Wall Street Journal
By Kristina Peterson
May 16, 2018
Support grew in the House for an effort to force a vote on several immigration proposals, sparking some conservatives to consider using a coming vote on the farm bill as leverage to try to block them.
GOP Reps. John Katko of New York and David Trott of Michigan on Wednesday joined a push from 18 other centrist Republicans to force a House floor vote on a series of immigration bills, including ones with a path to citizenship for young undocumented immigrants known as Dreamers. That left the GOP centrists just five GOP votes shy of the 218 signatures needed to trigger the votes, assuming all Democrats later join them.
The push is pitting one wing of the Republican Party against another. Centrists facing tough re-election fights in November are clamoring for an immigration vote that could widen their appeal at home, while conservatives threatened to potentially derail the farm bill to avoid that outcome. The farm bill includes federal support for farmers and tighter work requirements for food-stamp recipients.
Rep. Carlos Curbelo (R., Fla.), who is one of the immigration push’s leaders, said his group was “very close” to securing enough support. That “could happen this week,” he said.
The momentum for the immigration push alarmed some of the House’s more conservative members, who take a tougher line on immigration and worry that the centrists’ effort could end up allowing a bill to pass with mostly Democratic support.
“This immigration thing is coming to a head,” said Rep. Jim Jordan (R., Ohio), one of the founders of the House Freedom Caucus, a group of roughly three dozen of the House’s most conservative Republicans. “We’re nervous about what kind of bill that would be,” he said. “Our party wasn’t elected to put together a bill with 190 Democrats and a handful of Republicans.”
The centrist Republicans are seeking to use a rarely employed procedure known as “Queen of the Hill,” under which the House would vote on four immigration measures, and the one with the most votes would pass.
The measures range from a Democratic proposal to offer a path to citizenship to Dreamers to a far more conservative bill from House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R., Va.) that emphasizes interior enforcement and provides $30 billion for the border wall.
The quartet also includes a bipartisan bill that couples a path to citizenship for the young immigrants with border-security measures, and a placeholder that House Speaker Paul Ryan (R., Wis.) can fill with legislation of his choosing. Mr. Ryan, who has said he wants to find an immigration solution, says the centrists’ approach turns power over to Democrats.
Mr. Ryan said he and House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R., Calif.) met with President Donald Trump on Tuesday in the hopes of settling on an immigration proposal that could pass Congress and that Mr. Trump would sign into law.
Leaders of the centrist group met Wednesday evening with top House GOP leaders, who were hoping to find a plan that would satisfy all sides.
“We have our plan, we’re sticking to it, but we’re willing to see what theirs looks like,” Mr. Curbelo said as he left the meeting.
Conservatives, worried that one of the more centrist or Democratic measures might pass, were discussing Wednesday whether to try to prevent that outcome by withholding support for the farm bill, which is expected to come to the House floor on Friday.
House GOP leaders have been working for weeks to find enough GOP support for the farm bill. Most Democrats are expected to oppose the bill over their objections to its work requirements for food stamps.
Because the farm bill is considered crucial in certain regions, some members of the Freedom Caucus are expected to vote for it on Friday regardless of the immigration debate. But a “significant” number of its members are mulling withholding their support for the farm bill unless House GOP leaders take certain steps to block the discharge petition, Mr. Jordan said.
Mr. Jordan said his group was still discussing what exactly they would press GOP leaders to deliver. Lawmakers said one option would be to urge them to bring Mr. Goodlatte’s bill to the House floor. That would sideline the discharge petition for procedural reasons and force the centrists to restart that effort, aides and lawmakers said, though the procedure was still under debate Wednesday evening.
However, the House would have to first approve bringing the Goodlatte bill to the floor with a procedural vote called a “rule,” which could be blocked by Democrats and roughly 22 House Republicans, aides said. Mr. Jordan said he has also been asking GOP leaders to at least let Mr. Goodlatte’s bill pass out of the House Judiciary Committee.
Members from agriculture-heavy states said they weren’t surprised that conservatives were adding some late hurdles to the farm bill’s passage.
“The Freedom Caucus for the entire time they’ve existed have been a challenge,” said Rep. Frank Lucas (R., Okla.), a former chairman of the House Agriculture Committee.
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