By Dana Milbank
Tuesday, May 22, 2007

Hours before the great immigration debate began in the Senate yesterday, Sen. Jeff Sessions was polishing his arguments at a news conference in a park across from the Capitol.

"This bill," the Alabama Republican told the cameras, "is not going to save Social Security. It's not going to save Medicare. And it's not going to balance the budget."

Well, that's true, Senator. It also won't end the war in Iraq, cure cancer or cause the Nationals to win the pennant. It is, after all, an immigration bill.

Still, that non sequitur was as good a way as any to kick off what is becoming Congress's annual immigration debate -- a celebration of legislative futility.

The need to change the nation's immigration laws cannot be doubted: Last week, a Gallup poll confirmed that Americans consider it the most important issue after Iraq and the economy, putting it ahead of health care and terrorism. The method is also fairly obvious: The Bush administration has crafted a blend of border enforcement and legalization that has majority support in both chambers. And yet the ferocity of opponents on the far right and the far left makes it unlikely that new immigration legislation will be enacted.

The assault on the latest immigration package began on a freshly mulched patch of the Upper Senate Park yesterday morning. In what sounded like an audition to be guest anchor on "Lou Dobbs," Sessions and colleagues outlined their objections to the yet-to-be-introduced proposal.

"The problem with it is that lower-skilled people with low education don't speak English, have very difficult problems of being productive at the level that they would pay taxes, and, in fact, often draw more in benefits than they pay into the government," Sessions asserted.

Sen. Jim Bunning (R-Ky.) had a similar pitch: "This bill is compromising to the country's economy, national security and very foundation of a democracy rooted in the rule of law."

Heritage Foundation scholar Robert Rector, joining the lawmakers, reported that the bill would cost taxpayers as much as it would to buy each of the immigrant households "an automobile each and every year for their lives."

Fox News's Major Garrett pointed out that "the left seems to dislike it much more than last year's bill," because those lawmakers consider it too tough on immigrants. "Does any of that suggest to you that there might be some underlying merit to this bill?"

Bunning was stumped. "I don't know the answer to your question," he said.

Opposition on the left will undoubtedly materialize, but it wasn't as well organized yesterday. A coalition representing trade unions and immigration groups scheduled a teleconference for the afternoon but promptly canceled it. That left the likes of Sessions unchallenged as he made his way from news conference to television studio to the Senate floor. He took three hours of the Senate's time to argue against the compromise, illustrating his argument with a poster of an educational cartoon titled "How a Senate Bill Becomes a Law."

"So, Mr. President, how does a bill normally become law?" Sessions inquired.

The presiding officer, Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), didn't answer; he was signing letters on his official stationery. All other senators had left the chamber, as had all but three or four staffers. This left Sessions as the sole spokesman for what he repeatedly referred to as "the American people."

"There's no way that we could and should produce this bill after one week's debate," Sessions maintained. "If that's so, the American people can know we've had a railroad job for sure."

Sessions went on to outline an expanded Bill of Rights for the American people. "The American people have a right to be nervous about this," he said. "They have a right to be cynical."

As for the negotiations that led to the immigration compromise, he said, "I will tell you who was not in those meetings: It was the American people." In fact, negotiators "would listen to everybody, I guess, but the American people."

Not surprisingly, Sessions argued that this exclusion "should cause the American people to be troubled." The senator found this all the more disappointing because "the American people, for the last 40 years, have had the right instincts."

"The American people do care," Sessions continued. And public meetings about immigration "might have really made the American people feel better." Instead, there was "an attempt to mislead the American people," and, as a result, "the American people are cynical on this point."

Sessions briefly yielded the floor to others who expanded on the theme. Sen. David Vitter (R-La.) asserted that "if the American people fully understood what was buried in this bill, there would be a massive outcry."

Nobody, however, could speak for the American people as well as Sessions could. "It's time for us to listen to the American people," he lectured. "Their heart is right on the subject. They believe in immigration. They believe in a lawful system of immigration that should serve our national interest."

So, will Congress do something about it? The American people are skeptical.