Photograph by Joe Klamar/AFP via Getty Images

People march through the streets of Oxnard, California, for immigration reform and to honor the legacy of Cesar E. Chavez, founder of the United Farm Workers of America, on March 24, 2013.

At the rose-adorned grave-site of Cesar Chavez, co-founder of the National Farm Workers Association, widow Helen Chavez had one wish for the visiting President Barack Obama.

“I would like to make sure and request that you get immigration reform passed,” she said at that encounter last fall, according to Arturo Rodriguez, a longtime associate of the late farmworkers’ leader and now president of the United Farm Workers, recounting Obama’s reply: “He said, `You know what, Mrs. Chavez, I promise you I will get that done.”’

While the Obama White House hasn’t taken the public lead on an immigration bill shaped by a bipartisan group of senators working its way through the Judiciary Committee — wary that any bill with Obama’s name on it will become a target for Republican opposition — the president has blessed the bill as within the bounds of the sort of comprehensive legislation he wants: Offering a path to citizenship for some 11 million undocumented workers already in the U.S., while securing the nation’s borders and instituting a sensible program of guest-worker visas for lower- and higher-skilled workers alike — including farmworkers.

During negotiations over the farmworker provisions of the bill led by Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California and Republican Marco Rubio of Florida, the UFW’s Giev Kashkooli says, the Obama administration’s Departments of Homeland Security, Agriculture and Labor were instrumental in guiding which one of the many proposals on the bargaining table would work and which ones wouldn’t. The agencies provided good “technical assistance,” he said, “on what was possible and what was not possible.”

At the center of the farmworkers’ concerns in what could be the most significant immigration legislation in a generation is the provision enabling those who have toiled in American fields without legal residency to seek a path to citizenship, Rodriguez says. At least 800,000 and as many as 1.1 million families  stand to benefit from that, he says.

“We’re very optimistic and very hopeful,” Rodriguez said today, at a breakfast sponsored by Bloomberg Government in Washington. “We developed what I believe is a very important step… to ensure that they gain legal status,” he said. “They’ve earned the right to be able to do that in this country.”

Today, as the Democratic-run Senate Judiciary Committee continues work on amendments to the bipartisan bill, the Republican-run House Judiciary Committee is taking testimony on far more limited legislation involving the guest farmworker program. House Judiciary Chairman Bob Goodlatte of Virginia, the bill’s sponsor, has spoken out against a path to citizenship for the undocumented, and is more interested in specific legislation enhancing border security and amending the guest-worker visa programs.

Yet the House’s bill is worse than limited, Rodriguez maintains. As Bloomberg’s Alan Bjerga reports on Rodriguez’s remarks, it represents a throw-back to the 1940s and 1950s, he says — evoking the Bracero program in place from 1942-64. Prompted by a need for manual labor during World War II, the agreement between the U.S. and Mexico permitted Mexican citizens to take temporary farm work in the U.S. Initially, 10 percent of their pay was deducted for savings accounts that many of the workers never saw. A Labor Department employee in 1964 called it “legalized slavery.”

“We can’t afford to go back in history,” Rodriguez said.

Negotiations in the House among another bipartisan group of lawmakers for broader legislation along the lines of the Senate bill are reported at a near-impasse. Yet, “there’s too much momentum at this point,” Rodriguez suggests. “I don’t think Congress can afford to ignore this anymore.”

On Oct. 3, one month before his reelection, Obama traveled to Nuestra Senora Reina de la Paz – Our Lady of Peace — in Keene, California, resting place of Cesar Chavez and home of the union he led until his death in 1993. The president declared 105 acres a national monument to be managed by the National Park Service. He visited Chavez’s grave with his widow and declared the farmworkers’ movement a “story of determined, fearless, hopeful people who have been willing to devote their lives to making the country a little more just and a little more fair.”

In November, Obama won 71 percent of the Hispanic vote, which helped him defeat Republican Mitt Romney.

The narrative of the immigration debate under way in Washington suggests that Republicans ultimately will align with Democrats on a long-sought revision of U.S. law because it is in their political self-interest to avert another drubbing.

