Immigration Bill Coming Back After the Fourth of July

From today’s New York Times…

Senate Democratic and Republican leaders announced on Thursday that they had agreed on a way to revive a comprehensive immigration bill that was pulled off the Senate floor seven days ago.

The majority leader, Harry Reid, Democrat of Nevada, and the minority leader, Mitch McConnell, Republican of Kentucky, said they expected the bill to return to the floor before the Fourth of July recess.

In a joint statement, Mr. Reid and Mr. McConnell said: “We met this evening with several of the senators involved in the immigration bill negotiations. Based on that discussion, the immigration bill will return to the Senate floor after completion of the energy bill.”

The immigration bill, ardently sought by President Bush, would make the biggest changes in immigration law and policy in more than 20 years.

I wish that the national Republican establishment had been this tenacious in pushing the President’s Social Security reform and/or healthcare reform proposals, but repairing the dangerously unsustainable regulatory and tax systems used by the general public doesn’t seem to instill the same sense of urgency in the national Republican party as does taking care of the needs of the cheap-labor business lobby.