Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) is pressing his Republican colleagues to put a moratorium on earmarks. (UPPA/ZUMApress.com)

With a fight brewing between Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and Tea Party ringleader Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) over the practice of requesting earmarks in the Senate, most Republican Senators have been desperately hoping to avoid picking sides. But Tea Party groups, which are eagerly monitoring a closed-door Republican Party vote on the issue next Tuesday, have decided to make sitting on the sidelines that much more difficult.

[GOP1] “It might not ever be known, but if somebody won’t come out and say they’ll vote against earmarks, then we’ll be pretty sure we know they voted for allowing them,” said Mark Meckler, co-founder of the Tea Party Patriots, a national network of Tea Party groups. “And if that’s what they’re going to do, then a lot will see themselves facing primary challenges.”

The added pressure leaves many Republican senators between a rock and a hard place in the lead-up to Tuesday’s vote. On the one hand, they don’t want to undermine McConnell’s leadership or appear hypocritical should they continue the routine practice of requesting earmarks in the next Senate session. But they risk finding themselves on the wrong side of the GOP’s anti-spending campaign and alienating Tea Party groups that have made earmarks an important symbol of all that’s wrong with Washington.

Between now and Tuesday, Republican senators must weigh the dangers of speaking out versus straying mum and then cast a decisive, albeit non-binding vote that activists are looking to as a first sign of the character of next year’s Senate Republican caucus.

Following last week’s elections, DeMint wasted no time in capitalizing on the anti-spending fervor in Washington — and the anti-earmarks platforms on which many Senate Republicans had run — to announce a new push for a vote to place a year-long moratorium on the practice of earmarking at the upcoming Republican Conference meeting among Republicans. The issue quickly drove a wedge between the Tea Party and McConnell, who pushed back against DeMint’s proposal on television and in private. Tea Party leaders like Meckler couldn’t believe it.

“I think McConnell’s a perfect example of what’s wrong with the GOP and has been wrong for a long time,” said Meckler. “Following the election, he has a chance to be a hero and he’s being a zero. It’s very clear that the vast majority of Americans are anti-earmark. He’s a classic example of the arrogance of the ruling class.”

DeMint released a letter indicating that he had gathered the signatures of ten fellow Republican senators, including six fresh faces — Marco Rubio (Fla.), Pat Toomey (Pa.), Rand Paul (Ky.), Mike Lee (Utah), Ron Johnson (Wis.) and Kelly Ayotte (N.H.) — many of whom had run on explicitly anti-earmark platforms.

But many Republican senators hoped to avoid declaring either way, buoyed by the prospect that Tuesday’s vote would remain anonymous. The last time Senate Republicans had voted on a moratorium to end earmarks was in March, when DeMint led an open vote of the full Senate, and while a majority of Republicans had voted for the measure then, they had the benefit of knowing that with most Democrats voting against it, it had little chance of passing.

“It got a majority of the Republican conference last time, but like Bob Dole once said, you never get in trouble for voting for something that fails or against something that passes,” said Steve Ellis of Taxpayers for Common Sense, a group that advocates for reforming the congressional earmark process.

The secret ballot in Tuesday’s vote appeared to make approval of DeMint’s resolution that much less likely. “If you have a closed-door vote, then certainly there are people who can talk one way and vote another or won’t worry about the pressure back home or whatever else,” Ellis said.

The news that Tea Party groups will consider silence on the issue an admission of guilt, however, has thrown GOP senators’ previous calculations into flux and brought increased pressure on them to reveal their intentions. DeMint’s office confirmed on Wednesday that two more senators — Richard Burr (R-N.C) and Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) — have signed on as cosponsors to his proposal and Sen. Bob Corker’s (R-Tenn.) office responded via email on Wednesday night to say that he, too, had signed the letter. Tea Party groups across the country, meanwhile, have rallied to DeMint’s cause.

“We support it because we would like for our elected officials to vote on the bills at hand and not attach other things to it that might cause them to vote for bad legislation,” said Phillip Dennis, who sits on the steering committee for the Dallas Tea Party. “Let them vote on each bill on its own merits.”

As for Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Texas), who voted against DeMint’s proposed moratorium in March and has yet to signal a position on the upcoming vote, Dennis added that his group will be “very interested in what she’s doing.”

