The tide is changing in the push for comprehensive immigration reform in the House.
The fight for reform had slowed over the late summer months when the “Gang of Eight” bipartisan bill passed the Senate and ultimately stalled in the House.
But momentum is quickly shifting behind real comprehensive immigration reform that brings 11 million aspiring Americans out of the shadows and keeps our families together.
Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, a Republican Congresswoman from Florida, becomes the second House GOP member to publicly announce support for H.R. 15, a comprehensive immigration reform bill based on the bipartisan legislation that passed the Senate Judiciary Committee earlier this year.
Ros-Lehtinen issued a statement, saying, “It’s important to keep the conversation going in trying to fix the broken immigration system. I favor any approach that will help us move the negotiations forward. Other Members may soon produce a bipartisan product that may also deserve support and I’m cautiously optimistic that we can pass meaningful immigration reform.”
H.R. 15, which was introduced in the midst of the government shutdown in early October, combines the Senate Judiciary Committee bill with a bipartisan border security bill passed by the House Homeland Security Committee.
Ros-Lehtinen joins Rep. Jeff Denham of California and 183 Democratic co-sponsors of H.R. 15. Denham had said this past Sunday that the Democratic bill was a “good solution” and that he was encouraging – and expecting – other House Republicans to come on board with the bill.
There are now at least 28 Republicans in the House that have publicly announced their support for immigration reform. We clearly have the votes in the House to pass immigration reform this year, we just need to bring the bill to the floor for a vote.
It’s time for all of us to do our part and to reach out to our elected officials and ask that they join Rep. Denham and Rep. Ros-Lehtinen in supporting the immigration reform bill brought forward by House Democrats, so that we can move forward on a vote before the end of the year.
