After dodging a series of questions from reporters today, regarding his position on a controversial new immigration law in Arizona, House Minority Leader John Boehner categorically declared comprehensive immigration reform dead in Washington.
“There is not a chance that immigration is going to move through the Congress,” Boehner said at his weekly press conference. “Even the President last night admitted that this wasn’t going to happen.”
Boehner went on:
I’ve been around here for a little while and know that in the middle of an election year after we have had bills like health care shoved down our throats, in a process twisted tortured, pressured, bribed, you can not do a serious piece of legislation this size, with this difficulty, in this environment. It’s nothing more than a cynical ploy to try to engage voters–some segment of voters–ot show up in this November’s election.
Before declaring immigration reform DOA, Boehner was at pains to take a position on the Arizona law, which requires state law enforcement officials to demand proof of citizenship from anybody whom they have reason to suspect is in the country illegally.
“I think the people of Arizona have a right to pass their laws under the 10th amendments,” Boehner said, in response to a question from TPMDC. Boehner did not say whether he’d favor such a law in his home state of Ohio.
The Arizona law, though, deals with how to deal with people who are already in the country illegally. So how should the federal government deal with that issue?
“I think that we ought to have an immigration reform plan move through Congress,” Boehner confessed, without offering specifics. “But you can’t do immigration reform in a boiling political pot here in Washington, D.C.”
