Cruz in 2013: ‘I Want Immigration Reform to Pass’
War: Cruz, Rubio Clash On Immigration (The Weekly Standard)
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When Rubio says Cruz is “a supporter of legalizing people that are in this country illegally,” he is referring to a Cruz-proposed amendment, which the Texan did not mention on Ingraham’s show. Cruz’s amendment would have preserved the original bill’s paths to legal status—the 13-year “generic” Registered Provisional Immigrant path, a 5-year expedited path for DREAMers, and an 8-year expedited path for agricultural workers—but not have allowed those immigrants to eventually receive citizenship.
During the hearing in which he offered his amendments, Cruz touted them by saying that his would not interfere with the bill’s provisions to provide legal status. “If this amendment is adopted to the current bill, the effect would be that those 11 million, under this current bill, would still be eligible for RPI status. They would still be eligible for legal status, and indeed, under the terms of the bill, they would be eligible for LPR [green card] status as well, so they are out of the shadows, which the proponents of this bill repeatedly point to as their principle objective: to provide a legal status for those who are here illegally to be out of the shadows. This amendment would allow that to happen.”
Cruz went on to say that failing to pass his amendment threatened to kill the immigration bill's chance in the House of Representatives. "I don't want immigration reform to fail," Cruz said. "I want immigration reform to pass. And so I would urge people of good faith on both sides of the aisle, if the objective is to pass common sense immigration reform that secures the borders, that improves legal immigration, and that allows those who are here illegally to come in out of the shadows. Then we should look for areas of bipartisan agreement and compromise to come together. And this amendment, I believe, if this amendment were to pass, the chances of this bill passing into law would increase dramatically.”
