Senate Parliamentarian Rejects Democrats’ ‘Plan B’ to Insert Amnesty in Infrastructure Bill

Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough struck down the Democrats’ Plan B to insert amnesty into the infrastructure bill. They tried to change the date when the immigrants in the US can apply to change their legal status:

Senate parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough, an official who advises the Senate on how its rules, protocols and precedents should be applied, rejected Democrats’ second argument after they submitted a memo Tuesday.

“This registry proposal is also one in which those persons who are not currently eligible to adjust status under the law (a substantial proportion of the targeted population) would become eligible, which is a weighty policy change and our analysis of this issue is thus largely the same as the LPR proposal,” MacDonough wrote in a response, which was obtained by CNN.

The source stressed to CNN they believed this fight for including immigration reform “is not over,” but this is — again — a huge loss for Democrats who want to include these provisions as a last-ditch effort for reform.

MacDonough rejected the Democrats’ first plan last week:

Democrats pitched MacDonough earlier this month on their plan to use the $3.5 trillion spending bill to provide 8 million greencards for four groups of immigrants: Dreamers, temporary protected status (TPS) holders, agricultural workers and essential workers. Getting legal permanent resident status allows an individual to eventually apply for citizenship, if they can meet other qualifications.

MacDonough described the plan as a “new immigration policy.”

The Democrats have to be so full of themselves that they thought changing the date would change MacDonough’s mind.

The Democrats want to use reconciliation to pass the bill without Republicans. They must abide by certain requirements, including “any provision in the bill has to impact the federal government’s spending or revenues and that the impact can’t be ‘merely incidental’ to non-budgetary intentions.”

The Democrats are ticked off:

Following the ruling from the parliamentarian, Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin called it a “disappointment.”

“Unfortunately we can’t find the language to clear for the reconciliation,” Durbin said, adding Democrats plan to continue finding a way to include it in the bill.
Sen. Bob Menendez, a Democrat from New Jersey and another champion of immigration reform, also added to the disappointment from Democrats and called the decision “unfortunate.”

“I disagree with her, as I did from her original principle that she’s working from. I disagree with the principle she’s come out with,” he said, referring to the parliamentarian’s ruling that the budgetary impact is dwarfed by the significant impact of the policy change.

Menendez said now Democrats “will go to plan C,” but he wouldn’t elaborate on what that would entail. He said he doesn’t know when they’re going to meet with the parliamentarian again, but said, “We have a Plan C prepared, we just have to talk about executing it.”