Yet will passage of an immigration bill repair the Republican Party’s torn relations with Latino voters, following a campaign in which deportation of the undocumented drove the party’s primary contests?

“It’s hard to say what the dynamic would be — how it would change peoples’ thinking,” Rodriguez said. “We’re like everybody else out there,” he said, suggesting that the public at large will thank Congress for taking action on what everyone knows is “a broken immigration system” — and look askance at failure.

Original post is Immigration Bill: Promise with a Prayer by Political Capital.

Photograph by Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP Photo

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif. speaks during a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington on Jan. 24, 2013, to introduce legislation on assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition feeding devices.

Ted Cruz, the first-year Republican senator from Texas who has taken on some senior lawmakers in rhetorical fisticuffs during his debut on Capitol Hill, ran into one contender today who showed little patience for his brashness.

Cruz put a question to Sen. Dianne Feinstein, the Democratic senior senator from California and former mayor of San Francisco who witnessed bloodshed in her own tenure at City Hall and is pushing a ban on assault weapons and mega-sized ammunition clips in the aftermath of the shootings of 20 schoolchildren in Newtown, Connecticut, with a Bushmaster.

“The right of the people” to keep and bear arms, Cruz said, is a term of art in the Second Amendment that is sounded in the First Amendment as well.

“The question that I would pose to the senior senator from California is, would she deem it consistent with the Bill of Rights for Congress to engage in the same endeavor that we are contemplating doing with the Second Amendment in the context of the First or Fourth Amendment,” Cruz said.

“Namely, would she consider it constitutional for Congress to specify that the First Amendment shall apply only to the following books and shall not apply to the books that Congress has deemed outside the protection of the Bill of Rights? Likewise, would she think that the Fourth Amendment’s protection against searches and seizures could properly apply only to the following specified individuals and not to the individuals that Congress has deemed outside the protection of the Bill of Rights?”

“I’m not a sixth grader,” Feinstein replied. “Senator, I’ve been on this committee for 20 years. I was a mayor for nine years. I walked in, I saw people shot. I’ve looked at bodies that have been shot with these weapons. I’ve seen the bullets that implode. In Sandy Hook, youngsters were dismembered.”

“Look, there are other weapons” that people can purchase, she said. “I’m not a lawyer, but after 20 years I’ve been up close and personal to the Constitution. I have great respect for it. This doesn’t mean that weapons of war and the (Supreme Court’s) Heller decision clearly points out three exceptions, two of which are pertinent here.”

“And so I — you know, it’s fine you want to lecture me on the Constitution,” she said. “I appreciate it. Just know I’ve been here for a long time. I’ve passed on a number of bills. I’ve studied the Constitution myself. I am reasonably well educated, and I thank you for the lecture.”

The bill, she said, specifies more than 100 banned weapons — yet it exempts more than 2,000 weapons.

“Isn’t that enough for the people of the United States?” she asked. “Do they need a bazooka?.. I come from a different place than you do.”

“I would note she chose not to answer my question,” Cruz said, pressing his luck.

“The answer is obvious — no.” Feinstein said.

The chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee joined in, Democratic Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont, pointing out to Cruz that, in his home state of Texas, the state Board of Education “tells people which books they can and cannot read.”

The ban on assault weapons and clips with more than 10 rounds of ammo passed the committee by a vote of 10-8 along party lines, only Democrats backing it.

President Barack Obama congratulated the committee:  “ These weapons of war, when combined with high-capacity magazines, have one purpose: to inflict maximum damage as quickly as possible.  They are designed for the battlefield, and they have no place on our streets, in our schools, or threatening our law enforcement officers. ”

The ban is likely to die in the full Senate.

Original post is Cruzing for a Lecture: Feinstein on Guns by Political Capital.

Photograph by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

Senate Judiciary Committee member Sen. Lindsey Graham during a hearing about gun control on Capitol Hill on Jan. 30, 2013.

Some Republican senators say that today’s  Judiciary Committee  hearing on gun control would have been better with some show-and-tell.