Indeed, Hutchison is considered among the most vulnerable of GOP incumbents who are being scrutinized and asked to take a stand. She, Richard Lugar (Ind.), Olympia Snowe (Maine) and Roger Wicker (Miss.) all voted against DeMint’s earmark moratorium in March, and all are facing re-election in 2012. All four offices have refused to reveal their positions this time around, but by doing so they risk incurring renewed calls by the Tea Party to run primary challenges against them in two years’ time.

“We’ll do what we always do,” said Meckler. “Our members will put immense pressure on every senator to vote against earmarks. This is a fundamental issue — it’s both substantive and symbolic. Will they vote against the politics of the past or are they still stuck in it? This is a vote that will never go away, like TARP. Tea Partiers have long memories. Politicians have always taken advantage of the fact that voters have short memories, but we’ll know, we’ll remember, and in 2012 when they have aggressive, well-funded primary challengers, they’ll know why.”

One Republican Senate office, which asked to remain anonymous, urged Tea Party groups not to make assumptions about the senator’s lack of public commitment at this time. Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), who is also up for re-election in 2012, will wait until talking with his colleagues next week before coming to a decision. The office of Sen. John Barrasso (Wyo.), who has also thus far declined to indicate how he will vote, did not return requests for comment.

Staying silent, however, no longer seems like the safest option.

Reid claims his caucus is behind him on the act, which would give some undocumented students and military service members a change to gain legal status to remain in the country. “We all support the DREAM Act,” he said on Univision in an interview that aired Sunday. “I just need a handful of Republicans to help me.”

Kirk has said he wouldn’t, despite exhaustive efforts by DREAM Act supporters to convince him otherwise. “This is not the time to do that,” Kirk said in a debate.

How important is Kirk’s vote for passing the DREAM Act? It depends on who Reid means when he says “we all support the DREAM Act.” There are 59 senators who caucus with the Democrats and 41 Republicans. Kirk will change those numbers to 58 and 42. Reid needs 60 votes to overcome a filibuster if he hopes to pass the DREAM Act.

If Reid’s right about his caucus, he would only need two Republicans to vote “yes” on the DREAM Act. Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.) co-sponsored the bill and would almost certainly vote for the it as a standalone measure, although he voted in September to filibuster the defense authorization bill that included it. Sen. Bob Bennett (R-Utah) has also said he would vote for the act as a standalone bill.

But if either of them or any Democrats fall through, other Republicans are tougher to pin down. Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), who was one of the original sponsors of the DREAM Act, seems likely to vote against it now because he favors a borders-first approach to tackling immigration problems. “The American people want the government to secure our borders, create jobs and reduce the deficit.” Hatch said when he announced plans to vote against the DREAM Act’s inclusion in the defense authorization bill.

Lugar, Hatch and Bennett were two of twelve Republicans who voted for the DREAM Act in 2007. The others still in Senate — Sam Brownback (R-Kans.), Susan Collins (R-Maine), Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Texas) and Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) — have been vague about whether they would support the measure as a standalone this year.

When the bill came up as a possible addition to the defense authorization bill, a few Democrats said they were not sure they would support it this time around. Sens. Kent Conrad (D-N.D.), Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.), Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.), Mark Pryor (D-Ark.) and Mary Landrieu (D-La.) told The Hill in September they might vote “no” on the DREAM Act.

Reid said he expected full support from Democrats, but needed a few Republicans to vote for the bill. “I have the right to bring that up any time I want, that’s why I brought it up the first time,” he said. “I am a believer in our needing to do something. … We all support the DREAM Act. I just need a handful of Republicans to help me.”

He didn’t seem to expect support from Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), who once supported the bill but has since shifted far to the right on immigration issues. Reid blamed him, at least in part, for stalling the immigration reform effort this session. “As a result of his unwillingness to help, we have not had a single Republican offer to help us with comprehensive immigration reform,” Reid said. “The system is broken and all they want to do is demagogue the issue.”

