Big: Amnesty Amendment "Jettisoned" from War Funding Bill

I'm surprised. I thought they'd finally ram it through on the back of the utterly-unrelated war funding bill.

I'm so behind on this story I didn't even know Bush had threatened a veto:

At the same time, the White House renewed its veto threat, reminding everyone involved that the trouble-filled path to Senate passage is but one more step in an even more hard-to-figure battle.

Reid brought up the domestic add-ons in an unusual move designed to win their adoption — over opposition from the White House and GOP conservatives — before turning to legislation providing $165 billion (€106 billion) to conduct military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan into next spring….

…Reid has signaled he wants the non-war extras to get a vote before the war funding itself, but it’s a high-wire strategy.

“It is going to be extremely difficult for us to get from where we are today to completing this legislation,” Reid said.

Senate Republicans seemed to suggest they’ll let the add-ons advance to a Bush veto rather than filibustering them this week. A key vote on letting the bill advance looms Thursday, just as senators will be eager to leave Washington for the weeklong Memorial Day recess.

The measure was also opposed by open borders advocates, who once again cannot countenance any sort of guest-worker program that doesn't include a mass amnesty and pathway to citizenship for border-hoppers.

Not to shill for McCain too much, but the president's power of veto is pretty big shakes.

I'm not sure what McCain's position on this was -- Kaus kept asking why McCain wasn't following through on his secure-the-borders first promise, so I imagine he just ducked it. Asked! I sent an email to McCain's online guy to find out.

Thanks to someone.

posted by Ace at 02:48 PM

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