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A quick analysis of election results and its relevance to us:
As of 11:45 PM PST, House has gone to Democrats in a landslide; the Senate is on its way depending on outcome in Montana and Virginia. If Democrats win MT and VA (Jon Tester in MT, Jim Webb in VA), the Democrats would control the Senate too.
What it means for us:
Change of control in the House:
This is of biggest consequence. Since Democrats won the House, every chairman of every committee in the house will be a Democrat. They will decide what goes into each committee, what comes out of the committee, what gets floored on the house floor and when. They set the agenda, they set the timetable. They run everything...including what gets served in the House Cafeteria and who occupies which office and who gets how much budget to run their offices. Republicans in the last few years have followed the mantra of “Majority of the majority” when it came to setting the agenda and timetable of house floor votes. What this did was, bills that would win the majority of 435 votes by combining Democrats plus moderate Republicans never got floored onto the house, since the majority of majority (conservative republicans) were against such CIR and by that token non-receptive to the legal variety of immigration.
To get an idea of the minority in the house read this quote from more than a 100 years ago:
”The job of the minority is to make a quorum and to draw its pay.”
-- Speaker Thomas B. Reed, 1890.
Throughout 2006, the biggest obstacle to high-skills-only bill to be floor on the full house or on the judiciary committee was the Republican controlled judiciary committee headed by Jim Sensenbrenner. He has won his own race(Wisconsin’s 5th) – no surprise there – he would not be heading the house Judiciary committee. Even if Republicans would have controlled the house, it would not have been Sensenbrenner, it was his last term as chair of judiciary committee. With Democrats winning, the difference is that it would not be Lamar Smith heading the house judiciary committee; it would be the Democrat John Conyers of Michigan. Whenever there was a non-CIR bill related to high-skills employment based immigration, like the one sponsored by John Shadegg (SKIL bill of the house) it was referred to House Judiciary committee. And Sensenbrenner basically put it on the shelf. That would change. How much? Only time will tell.
Individual Races:
Firstly, J.D. Hayworth of Arizona is on his way to losing his house seat. That’s house congressman called by Arizona Republic Newspaper as a “bully”, a strong anti-immigrant, who is gone from the House.
Secondly, Jim Kolbe (pro-immigrant) retired from Arizona and a Democrat(Giffords) now occupies that seat. A strong anti-immigration candidate (Graf) lost election for that seat. That’s another good news.
Thirdly, Jon Kyl almost lost his Senate seat in Arizona. If it’s any indication that anti-immigration noises are no career-savers, this may be it.
CIR and Democratic majority:
Democrats may still be weary of CIR because of its Amnesty component, but if they win with a landslide they may go for it. If they have a slim majority in the house, CIR could still be in jeopardy. But once CIR is dead, a legal skilled immigration bill may have a better chance as the House Judiciary committee wont be killing it every time it sees it and the Senate has already passed high-skills relief in one form or other more than once since December 2005 – S 1932 provisions, Managers amendments to CIR and Cornyn’s SKIL amendment to CIR.
As of 11:45 PM PST, House has gone to Democrats in a landslide; the Senate is on its way depending on outcome in Montana and Virginia. If Democrats win MT and VA (Jon Tester in MT, Jim Webb in VA), the Democrats would control the Senate too.
What it means for us:
Change of control in the House:
This is of biggest consequence. Since Democrats won the House, every chairman of every committee in the house will be a Democrat. They will decide what goes into each committee, what comes out of the committee, what gets floored on the house floor and when. They set the agenda, they set the timetable. They run everything...including what gets served in the House Cafeteria and who occupies which office and who gets how much budget to run their offices. Republicans in the last few years have followed the mantra of “Majority of the majority” when it came to setting the agenda and timetable of house floor votes. What this did was, bills that would win the majority of 435 votes by combining Democrats plus moderate Republicans never got floored onto the house, since the majority of majority (conservative republicans) were against such CIR and by that token non-receptive to the legal variety of immigration.
To get an idea of the minority in the house read this quote from more than a 100 years ago:
”The job of the minority is to make a quorum and to draw its pay.”
-- Speaker Thomas B. Reed, 1890.
Throughout 2006, the biggest obstacle to high-skills-only bill to be floor on the full house or on the judiciary committee was the Republican controlled judiciary committee headed by Jim Sensenbrenner. He has won his own race(Wisconsin’s 5th) – no surprise there – he would not be heading the house Judiciary committee. Even if Republicans would have controlled the house, it would not have been Sensenbrenner, it was his last term as chair of judiciary committee. With Democrats winning, the difference is that it would not be Lamar Smith heading the house judiciary committee; it would be the Democrat John Conyers of Michigan. Whenever there was a non-CIR bill related to high-skills employment based immigration, like the one sponsored by John Shadegg (SKIL bill of the house) it was referred to House Judiciary committee. And Sensenbrenner basically put it on the shelf. That would change. How much? Only time will tell.
Individual Races:
Firstly, J.D. Hayworth of Arizona is on his way to losing his house seat. That’s house congressman called by Arizona Republic Newspaper as a “bully”, a strong anti-immigrant, who is gone from the House.
Secondly, Jim Kolbe (pro-immigrant) retired from Arizona and a Democrat(Giffords) now occupies that seat. A strong anti-immigration candidate (Graf) lost election for that seat. That’s another good news.
Thirdly, Jon Kyl almost lost his Senate seat in Arizona. If it’s any indication that anti-immigration noises are no career-savers, this may be it.
CIR and Democratic majority:
Democrats may still be weary of CIR because of its Amnesty component, but if they win with a landslide they may go for it. If they have a slim majority in the house, CIR could still be in jeopardy. But once CIR is dead, a legal skilled immigration bill may have a better chance as the House Judiciary committee wont be killing it every time it sees it and the Senate has already passed high-skills relief in one form or other more than once since December 2005 – S 1932 provisions, Managers amendments to CIR and Cornyn’s SKIL amendment to CIR.
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