Dream Act fails to advance in Senate

Obama's fury as Senators kill DREAM legislation giving illegal immigrants the right to stay in America
Senate Republicans doomed an effort to provide hundreds of thousands of young Illegal Immigrants a path to legal status by enrolling in college or joining the Military today. Sponsors of what they call the DREAM Act fell five votes short of the 60 they needed to break through largely Republican opposition and win its enactment. That effectively kills the DREAM as Republicans take over the House of Representatives and narrow Democrats' majority in the Senate next month. 'A minority of senators pr...

The Dream Act Fails in the Senate
 DREAM Act Fails! (FoxNews)- DREAM Act Goes Down in Flames in Senate. An Immigration Bill that would blaze a trail to legal status for hundreds of thousands of undocumented Students went down in flames in the Senate on Saturday, delivering a critical blow to Democrats and Hispanic Activists. Even though the House approved the DREAM Act last week, the Senate fell five votes short of the 60 needed Saturday to advance the bill past Republican opposition. President Obama said in a statement it ...

Post-DREAM Act: Is Real Immigration Reform Dead?
The failure of the Senate to achieve Cloture on the DREAM Act has not ended the Immigration debate. Politically, both sides will attempt to capitalize on this vote.  Democrats will argue that they are the only ones who care about the Hispanic community, while Republicans will claim that they are the only ones serious about enforcement.  But from a policy perspective, where might the debate go during the next Congress with Republicans running the House and a stronger GOP presence in the Senat...

Requiem for a DREAM Act
The DREAM Act, which would have provided de facto Amnesty for millions of Illegal Immigrants died in the Senate today, which is good for all of us. We simply can not ignore our own laws, especially Immigration laws, and hope to keep our nation intact. I feel for those people who were brought here illegally by their parents or relatives and who have grown up knowing only America as home. It’s not their fault they’re here and they are in a terrible position. Most of them have no desire...

Immigration Vote Leaves Obama Policy in Disarray
The vote by the Senate on Saturday to block a bill to grant legal status to hundreds of thousands of Illegal Immigrant Students was a painful setback to an emerging movement of young immigrants and also appeared to leave the Immigration policy of the Obama Administration, which has supported the bill and the movement, in disarray. DREAM Act supporters after the vote. The latest on President Obama, the new Congress and other news from Washington and around the nation. Join the discussion. Suppo...

DADT repeal passes, DREAM Act fails
Some history was made yesterday. The Senate took a big step toward ending the Military’s ban on Openly Gay servicemembers today. By a vote of 63 to 33, the Senate voted to end debate on a bill repealing the Military’s Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy, opening the door for a final Senate vote on the standalone Repeal bill passed by the House Tuesday. That means a simple majority of 51 Senators can now bring the legislative fight on repealing DADT to an end. [...] Voting wit...

Dont ask Dont tell repealed
Don’t ask Don’t tell repealed - Harry Reid tweets to Lady GaGa I’ve stated before that if gays wanted to serve the country freely and openly, i wasn’t opposed to it. But making major changes like this during wartime wasn’t a good idea in my opinion. Be that as it may, the Senate repealed Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell today by a vote of 65-31. The eight so called “Republicans” who voted for this include North Carolina’s Richard Burr, the...

The Dream Act is dead. Long live the Dream Act
The DREAM Act is dead.  Long live the Dream Act. Just kidding, the DREAM Act isn’t really dead, it is undead.   Unlike the zombies of fiction in TV and movies, this zombie is real and it will return, I guarantee it.  But for now at least this piece of junk Legislation, this sewage, this deceitful lie from its very inception, won’t be threatening our Sovereignty or occupying Activists time.   And our email accounts will, temporarily, cease to be...

DREAM Act Goes Down in Flames in Senate
Undocumented Students push for the DREAM Act at a New York rally. An Immigration Bill that would blaze a trail to legal status for hundreds of thousands of undocumented Students went down in flames in the Senate on Saturday, delivering a critical blow to Democrats and Hispanic Activists. Even though the House approved the DREAM Act last week, the Senate fell five votes short of the 60 needed Saturday to advance the bill past Republican opposition. President Obama said in a statement it was "incr...

Students look to 2012 after immigration bill fails
Los Angeles -- Emboldened by months of phone calls to lawmakers, Hunger Strikes and sit-ins, a group of College Students and graduates in Los Angeles say they plan to take their fight for immigrant rights to the states and the 2012 election after Senate Republicans blocked a key piece of Legislation. But it won't be easy. The Senate vote Saturday to toss the proposal that would have granted young Illegal Immigrants a route to legal status dealt a harsh blow to Student Activists who will face ...

The power of strong tea
The Power of Strong Tea by digby If you want to understand the power of the Tea Party, and more importantly, the power of winning primary battles, read this postmortem on the defeat of the DREAM Act. They tried mightily to convert the many vulnerable 2012 Democrats with threats, but were only successful in a handful. But they converted nearly every 2012 Republican who had previously supported Immigration Reform. I suspect one of the reason we did so much better with the smaller group of Repub...

Midday Open Thread
DADT is dead, 17 years too late. After much trial and with much tribulation, President Obama and Majority Leader Reid kept a crucial campaign promise and advanced equality in our country. Welcome to the thread. The Christian conservative right considers this the end of America. This is worth reprinting at length for the sheer hilarity. This isn’t a game, and the Military should never be used, as is now being done, for massive social re-engineering. The new Marine motto: “The Few, ...

