Immigration issues are resurfacing in Congress

WASHINGTON — When a broad immigration bill failed in the Senate in June after a vitriolic national debate, many legislators said the issue was dead, perhaps until President Bush left office. But already some of the less contentious pieces of the bill are returning to life.

Last week, the Senate approved $3 billion for border security as part of a Homeland Security spending bill. Democrats and Republicans have also begun laying ground for a bill that would create a temporary immigrant worker program for agriculture.

Another bill, also supported by senators from both parties, would give a path to U.S. citizenship for high school graduates who are illegal immigrants but who complete two years of college or military service. Sen. Richard J. Durbin, an Illinois Democrat who is a sponsor of the bill, attached it as an amendment to the military authorization legislation that the Senate last month put off until September. He said he would seek to move it again then.

The bill attracted renewed interest this week because of Juan Sebastian Gomez, a student who just graduated with honors from Killian Senior High School in Miami. On July 25, immigration agents in Florida detained Gomez, 18, his brother and his parents, all illegal immigrants from Colombia, and prepared to deport them.

Immigration officials delayed the deportation on Wednesday after a determined band of Gomez's high school friends roused support in south Florida and then flew to Washington to pound on doors. They pointed to Gomez's academic record — a near-perfect 3.96 grade-point average — and top scores on 11 Advanced Placement examinations. They argued he should not be punished for his illegal status because his parents brought him to the United States when he was 2 years old.

The failed Senate immigration bill, which included a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants, was defeated by opponents who said it would reward knowing lawbreakers and the employers who hired them.

But many legislators, including some who opposed the broader bill, see the student measure differently because it would benefit immigrant teenagers who are illegal only because of decisions their parents made.

"It's unfair to make these young people pay for the sins of their parents," Durbin said.

According to the Migration Policy Institute, a nonpartisan research organization in Washington, nearly a million immigrant students across the country could gain legal status under the bill, whose supporters call it the Dream Act.