a fine, and file and pay all back taxes to
seek citizenship.

Hopeful citizens would then be granted an interim
probationary status, during which they would be ineligible for food stamps,
Medicaid or unemployment insurance.

Many of those measures were first unveiled when the Senate
group first announced their blueprint for immigration reform in January, but
many crucial details remain unresolved.

The senators have not decided how long illegal immigrants would
have to wait to apply for permanent status. Any bill including a pathway to
citizenship would need to address other immigration issues, including visas for
high-skilled workers and a possible guest-worker program.

Some Hispanics and Democratic lawmakers also worry that the
process will be so punitive as to discourage illegal immigrants from working
toward citizenship.

Another looming issue is how to fund increased border
security measures amid Washington’s perpetual budget battles and the spending
cuts enacted by the sequester.

Any measure allowing citizenship would face a tough fight in
the House, where GOP lawmakers have derided such proposals as “amnesty.” Many Republicans
have called for strengthened border security before efforts are made to
legalize immigrants already in the country.

But the pathway to citizenship has been one of the biggest
hurdles facing immigration reform, and movement on that front is encouraging to
advocates of reform.

Many of the Senate group’s principles mirror those of President
Obama, and politicians on both sides of the aisle appear to agree Congress
faces its best opportunity to fix a broken immigration system since bipartisan
efforts collapsed in 2006 and 2007.

Obama has said he expects an immigration reform bill to be
signed into law by year’s end, and possibly as early as June.

An early draft of the president’s own plan, which was leaked
earlier this year, also provided a path to citizenship. But that plan was
roundly criticized by GOP lawmakers for not tying a pathway to citizenship to
enhanced border security measures.

Republicans are also motivated to act on immigration reform
after Obama took more than 70 percent of the Hispanic vote in the 2012
presidential election.

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) has been at the front of the
reform push on the GOP side, and has sought to allay the fears of some Republicans
skeptical of overhauling the nation’s immigration laws.