The House will not consider the immigration reform bill that the Senate has passed, but it will have a vote on a series of bills. The House will deal with all the issues and for the House, border security is the most important issue. Supporters of immigration reform believe that the House will come up with a reform legislation by the end of this year.
The House has to wait until the Congress returns from its August recess. During the five-week break, the representatives have planned to hold town hall meetings and the members of the House aim at gauging the mood of their constituents.
Immigration activists are looking forward to press their case with the members of the House, during the break. This break has renewed the hope of the supporters of immigration reform. Immigration reform activists say that the Republicans are making efforts to find solutions for the problems related to the country’s broken immigration system.
Business and religious leaders, labor groups and law enforcement groups are already lobbying for immigration reform. At the same time, opponents of this reform do not want to grant the undocumented immigrants amnesty; they say that immigration reform will only benefit those law breakers.
The members of the House rejected the immigration reform bill that the Senate has passed and they would consider smaller bills. They are likely to vote on smaller bills by October. Many Republicans are open to an immigration reform bill without a special path to US citizenship. They want to legalize the DREAMers, the young undocumented immigrants, and not all the undocumented immigrants in the country.
Republicans now believe that they need to build a relationship with the Latino voters in order to remain as a majority party. Supporters of immigration reform hoped that the House will pass a bill before the August recess but that did not happen. Nevertheless, supporters now believe that the House that had been so far disappointing them, would pass a reform bill after the break.