Republicans should support immigration reform

So Republican House of Representatives leadership is outraged by President Obama’s executive action on immigration reform, claiming “this is not the way democracy is supposed to work.”

But democracy is supposed to work by majority rule and the real outrage is that Republican leadership, including our Representative Cathy McMorris Rodgers, has never allowed a vote of the full House on the bipartisan immigration bill passed 17 months ago by the Senate, even though the bill has long had enough House votes to pass.

This bill, that Obama supports, is more substantial than his executive action and resulted from bipartisan cooperation among lawmakers, business groups, labor unions, agricultural interests and immigration advocates.

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office projects the bill would reduce federal budget deficits by $197 billion over the next decade. It is supported by such pro-business and pro-agriculture groups as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the local Washington Growers League, an influential Eastern Washington agribusiness association working on immigration in an unusual alliance with the Washington Federation of State Employees. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on Migration chairperson has also expressed support.

It is high time that real democracy works by House passage of this bill.

Norm Luther

Spokane