A bipartisan Senate panel says the Bush administration is unwilling to promote a guest-worker program in an election year.

By Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar
Times Staff Writer

WASHINGTON — The Bush administration has failed to put much political muscle behind its immigration reform plan, and as a result Congress is unlikely to act on it this year, senior senators from both parties said Tuesday.

In a tough exchange with administration officials at a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on Mexico, centrist Republicans and Democrats suggested that President Bush was unwilling, in an election year, to expend the political capital needed to overcome criticisms of his guest-worker proposal from both the political right and the left.

"I've been around long enough to know when an administration wants something and when they're just being lukewarm," said Sen. Christopher J. Dodd (D-Conn.), who has been in the Senate for 23 years. "I'm being polite calling this lukewarm. I don't get any sense of movement at all."

Speaking with reporters after the hearing, Eduardo Aguirre Jr. — who as head of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services is the administration's point man on immigration reform — insisted that Bush remained committed to passing a bill soon. But, he added: "If [lawmakers] run out of time this year, there is nothing I can do about it. I don't control the legislature."

Sen. Charles Hagel (R-Neb.) joined Dodd in grilling Aguirre and other administration witnesses. He asked what the White House was doing to encourage Congress to take action and whether top administration officials — including Vice President Dick Cheney, Secretary of State Colin L. Powell and Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge — were calling the congressional leadership in support of the proposal.

Told that Bush promotes immigration reform at public events and mentioned it in his State of the Union message in January, Hagel responded: "Mentioning it is good, but it really doesn't move the ball."

Bush's framework for immigration reform — a set of principles, not a detailed plan — "only takes us about 5% of the way," said Hagel, coauthor of a bipartisan bill that would cap the number of guest workers but would allow more illegal immigrants already in the United States to get on the path to citizenship.

The president has called for a guest-worker program that would allow Mexicans and other immigrants to hold jobs in the United States for a limited number of years and then return to their home countries with their savings. Undocumented immigrants already here would be eligible for legal temporary worker visas. But those wishing to become permanent residents and citizens would have to apply separately, with no guarantees.

"Immigration reform is going require the president's leadership," Hagel said.

With another summer approaching and the prospect of scores of migrant deaths in the desert along the southern U.S. border, immigration reform remains the central issue in America's relationship with Mexico. About 60% of the estimated 8 million to 11 million illegal immigrants in the United States were originally from Mexico.

The administration's proposal has won support from business groups and from Mexican President Vicente Fox. Some lawmakers involved with immigration issues praised it as a constructive first step, but others have called it unworkable.

Many Democrats and Latino organizations say the plan does not do enough to help longtime undocumented residents become citizens. Proponents of restricting immigration say the Bush plan amounts to an amnesty.

In the House, where opposition from conservatives is strong, a hearing today will examine whether the guest-worker plan would take jobs from Americans.

Immigration has become "politically too hot," Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) told reporters after joining other senators to testify in favor of action on reform.

"The extremes are driving this debate," he told the committee. "It's apparent to me that the Congress is not going to act this year on the immigration issue."

Sen. Richard G. Lugar (R-Ind.), committee chairman, said the administration should tell lawmakers if its timetable for action was really in 2005 and not this year. That might allow more limited measures that have bipartisan support in Congress to move ahead, he noted.

"We are all needing some guidance as to the priorities the White House has on this issue," Lugar said.

Separately, Aguirre's agency announced Tuesday that tens of thousands of illegal immigrants wrongly turned away when they applied for green cards in a late 1980s amnesty program could now reapply. After years of fighting lawsuits by pro-immigrant groups, the government in January agreed to reconsider the cases.

Illegal immigrants who were in the United States before 1982 can reapply during a one-year period beginning May 24. Information is available online at http://www.uscis.gov under "USCIS Legal Settlement Notices and Agreements." The government estimates that fewer than 60,000 people will be eligible for green cards, but immigrant advocates say the number could approach 200,000.