On Sunday Sept. 19 Senate parliamentarian, Elizabeth MacDonough, rejected a Democrat provision, nestled within their 3.5 trillion dollar social spending bill, intended to provide a path to citizenship for approximately 8-million illegal immigrants.
MacDonough expressed that the Democrats’ provision is “by any standard a broad, incipient immigration policy,” that did not meet the stringent requisites that can be included in a budget resolution.
In her decision MacDonough ruled that the Democrats’ proposal represented a “broad, new immigration policy” and that the policy change “substantially outweighs the budgetary impact of that change”, Politico reported.
Had the provision passed it would have allowed immigrants to apply for permanent residency, which in turn would have allowed them to receive federal benefits like Affordable Care Act healthcare subsidies, Medicaid, refundable tax credits, Supplemental Security Income and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), or food stamps.
The Congressional Budget Office’s preliminary estimate predicted that had the provision passed that it would have increased budget deficits by $139.6 billion over a ten-year period.
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The provision intended to grant amnesty to four groups of illegal immigrants in the United States; former President Barack Obama’s “Dreamers”, individuals with temporary protected status (TPS) holders, agricultural workers, and essential workers, among others.
“Dreamers” are illegal immigrants who entered the United States as children and were granted amnesty under Obama’s executive order titled, “Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals” or DACA.
Chuck Schumer, Senate Democratic Leader said Democrats were “deeply disappointed in this decision but the fight to provide lawful status for immigrants in budget reconciliation continues.”
Schumer said that Democrats have already prepared proposals to address the matter and that he hopes to schedule additional meetings with MacDonough.
Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) characterised the Democrats’ provision as “inappropriate” and “radical” adding that he is “glad it failed.” The Epoch Times Reported.
“Democrats will not be able to stuff their most radical amnesty proposals into the reckless taxing and spending spree they are assembling behind closed doors,” McConnell added.
McConnel continued, “This just illustrates how radical Democrats’ aspirations are and how unmoored their far-left wish list has become from the procedures they want to use to ram it through.”
