Congress struggles to agree on a solution

Lawmakers have already introduced dozens of border security bills.
WASHINGTON (AP) -- From building a fence to keep them out to passing a law to help them stay, members of Congress have lots of ideas on how to respond to President Bush's challenge to take on the problem of illegal immigrants. There's a will to act but so far not much consensus.
The first stab at the problem could come in the next two weeks, when the House may vote on legislation to strengthen border security. That's the easiest of the three legs of immigration reform. The others, enforcing workplace hiring rules and setting up a guest-worker program that might incorporate illegal immigrants, are far more divisive.
In the Senate, Majority Leader Bill Frist plans to bring up a border security bill in February, and use that as a starting point for broader reform. "We must boldly address the challenges of border security first," Frist, R-Tenn., said this week as Bush toured the Texas-Mexico border to stress the need for both tougher border controls and a guest-worker program.
The House bill will likely come from Judiciary Committee Chairman James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., with the focus on tighter borders and some elements of workplace enforcement. His spokesman, Jeff Lungren, said it could contain a proposal by Rep. Ken Calvert, R-Calif., to expand a program for verifying employee records with the Homeland Security Department and the Social Security Administration, and another by Rep. David Dreier, R-Calif., to make Social Security cards more tamperproof.
Other proposals
But there are lots of other proposals to choose from. The Homeland Security Committee this month approved a bill by its chairman, Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y., that would add border patrol agents, use new monitoring technology including unmanned aerial vehicles and end the "catch and release" practice for non-Mexican illegals.
Dozens of other border security bills have been introduced, many by conservatives and border state lawmakers fed up with the government's failure to stop the flow of illegal immigrants.
Rep. Virgil Goode, R-Va., is seeking $2 billion to build a fence along the border with Mexico. Rep. Tom Tancredo, R-Colo., who has made a crackdown on illegal immigrants the theme of a long shot presidential bid, is among several who would change existing law to allow use of the military for border enforcement. Rep. J.D. Hayworth, R-Ariz., has an extensive bill that would let state and local police enforce immigration law.
"I expect it to grow," Lungren said of Sensenbrenner's bill.
Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said Thursday that fencing didn't make sense in deserts. "A wall across the border would be phenomenally expensive," he told reporters, and "it wouldn't be particularly effective."
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