Reid didn’t name names when it came to which Republicans he hoped would vote for the DREAM Act during the lame duck session. Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.) is an almost certain “yes” vote, but other Republicans’ positions remain unclear. Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) was an original sponsor, but has since wavered in his support and voted in September for a filibuster of the defense authorization bill that would have served as a vehicle for the act. Maine Sens. Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins also voted to filibuster, but might support the DREAM Act as a standalone bill.

In September, bill sponsor Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) said he hoped senators who lost their elections would vote for the bill. “Some members of the Senate who are not going to return may vote in our favor,” Durbin said. “I hope that’s the case.”

Which Republicans may come around? In 2007, 12 Republicans voted for the DREAM Act’s passage. Only seven are still in the Senate, and they all voted to filibuster the defense authorization bill last week. While some objected to the bill being inserted into the defense bill, others seem more likely to now oppose the DREAM Act in general — meaning passage as a standalone is far from a sure thing.

Utah Sens. Bob Bennett and Orrin Hatch are in the “secure the borders first” camp, arguing immigration reform must be preceded by stricter enforcement efforts. “The American people want the government to secure our borders, create jobs and reduce the deficit.” Hatch said to explain his “no” vote on the DREAM Act.

Sen. Sam Brownback (R-Kans.) may also be tough to sway. He is running for Kansas governor and has said he opposes “amnesty” for illegal immigrants even though he supported paths to legal status such as the DREAM Act in the past.

Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchinson (Texas) focused her criticism of the defense authorization bill on the inclusion of non-defense items in the bill. (The DREAM Act would have an impact on the military and would likely ease recruitment.)

Maine Sens. Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe could be more likely to vote for the DREAM Act as a standalone bill. Collins said she joined the filibuster because Majority Leader Harry Reid unfairly limited Republican amendments to the defense authorization bill, not because she opposed the substance of his planned amendments. Snowe also stayed quiet on the DREAM Act when discussing her decision to filibuster.

Sen. Richard Lugar (Ind.) seems like a likely “yes” vote for the DREAM Act if it is pushed as a standalone bill. Lugar is a co-sponsor of the bill in its current iteration and has indicated he would support the bill’s passage this year.

But if not now, when will it possible to pass the DREAM Act? It’s unclear when the Senate could next take up the bill. There is very little time left before the Senate leaves again for its pre-election recess, and afterward it may be tough to pass legislation in a lame duck session.

“The legislative calendar for this year is growing very short,” Ira Mehlman of the anti-immigration reform group FAIR told TWI. “It’s a certainty that there’s going to be a lame duck session. As you get closer and closer to the end of congress, it’s going to be more difficult to pass the DREAM Act.”

FAIR opposes the DREAM Act. But some supporters of immigration reform also voiced doubts that Reid will be able to pull off passage this year. The main issue is Republican support. While some senators, such as Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.) might vote for the DREAM Act on its own, many others have said they would not support the measure.

Mary Giovagnoli, director of Immigration Policy Center, says today’s vote could indicate Republicans would be unwilling to support the DREAM Act in the future. “It’s pretty clear that it was a party line vote,” she told TWI this afternoon. “Consequently, unless some Republicans are brave enough to step over the line, it’s going to remain gridlocked.”

Despite challenges, supporters said they will continue to push for legislation to help illegal immigrants who came to the U.S. as children gain legal status through school or military service. Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-Ill.), one of the main advocates of comprehensive immigration reform in Congress, said “the fight is not over” for the DREAM Act.

“All we need is a small handful of relatively brave Republican Senators to step up to let the debate move forward, which could happen tomorrow if they choose to put the people before politics,” Gutierrez said in a statement.

Immigrants rights advocates said they will continue to put the heat on Republicans to support the DREAM Act, specifically those they believe might support the DREAM Act as a standalone bill or amendment to another piece of legislation.

A Somali refugee family resettles in Sioux Falls, S.D. (Flickr, UNHCR)

Stan Delp, a 67-year-old retired teacher living in Lansdale, Penn., was sitting in church in June, 2008, when he noticed four unfamiliar black-haired men by him. He found they were new to the United States, having spent 11 years in refugee camp in Thailand. Delp’s church is not big — about 200 people regularly attend — but nevertheless it has helped 47 such refugees assimilate to life in the United States over the past two years. When Delp met the men, he decided to do his part. He helped them buy clothes at Kohl’s and taught them how to use a refrigerator. He searched for jobs for them, and ended up waking at 5 a.m. to drive one man to work for several months, then allowed him to move into his home. Now that he lives in a retirement home, the refugees, now friends, visit a few nights a week.

