Democrats are exploring a different path to enact immigration reforms: include them in a sweeping spending bill that can be passed without Republican votes.

What You Need To Know

  • Democrats are toying with adding immigration reforms to a multi-trillion dollar spending plan they hope to enact through the reconciliation process, which would allow Senate passage without Republican support

  • President Joe Biden endorsed the approach Thursday, saying, “I think we should include in the reconciliation bill the immigration proposal."

  • Attempts at immigration reform have fallen apart repeatedly on Capitol Hill, torpedoed by Republicans

  • A federal judge in Texas recently labeled the Obama-era DACA program illegal

Democrats are toying with adding the reforms - including a pathway to citizenship for immigrants brought to the country illegally as children, often referred to as Dreamers - to a multitrillion-dollar spending plan they hope to enact through the reconciliation process, which would allow Senate passage without Republican support.

On Thursday, following a meeting with 11 congressional Democrats on immigration, President Joe Biden endorsed the approach.

“I think we should include in the reconciliation bill the immigration proposal,” he told reporters outside the White House.

Adding the reforms to the reconciliation package would put them alongside many other Biden priorities, like spending on child care and education.

Attempts at immigration reform have fallen apart repeatedly on Capitol Hill, torpedoed by Republicans.

House Judiciary Chairman Jerry Nadler, who attended the meeting with Biden, argues that as long as the Senate’s 60-vote filibuster rule remains in place, using the reconciliation process - which only requires a simple majority - is their only real option.

“It's become obvious that the Republicans in the Senate are not willing to negotiate in good faith on this,” Nadler said following the meeting.

Democrats feel the need to act.

A federal judge in Texas recently ordered the Biden administration to stop allowing individuals to enroll in the DACA program, which protects them from deportation. The judge labeled the Obama-era program illegal.

“This is an issue that we must put behind us and get it resolved for families, millions of families that are really just waiting and disenfranchised,” said Rep. Adriano Espaillat, whose district covers parts of Manhattan and the Bronx.

Espaillat, who has called for including the reforms in the reconciliation measure, was the first formerly undocumented immigrant to serve in Congress.

Of course, there are plenty of potential snafus ahead. Will Democrats in the evenly split Senate be able to stick together to get the reconciliation bill done? Will the Senate parliamentarian even OK immigration reforms being included in the bill?

In New York City, Hunter College student Maria Quinche is among those with her eyes on Capitol Hill.

A Dreamer, she arrived in the U.S. from Ecuador before she was two years old. She’s grown accustomed to watching the back and forth in Washington over the future of DACA, with her future hanging in the balance.

“It's really terrifying because the one thing that is allowing me to work and study here can be taken away,” she said.

For Quinche, a chance at citizenship, and the freedom from that fear that it would provide, is something she’s been waiting for.

“Our intentions are pure. We're just trying to succeed in life and do the best that we can,” she said.