South Carolina’s Sen. Lindsey Graham and Sen. Ted Cruz  of Texas fired off a letter to Judiciary Chairman Patrick  Leahy of Vermont complaining about being unable to bring various firearms to the hearing to help their colleagues learn before they legislate, as reported by Bloomberg Government’s Congress Tracker.

In the letter, the senators say they were foiled by what they called onerous gun restrictions. Among them: the District of Columbia’s ban on assault rifles.

“Our goal is simple — to educate fellow senators and members of the public how and why firearms are used by millions of law-abiding Americans in self-defense, hunting and sporting purposes,” they wrote. “We also want to shatter the mistaken belief that guns in the hands of law-abiding citizens are a danger to society.”

They complained the rules are “so impractical as to be unworkable” and urged Leahy to work with law-enforcement officials so that “at future hearings senators can request, and law enforcement will timely provide, various firearms for display and discussion purposes.”

The newly elected senator from Texas had some other thoughts today as well:

We need a serious debate about the Second Amendment. Here are my thoughts from hearing earlier today: youtube.com/watch?v=fiMYIQ…

— Senator Ted Cruz (@SenTedCruz) January 30, 2013

For the record, it’s not impossible to carry assault weapons to an event into the Capitol complex.

California Democrat Dianne Feinstein brought almost a dozen samples to her news conference last week unveiling her proposed ban on the weapons, something she was only able to do with lots of planning. They had to be brought into the Capitol by D.C. police, inspected by the Senate’s Sergeant at Arms as well as the U.S. Capitol Police and also have trigger locks, according to Brian Weiss, a spokesman for the senator.
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Original post is Gun-Control Hearing: No Show and Tell by Political Capital.

Photograph by Chip Somodevilla/Pool via Bloomberg

President Barack Obama plays basketball during the White House Easter Egg Roll on the South Lawn of the White House.

A blueprint for overhauling the nation’s immigration laws that includes a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants and provisions for border security and workplace verification will be released at 2:30 pm EST today by a bipartisan group of senators.

President Barack Obama welcomes the NBA champion Miami Heat team for a celebration of his favorite sport. He teamed with departing Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to defend his administration’s foreign policies in a joint interview on CBS’s “60 Minutes” program last night.

Obama and Vice President Joe Biden will meet this morning with local police chiefs from towns that have been scenes of mass shootings, including Newtown, Connecticut, as the administration presses. A proposed ban on sales of assault weapons would likely be an “uphill fight” and may not be part of gun legislation that reaches the floor of the Senate, Sen. Dianne Feinstein said on CNN’s “State of the Union” program over the weekend.

The Senate this week may get its first opportunity to test newly revised rules that make it harder for a single member to slow legislation when it votes on measures including $50.5 billion in Hurricane Sandy relief, confirmation of Sen. John Kerry to replace Clinton as secretary of state, and a House-passed measure to suspend the debt limit until mid-May.

Lawyers for alleged Sept. 11 plotter Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four others will seek permission to collect evidence showing that some of the men were tortured, during the first of four days of pretrial hearings in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Proving torture could help the defendants exclude evidence at their trial or build a case for a reduced sentences if they’re found guilty.

Original post is Washington Daybook: Heat Wave by Political Capital.

Photograph by George Frey/Bloomberg

An attendee looking at a Smith & Wesson Holding Corp. semi-automatic assault rifle for sale at the Rocky Mountain Gun Show in Sandy, Utah, on Jan. 5, 2013.

Most Americans hold a favorable view of the measures that President Barack Obama proposes for curbing gun violence in America, following the slaying of 20 first-grade children at an elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut, last month.

So shows the polling of ABC News and the Washington Post: 53 percent of those surveyed viewing favorably the president’s plans to ban assault-styled weapons and high-capacity ammunition clips and other proposals, and 41 percent viewing this unfavorably.

The poll conducted by Langer Research Associates is new today.

