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Immigration reform bill: Top 8 changes GOP senators want

More than 300 amendments were submitted for possible inclusion in a sweeping immigration reform package – at least 100 of them from two Republicans, Sens. Charles Grassley of Iowa and Jeff Sessions of Alabama. Here are eight notable changes GOP lawmakers want to see in bill, as the Senate Judiciary Committee takes up amendments between now and Memorial Day. 

2. More border security, please. (And no one gets 'legal' until that happens.)

Mike Blake/Reuters/File
US border patrol agents sit on their ATVs atop a hill overlooking Tijuana, Mexico, during a night patrol along the US-Mexico border in March.

  • By David Grant Staff writer

Senator Cruz isn’t finished: Another of his amendments would forestall illegal immigrants from obtaining even legal status (let alone citizenship) until the border is deemed secure, as defined by the Senate’s most conservative wing.

That would take at least three years.

The Cruz amendment envisions tripling the number of border security agents, completing a fence along a long swath of the 2,000-mile US-Mexico border, quadrupling the level of border security materiel (such as drones, helicopters, cameras, and the like), requiring a biometric screening system (meaning iris or fingerprint scans at all major ports of entry) – all leading to “100 percent operational control” of the border within three years.

If the Department of Homeland Security fails to meet those metrics, its budget would contract by 20 percent in the fourth year. That money would then be granted to border states to improve the security situation.

The Cruz security criteria are likely to cost more than the $4.5 billion designated for border security in the bipartisan reform bill. Cruz’s amendment does not offer any estimates of its cost.

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Mark Sappenfield
Editor

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