GREENWOOD VILLAGE | Aurora Representative Mike Coffman said he thinks the Republican-controlled House of Representatives can move forward on comprehensive immigration this summer, although he doesn’t support the omnibus immigration package passed out of the U.S. Senate last year. The Washington Post reported April 25 that Speaker of the House John Boehner, R-Ohio, mocked House Republicans on their inability to pass immigration reform.
“We get elected to make choices,” Boehner said, according to the Washington Post. “We get elected to solve problems, and it’s remarkable to me how many of my colleagues just don’t want to … They’ll take the path of least resistance.”
“I disagree with the Senate bill,” Coffman said April 25. “What Boehner has said, and I agree with, is that a comprehensive approach doesn’t have to be a comprehensive bill. We’re going to do step-by-step approach with individual bills on individual subject matters. The subject that I’ve taken up is on the military, but that’s certainly not the end all on immigration reform.”
Coffman said he doesn’t support a special path to citizenship for adults in the country who knowingly illegally immigrated to the country, contrary to one of the Senate bill’s main tenants and a contentious topic between Republicans and Democrats. Coffman is pushing is his Military Enlistment Opportunity Act, a proposal that would allow undocumented minors a path to citizenship through the military. That proposal would allow enlistees who have received Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals status a path to citizenship through military service. Currently, to enlist in the military, immigrants must be permanent residents with a green card. Coffman didn’t support the executive order creating DACA last year, but he said he supports the program — just not the way it was created by President Barack Obama.
Democratic representatives have praised Coffman’s effort on immigration.
“Mike Coffman has proven he is a leader in Congress on the issue of immigration,” Representative Luis Gutierrez, D-Ill., said in a statement. “He is one of the people who can work with colleagues in both political parties and specifically, he and I have worked on building consensus for a pathway to citizenship through military service for undocumented individuals brought into the United States as children.”
Passing any sort of reform may be tough in the House this year with or without Boehner.
“I support comprehensive immigration reform, and I’m among the few in my party that did. It is a struggle within the Republican Party,” Coffman said. “I think at the end of the day, there’s going to be a middle path. And in my view, we need to come up with a permanent solution that we’re not, 20 or 30 years from now, wringing our hands again and saying, ‘We have a broken immigration system.’”
What? Coffman will support “comprehensive” immigration reform, but it won’t
be “comprehensive”? He’ll support reform just enough to say that he
supports immigration reform. He’ll put his little toe in the water, but won’t
jump in. I’m sure that makes supporters of REAL comprehensive reform
joyous.
U are missquoting him. He said he supported comprehensive immigration reform but not in one comprehensive bill. He is looking for comprehensive immigration reform which will still be applicable 20 to 30 years from now. Just take a lesson from the Colorado system of writing bills – they are to cover one item – not a lot of aspects all in one bill..
Coffman is a big liar. He says he supports reform, but in small bills. Well guess what…. he was asked to cosponsor a small bi-partisan bill HR3431 – The American Familites United Act, which affects actual US Citizens and their families in the legal immigration system. What did he do? Say NO I will not cosponsor it.
Mike is lying. There is no way the House will pass a complete set of bills.
I say Open Borders. Let everyone in who follows the same rules as my ancestors did when they got off the boat.