Western governors to discuss immigrant issues

Immigration will be on the agenda of the next Western Governors' Association meeting this fall, Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. said, the first time the organization has talked about the controversial issue.

"There's been no thought given to a regional approach, and we are the region most directly impacted," Huntsman told the Deseret Morning News. "Governors in this region can probably embrace some key aspects of immigration reform regardless of political affiliation."

But he may face an uphill battle getting the association to take on immigration. All the governors have committed to do is consider during a closed-door meeting whether they want to pursue the issue in the future, according to WGA executive director Pam Inmann.

"If there's consensus or general agreement, then we'll pursue it. But if it only affects maybe three or five or whatever and the other (Western states) say maybe they should do it on their own," Inmann said. "It's a frank discussion of what they'd like us to get involved in."

The Colorado-based WGA has never tackled the problems surrounding illegal immigrants, she said. "We really try to focus on issues that affect a majority, if not all, of the states in the West," especially those related to natural resources.

And immigration may not be one of those issues. "I don't think you have the same issues like up on the northern border with North and South Dakota, Montana, Idaho. I don't think they feel the immigration issue quite as strongly as those along the southern border," Inmann said.

She stopped short of saying whether she expected the governors to agree to pursue the immigration issue. "I don't know. It's something they'll discuss and tell us. We let them tell us what to do."

Huntsman is trying a bipartisan approach. His ally in this effort is a Democrat, New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, a former leader of WGA who is already working with Huntsman to organize a regional presidential primary for 2008.

Richardson and another Democrat, Gov. Janet Napolitano of Arizona — the head of WGA — made news recently by declaring a state of emergency in their states because of the problems created by illegal immigrants coming across the border from Mexico.

"Gov. Richardson wants an in-depth dialogue with other governors who are facing the same difficulties we are," the New Mexico governor's deputy chief of staff, Billy Sparks, said. "The states need to be involved."