Positive signs even as Senate moves amnesty bill to floor
We have a ton of work ahead of us, but you have done an amazing job thus far with your phone calls and faxes and personal appearances.
The Senate a couple of minutes ago passed the Motion to Proceed bring S. 744 to the floor for debate.
Don't be alarmed by the fact that in this vote we got only 15 of the 41 votes we needed to kill the bill before it even started. We actually see in this vote some signs that our chances are better than we thought for killing the bill in the final filibuster vote later this month.
A number of the Senators who voted to proceed have announced over the last few days that they will eventually vote against the bill unless it is significantly changed on the floor. And the changes they are demanding are being called unacceptable on the floor right now by Chief Amnestymeister Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.).
We have no doubt that your tens of thousands of calls the last two days planted very powerful seeds among many of the YES voters today that makes them realize that they are going to have a very hard time voting YES at the end when the question is not debate but passage.
The 15 Senators who today said that this bill is so hopelessly out of touch with the needs of America that it shouldn't even be debated included four Senators who a couple of weeks ago were being touted in the media as prime swing voters who would push the final vote over 60:
Kirk of Illinois
Crapo of Idaho
Risch of Idaho
Barrasso of Wyoming
Congratulations to all of you from those three states who have done such a remarkable job of helping those Senators understand both where the voters are in your state and also the moral and practical imperative of stopping this bill.
Back in 2007, we also lost big on this procedural first vote to bring that amnesty bill to the floor. But we built on the solid opposition of a strong bloc of Senators to kill the amnesty on the final vote later.
HERE ARE TODAY'S CHAMPIONS WHO TRIED TO STOP THE AMNESTY BILL IN ITS TRACKS
ALABAMA: Sessions & Shelby
ARKANSAS: Boozman
IDAHO: Crapo & Risch
ILLINOIS: Kirk
IOWA: Grassley
KANSAS: Roberts
LOUISIANA: Vitter
OKLAHOMA: Inhofe
SOUTH CAROLINA: Scot
TEXAS: Cruz
UTAH: Lee
WYOMING: Barrasso & Enzi
Everybody else voted YES, except for three who didn't vote:
ALASKA: Murkowski
ARIZONA: McCain
OKLAHOMA: Coburn
I have no idea at this time why they didn't vote. Murkowski and Coburn have both made strong nods toward voting for the bill recently but have been hammered by the voters.
Interestingly, during the second less-important vote (because it required only a majority, instead of 60 votes), Mississippi Sen. Cochran voted NO, after having voted yes on over-riding the filibuster.
NumbersUSA agreed with four Senators on the Judiciary Committee who said the 1,000+ page bill is such a monstrosity of special-interest gluttony that it did not deserve any debate at all.
Thanks to all of you who responded to Anne's emailed alerts and to my phone calls to you the last two days pushing for a NO vote on bringing the bill to the floor. You laid a great foundation for the way many of these Senators will listen to the debate over the next two or three weeks.
This is the official statement that I sent out to the media:
Many Senators who oppose the bill as now written nonetheless voted to move it to the floor in the mistaken belief that it can be improved into something that serves the interests of the American people when every section of it was written to serve narrow corporate and political special interests.
Their biggest challenge will be showing compassion to the 20 million workers -- disproportionately Black and Hispanic Americans -- who can't find a full-time job, which will require dramatic cuts in the 33 million work permits the bill offers illegal and authorized immigrants in the first decade.
Sen. Sessions (R-Ala.) did a magnificent job in his speech on the floor today, speaking up not only for the 20 million unemployed but for the millions more Americans whose real wages have been driven downward by 30 years of high immigration.
He painted the picture very clearly that this is a bill about helping those affluent Americans who happen also to be greedy at the expense of the most struggling members of our society, and at the expense of the taxpayers.
Please don't grow weary in well-doing.
Those of you who beat back the huge amnesty pushes in 2006, 2007 and 2010 know that we have to act nearly every day to beat the extravagantly funded special interests, but we know from battle experience that we CAN win!
ROY BECK is the CEO & Founder of NumbersUSA