A Gallup Poll also released today shows 91 percent of Americans supporting the requirement of criminal background checks for all gun sales, 82 percent support for increased spending on mental health programs and 60 percent supporting the reinstatement of a ban on assault-styled weapons such as the Bushmaster rifle used in Newtown, a ban imposed in 1994 and ended in 2004.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California and Rep. Carolyn McCarthy of New York, joined by other Democratic  legislators, will introduce a new ban on assault weapons today. Read Bloomberg’s Heidi Przybyla’s account of why passage of ostensibly popular measures — in particular a ban on the high-capacity ammo clips that make those weapons so powerful — will be more difficult than proponents expect.

Original post is Gun Controls Approved in Polls — Difficult at Best in Congress by Political Capital.

Photograph by Mario Tama/Getty Images

Singer Alicia Keys performs during the Public Inaugural Ball at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center on Jan. 21, 2013 in Washington.

Alicia Keys took the stage at the Inaugural Ball, playing piano for a ready crowd with a revised rendition of her “Girl on Fire:”

“Obama’s on Fire.”

“He’s the president, and he’s on fire,” Keys sang to a delighted audience. “He’s living in a world and it’s on fire… filled with catastrophe, but he knows he can’t fly away. He’s got both feet on the ground, and he’s burning it down.”

The president and first lady took the stage at 9:55 p.m. and danced to “Let’s Stay Together,” sung by Jennifer Hudson.

On this inaugural day for a second term, the first president elected twice with 51-percent-plus margins of victory since Republican Dwight Eisenhower’s re-election in 1956 was not only intent on keeping his electoral coalition together — with an address reciting the core beliefs of a progressive political agenda. He also was intent on firing up that base for a new round of debates with Congress over everything from immigration and climate change to entitlement spending and gun control.

“All fired up, ready to go,” chanted some of the diners at the post-inaugural luncheon in the Capitol.

“Our work begins today,” the president tweeted from church yesterday. “Let’s go. -bo”

Now comes the cold, clear daylight of a wintry day in Washington, where the House Ways and Means Committee is holding a hearing on the debt-ceiling increase that the president is seeking. The House’s Republicans are inclined to give him only a three-month extension.

Now comes the e-mail from Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, warning supporters that Obama and his allies are “coming for your guns.”

“You and I are literally surrounded,” McConnell writes in an e-mail first reported by The Hill. “The gun-grabbers in the Senate are about to launch an all-out-assault on the Second Amendment. On your rights. On your freedom.”

McConnell campaign manager Jesse Benton spotlights three prongs of the new push for gun control following the shootings at Newtown, Connecticut. They include “the Feinstein Gun Ban,” California Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s legislation to ban assault weapons. “It is almost hard to believe the sheer breadth and brazenness of this attempt to gut our Constitution,” Benton writes.

Feinstein will roll out her legislation this week. Feinstein also will meet with Florida’s Republican Sen. Marco Rubio on the farm-worker provisions of a potential immigration bill. The opposition to any such reforms stands ready to pounce there as well.

The president may have fired up his base this week, yet the Republican ranks of McConnell’s forces in the Senate and House Speaker John Boehner’s fractured caucus in the House stand ready with a fire hose for much of what the White House will put forth.

Original post is ‘Obama’s on Fire:’ Alicia Keys — Boehner-McConnell Have Hoses by Political Capital.

Photograph by Bill Clark/Roll Call/Getty Images

Senate (Select) Intelligence Committee chairwoman Sen. Dianne Feinstein.

Though not all she asked for.

Senator Dianne Feinstein of California, whose campaign committee was drained of millions of dollars by her former treasurer, will be able to go back to some of her donors for replacement checks.

The Federal Election Commission said today that contributors whose checks were never cashed by Feinstein’s committee could send in another. However, the FEC failed to get the four votes needed to approve Feinstein’s request to allow donors whose checks went into former treasurer Kinde Durkee’s pocket rather than for the senator’s re-election to send another contribution.

Durkee pleaded guilty March 30 to five counts of mail fraud in connection with charges that she embezzled more than $7 million from Feinstein’s committee and those of other Democratic politicians. The government said it would seek restitution, though Feinstein and the others likely will not get back all of the money they lost.

Feinstein, who is up for re-election this fall, reported a bank account balance of $7.3 million as of April 30. She lent her campaign $5 million.

Original post is FEC Offers Senator Feinstein Some Financial Relief by Political Capital.