Defeated liberal Republican Paula Pennypacker bashes Russell Pearce, other conservatives
Paula Pennypacker, who was soundly trounced in the LD8 race for the House of Representatives this year by the more conservative Tea Party Candidate Michelle Ugenti, has decided to take out her rage on Conservatives. In an astonishingly rude blog post for the Arizona Republic, she bashes Senator Russell Pearce and Maricopa County Republican Chairman Rob Haney, complaining about an LD8 meeting where her hateful views against social conservatives weren’t warmly accepted. She sh...

Are Lame Duck Sessions of Congress Unconstitutional?
For a Congress that has squandered more time than any preceding legislative body on programs the American People oppose, the 11th has been the model of industry in the current Lame Duck session. Yesterday, Harry Reid’s Senate voted on the DREAM Act, which would have given Children of Illegal Immigrants a fast track to legality, and the Repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, which bans gays from openly serving in the Military. Today it’s on to the START arms reduction treaty. All of this

Lame duck Senate kills the DREAM Act
This has been a pretty good week to be a conservative. First Harry Reid was forced to kill his $1 Trillion, 2,000 page, earmark laden spending bill which nobody had a chance to read, and yesterday the Lame Duck Senate failed to get the 60 votes necessary for Cloture on the DREAM Act, killing this bill for the foreseeable future.   The DREAM Act is probably the one piece of Legislation that I feared the Lame Duck Senate might be able to ram through before the new Congress...

Republcans end year with scrooge move on immigration
Senate Republicans on Saturday doomed an effort that would have given hundreds of thousands of young Illegal Immigrants a path to legal status if they enrolled in college or joined the Military. Sponsors of the DREAM Act fell five votes short of the 60 they needed to break through largely GOP opposition and win its enactment before Republicans take over the House and narrow Democrats‘ majority in the Senate next month. “A minority of senators prevented the Senate from doing what most...

Joe Lieberman spearheads 'Don't Ask' repeal, DREAM act dies
Well, I'll say this for Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.), the only Orthodox Jew in the Senate: he lives up to his party label as “independent.” Just when it looked like he was just a hair's breadth from being a conservative Republican, he led the charge to Repeal the Military's Don't Ask Don't Tell policy, which passed both Houses of Congress over the weekend. This despite the fact that his best buddy and the guy he supported for the presidency in 2008, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), was po...

Napolitano confirms gang killed border agent in battle
An elite Border Patrol squad was pursuing a gang that preyed on Drug Smugglers when agent Brian Terry was shot and killed Tuesday night, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said Friday. "They were seeking to apprehend what's called a 'rip crew,' which is a name given to a crew that it is organized to seek to rip off people who are drug mules or traversing the border illegally," she said during a meeting with The Arizona Republic's editorial board. "That's why they were in that area." ...

A Wave Of Illegal Immigrants Floods Greece
Already struggling with a massive Debt crisis that is shrinking its economy, Greece is also facing a rising tide of illegal Immigration. The country's land border with Turkey makes it a major gateway to the European Union, which says more than 90 percent of this year's Illegal Immigrants entered through Greece. Despite EU assistance, Greece is overwhelmed by the influx of migrants who believe the financially crippled nation still has more to offer than their home countries. Detained But Not Dete...

Immigration Vote Leaves Obamas Policy in Disarray
The vote by the Senate on Saturday to block a bill to grant legal status to hundreds of thousands of Illegal Immigrant Students was a painful setback to an emerging movement of immigrants and also appeared to leave the Immigration policy of the Obama Administration, which has supported the bill and the movement, in disarray. You must login to comment. The Fox Nation is for those opposed to intolerance, excessive government control of our lives, and attempts to monopolize opinion or suppress free...

Jewish Groups Praise Senate's Move To Repeal 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell'
JTA — Jewish groups praised the U.S. Senate’s passage of a law allowing gays to serve openly in the Military and lamented its failure to legalize undocumented migrants who arrived as minors. “With today’s vote, Americans may serve without being forced to choose between their commitment to our country and their integrity,” said Rabbi Steve Gutow, the president of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, the umbrella Public Policy group, after the Senate lifted “don’t

Democrats Scramble for Votes to Ratify Arms Pact
Source: NY Times WASHINGTON — The top two Senate Republicans declared Sunday that they would vote against President Obama’s Nuclear Treaty with Russia as the Bipartisan spirit of last week’s tax-cut deal devolved into a sharp battle over National Security in the waning days of the session. With some prominent Republicans angry over passage of Legislation ending the ban on gay men and Lesbians serving openly in the Military, the mood in the Senate turned increasingly divisive and Mr. Obama an

Government will stay afloat, GOP leader says
WASHINGTON — Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky said yesterday that he and the Democratic leader have agreed on a spending measure to keep the government running through March. Passing the bill would prevent the government from running out of money for daily operations and forcing a shutdown. McConnell of Kentucky said on CNN’s “State of the Union’’ that he and Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada reached a deal on the measure. The Budget year beg...

Jon Tester was Wrong on DREAM, but Markos is Wrong on Tester
When I tweeted that yesterday, one of my more political friends asked why I was even bothering. Markos, after all, was just a blogger. This may just be one blogger taking another one too seriously, but after seeing a lot of digital ink hit my Twitter and Facebook feeds, I wanted to offer a few meditations on the whole thing, while also noting (and emphasizing) my pleasure that both of our Senators voted to Repeal Don't Ask, Don't Tell and further noting (and emphasizing) that Rep. Rehberg oppo...

Celebration and Mourning on the Same Day
Life plays funny tricks on you. In families and among circles of friends it sometimes happens where you are mourning one person's death at the same time a new baby is about to be born, or a Wedding is about to happen. Yesterday was like that for the progressive family, and it feels like the last couple of years have been that way all the time. At the same time we mourn the loss of the commonsense, bi-partisan, utterly moderate idea DREAM Act for immigrant Students, we celebrate the long delay...