Polling also indicates that those who feel that a "pathway to citizenship" is a good thing are much less passionate about the issue than those who hate all mexicans.  That enthusiasm, or lack of, makes a difference.

Personally, I don't even understand why are we even discussing this issue in congress.  This is a republican issue, not a democratic one.  When did any of the previous republican congresses even bring up health care?  Answer: almost never.  Even though the crisis has been severe, they didn't care about health care.  We shouldn't care about immigration "reform".

It's not our issue.  Any move we make will probably hurt us in some way.  What's the point?

Let the republicans spew their hate... we don't need to get involved.  

Thanks,

Mike

If the Democrats would just build the darn Border fence, they'd rob the GOP of this as an issue.

The Republican base is already voting Republican; they don't need more hot-button issues to retain their base.

No, immigration is an issue only because (1) it is emotional (and evokes racist psychologies), and (2) has some power as a wedge issue to split the Democratic coalition. But, to really understand the opinion polling immigration, and why it works as a wedge issue against the Dems, you need to ignore the aggregates and look at how immigration polls disaggregate with different demographic groups, racial groups, regions, and most important, swing districts.

The 2008 election is all but determined in most states or districts due to the clear dominance of one perty or another. How does immiration play in Ohio, Missouri and Pennsylvania, which are some of the largest swing states.

Does fear of immigration resonate sufficiently well in these states to pull off some of the Democrat supporters? I'd like to see this kind of specific opinion polling.

Why do i need to keep restating this to my Democratic friends? It is not immigration that people dislike but illegal immigration. Some of us Democrats do feel that, whether it is "our" issue or not, its an American issue and I am glad Democrats in Congress are attempting (although feebly) to do something. Of course mass deportations are not what anyone sane person wants, but no State can live long that can't control its borders. Why is it that almost no one wants to seriously tackle this situtation?

I think its important to note that this pandering is really going to hurt the GOP in the future with Hispanic voters, a bloc of the population that is only getting bigger and bigger. I think you're gonna see a backlash against this xenophobia much like after California Gov Pete Wilson signed that state's anti-immigrant bill in '94. Its not a smart play for their party and it will put Texas, of all states, back in the competitive column.

Under the status quo, 5% of America's labor force comes from the 12 million undocumented people living in shadows in America.

Corporations abuse these workers, who are afraid to protest (and risk deportation) when their employer takes advantage of them in any number of ways -- withheld overtime, brutal working conditions, sub-minimum wage payments, etc....  

This situation is untenable for low wage native born workers who should not have to compete with these indentured servants.

A serious comprehensive immigration reform bill will accomplish the following objectives:

1. Increase work-site enforcement efforts and penalties, including stiff fines for employers and mandatory jail time for repeat hiring offenses. Allow states to augment illegal immigration worksite enforcement activities. Without work (or job magnet), many illegals will leave or self-deport on their own over time. (Note: After ICE arrested and deported 90 percent of the workers at a meat packing plant in Georgia last year, the company raised wages and improved working conditions to hire local black citizens who had been displaced by illegals.)

2. No amnesty. (Do not reward people for entering or remaining in our country illegally, and for committing identity fraud.

3. Allow illegals to return to their country of origin, where they may apply for legal entrance.

4. Lower legal immigration levels from 1 million per year (1.3 million last year) to 250K per year. A tight labor market is the best friend the working-class workers (especially for black workers) ever had. Wages and benefits increase when employers abide by the laws of economics to compete fairly for labor. Additionally, a lower immigration level promotes healthy communities, where revenues can adequately service a community needs for social support, education, housing, health care, transportation, energy consumption and waste disposal.

5. Lower H-1B visas to reduce insourcing of middle-class jobs in technology, knowledge and medical. Nursing schools are filled to the brim, yet hospitals are importing nurses from Africa and Asia. Also, many technology workers with advanced degrees are not working in their desired profession, because too many tech companies are hiring over them to reach cheaper workers in India and China.

6. Overhaul H-2A and H-2B visas to minimize the use of so-called "guest workers." According to a new report by the Southern Poverty Law Center, Close to Slavery: Guestworker Programs in the United States, "Guest workers are usually poor people who are lured here by the promise of decent jobs. But all too often, their dreams are based on lies, their hopes shattered by the reality of a system that treats them as commodities. They're disposable workers in the global economy."

7. Promote foreign investment that values the economic security of American workers, while helping poor countries build sustainable economies that support poor people where they live, so that they do not have to leave their home of origin for better wages. This will help discourage economic policies, like those in Mexico, that rely on remittances from its exported citizens.

8. Construct a barrier along the border to further minimize illegal entry and, most importantly, drug trafficking.

Though I have been impressed by the political and economic calculations in the comments thus far, I find some important points missing from the debate. Senators on both sides of the aisle cannot walk away from immigration reform. Immigration isn't soemthing that democratic leadership can take or leave- it is a must. Why?

Because immigration isn't simply a wedge issue for the millions of voters suffering from the US' broken immigration system:

    - A few weeks ago, in a suburb of NYC, ICE officials used an outdated warrant to break into the house of US citizen and 12 year-old Erica Leon in the middle of the night, harrassing her citizen mother, grandmother and little brother. The man that ICE was looking for hadn't lived there in over a year. The family continues to live in trauma.

    - Over the last few weeks we have been hearing consistent local media reports that farmers and local industry will be at a major loss without immigration, and reform of the visa system.

    - On average, American taxpayers spend over $8,000 per person to arrest and deport an undocumented immigrant. We can no longer continue to fund inefficient and unworkable immigration policies.

    - US workers across the country are affected by the lack of worker protections for immigrant workers. Without better worker protections for immigrant workers we are unable to raise the working conditions of all workers.

   - Last week, House republicans had the gall to suggest that immigrant families were not the bedrock of strong and prosperous communities in the US; making this ascertion in the face of numerous statistics that indicate that family based immigration actually raises the wages of the US worker.

When you walk through towns in the southeast that our experiencing population growth in the hundreds and the thousands, or when you visit a man wrongly dpoerted to Guatemala after the New Bedford, MA raids... you begin to see the reality of immigration in the Us that goes far beyond the back door deals and politicing on the hill. If we don't make change now, America will have to wait at least two more years- I am in interested in knowing: can voters wait that long? And what will our country look like by then?