A group of congressional Democrats on Wednesday pushed for immediate efforts to rein in the Trump administration’s sweeping immigration enforcement operation and “bring sanity” to an immigration system that Donald Trump said, after his party’s midterm drubbing, had been “too tough” in certain aspects.
Just over a week after the midterm elections in which the US president’s harsh crackdown on immigration fueled a voter backlash against Republicans, some sitting and newly elected Democrats gathered outside the US Capitol in Washington to advocate for a bipartisan approach to reforms – even as they gear up to take control of both legislative chambers next year.
“I have very aspirational dreams and hopes for immigration reform. But I am also a pragmatist. And as we have – as we continue to have – Donald Trump in the White House, and without a supermajority in the Senate, we need Republican support. So any comprehensive immigration reform must be bipartisan,” said congresswoman Veronica Escobar, a Democrat from Texas whose district includes El Paso on the US-Mexico border.
The group’s press conference included progressive as well as moderate Democrats from the Senate and House, in a show of unity. Many attendees held signs saying “legal pathways for long-term immigrants”.
The one Republican lawmaker slated to attend, congresswoman Maria Salazar of Florida, who has taken jabs at the president over immigration that are rare from his side of the aisle, did not appear.
“There is time still this session for a deal,” said US senator Ruben Gallego of Arizona. “We should try to work, even if we can’t get something this session, next session for a deal. We owe it to this country. We owe it to our friends.”
He added: “Republicans have been saying we will have immigration reform as soon as we have a safe, secure border. We have that right now. We did the job. Now let’s figure out how to right-size our immigration issue. Let’s figure out how to keep families together.”
The remarks followed Trump’s aggressive mass deportation campaign and ruthless moves that dramatically slowed crossings at the border, beginning as soon as he re-entered the White House in January ۲۰۲۵. His Democratic predecessor Joe Biden saw significantly elevated levels of migration at the border, and despite his at times harsh approach, the subject of migration became a high-risk political topic for Democrats, who gained a reputation as being too soft on the issue.
Since then, Trump’s second term has also seen US citizens and immigrants killed by immigration enforcement agents, record numbers of people held in often squalid detention conditions and highly visible, violent tactics in the country’s interior that led many voters to sour on some of his policies or at least how they are carried out.
The president’s mixed messages post-midterms included a tentative offer to make a deal with Democrats to help longstanding and law-abiding undocumented immigrants in the US avoid his crackdown. But that contrasted sharply with his actions so far, and shortly after the comments were recorded for TV he named Stephen Miller as his new chief of staff despite him being the architect and orchestrator of Trump’s most draconian, white nationalist immigration policies.
Trump has also signaled that he intends to use his presidential veto power often to block Democratic-supported legislation if it passes Congress.
At the same time, experts expect a barrage of investigations and oversight hearings from Democrats next year in an effort to bring accountability.
But lawmakers on Wednesday said they did not want to wait that long to begin improving the immigration system, highlighting two existing bipartisan bills they believe could be a practical starting point. There was no detailed talk on Wednesday of how to abolish or even significantly reform Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) despite it being a hot topic during the election campaign.
The first highlighted by the lawmakers who spoke on Wednesday, the American Dream and Promise Act, focuses on providing legal pathways to a green card for undocumented immigrants brought stateside as children, colloquially known as “Dreamers”, as well as people with temporary protections to remain in the US while their country of origin experiences serious turmoil.
Not only has Trump not offered such a path, his administration stopped recognizing many temporary legal statuses awarded under past Democratic administrations and has been deporting or trying to deport many who have papers or long-term legal options.
Lawmakers on Wednesday pitched the proposed legislation as an opportunity to act even before the new Democratically-controlled Congress is sworn in come January, asking for Trump’s help in getting it past the finish line.
“We all can agree that the immigration system is broken. But we can start today on a path to build a foundation with the Dream and Promise Act, and to move forward next year when we take over to make even more reforms,” said representative Sylvia Garcia of Texas.
Separately, the Dignity Act is the only bipartisan, comprehensive immigration reform bill introduced in over a decade, with ۳۵ Democratic and ۲۰ Republican sponsors. It couples strict border security measures with some protections for undocumented people.
Salazar is the bill’s lead sponsor. But Escobar, one of the Dignity Act’s fiercest champions and its co-author, said that she and her colleagues planned to reshape it over the next few weeks before reintroducing it next legislative session.
“If we can get this passed this upcoming Congress, we can do even more in ۲۰۲۸ to grow and expand what we can do for immigrants, immigrant families, and our economy and our communities,” she said. “We need to bring sanity back to the immigration system. We can do this. We will do this.”
Meanwhile, representative Henry Cuellar, another Texas border-area Democrat, expects to chair the House appropriations homeland security subcommittee in the new year – and thus control the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) funding.
He said he has a list of guardrails to revert ICE, which comes under the DHS agency, to its role prior to Trump’s second term.
