The immigration-reform bill passed by the Senate last week has “lots of defects,” including giving premature legal status to 11 million-plus immigrants, Virginia Rep. Bob Goodlatte said Sunday.
“We want to work with Democrats,” Goodlatte said on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “We want to work with [Rep.] Luis [Gutierrez] and others to do a bill, but not the Senate bill. The Senate bill gives legal status to 11 million people before it solves all the problems with securing the border, with e-verify, with entry/exit visa system and says, ‘We’ll take care of those later.’”
The chairman of the House Judiciary Committee said his goal is to solve “all three major problems” with immigration reform: improving it so it boosts the economy and creates more jobs; focusing on enforcement; and finding appropriate legal status for those who already have immigrated to the United States.
“There are lots of defects in the Senate bill that we don’t like,” Goodlatte said.
Appearing with Goodlatte on CNN, Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-Ill.) said he fears the House will do so on a partisan basis, setting up the Senate bill to fail, the immigration proponent.
He warned against House Speaker John Boehner and the Republican-controlled chamber controlling the fate of much-needed immigration reform.
“Will he [Boehner] allow a small group, maybe even a majority of his caucus, to control the debate and the future of this issue?” Gutierrez asked. “If he decides to do that, we will then end in a stalemate and an impasse once again. Yes, the [House Judiciary Committee] chairman [Goodlatte] has a solution, but it’s not a bipartisan solution, so it’s a solution that’s going to lead us to nothing.”