“It’s like being a dad to them, really,” Delp says. “It takes 14 years to get assimilated into American culture. That’s a long time.”

[Immigration1] In the United States, the refugee resettlement system has always worked largely thanks to the generosity of people like Delp, as a public-private partnership with volunteer services and government backing. But the recession is threatening the stability of the program and the availability of resources to refugees. The government has stepped up its contributions to help new refugee migrants adjust to American life, but provides just eight months of resources. With jobs scarce, the churches and community centers that help after then are stretched to the point of breaking.

The government is aware of the problem, but thus far has taken only small steps to ameliorate it. The State Department doubled the amount of money it gives private resettlement agencies to help refugees when they first come to the United States, from $900 to $1,800. That amount helps the groups provide services for refugees and fund-raise for additional aid money for up to 90 days after the refugee enters the country. But the State Department knows $1,800 is not enough to support a refugee for three months, particularly with the difficulty of finding work, a State Department official told TWI.

“Part of the philosophy of our program is for people to reach self-reliance as quickly as possible,” says the official. “It used to be that very often refugees would have found work by the time our period of responsibility is up, and that’s much less true now.”

The Obama administration authorized in September 2009 the admission of up to 80,000 refugees in the 2010 fiscal year, up from 75,000 admitted in the 2009 fiscal year. In the authorization, the administration acknowledged that the “recent economic downturn has presented new challenges for this and other humanitarian programs.” To address these problems, the National Security Council was tasked with determining what needs to be done to improve refugee resettlement in the U.S.

“The basic set-up of the program hasn’t been altered in many years,” National Security Council spokesman Ben Chang told the Los Angeles Times in June. “It was time to take a fresh look.”

A few policy improvements have been recommended so far. Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) introduced legislation in March that would allow refugees to apply for green cards immediately upon entering the U.S. and adjust refugee resettlement grants annually based on inflation and the cost of living.

Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.), the ranking member of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, commissioned a report on refugee resettlement and found the process often places an unfair burdens local communities. Called “Abandoned Upon Arrival,” Lugar argues in the opening of the July 21 report that the government should modify its funding and admittance numbers — either increasing funding of refugee resettlement programs or decreasing the number of refugees it admits — so high costs are not passed on to local communities.

“We must acknowledge the costs associated with this activity,” Lugar wrote in a July 20 letter formally requesting a Government Accountability Office investigation on the refugee resettlement process.

The idea of cutting down on refugee admissions is not appetizing, particularly at a time when the need is so high. Of 42 million people forced by conflict or persecution to move from their homes, 16 million need asylum or refugee status, according to a 2009 report from the United Nations Refugee Agency.

Forcing refugees to wait in camps, which often cannot provide the same health and education services they could find in the U.S., can have a detrimental affect on them, says Susan Krehbiel, a vice president at the Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service.

“It does become kind of a Catch-22,” Krehbiel says. “Some of the refugees have been in camps for 15 to 20 years. There are some human costs to delaying peoples’ resettlement.”

Still, Krehbiel says the current system struggles to serve the refugees it does admit, and relies too heavily on volunteer donations of time and money. The Office of Refugee Resettlement, established in 1980 as part of the Department of Health and Human Services, provides funding for up to eight months of cash and medical assistance, and refugee families may be eligible for additional money through Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, or TANF, and Medicaid.

The government also provides up to five years of employment services, supplemented by private programs. But with the sluggish economy, employment programs through the Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service have seem a marked difference in the speed of job searches among refugees, Krehbiel says. While in previous years 80 percent of refugees were employed within four months, the recession dropped that number to about 60 percent. It usually takes about a year to get 80 percent of refugees in the program hired, she says.

Janet Panning, a program director at two Pennsylvania Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service programs, says she has seen a significant decrease in employment opportunities for refugees. Recent anti-immigrant fervor hasn’t helped the situation, as some employers are hesitant to employ refugees because they think they could be illegal immigrants.

“People are very afraid of hiring people they think might be illegal or not have proper work documentation,” Panning says. “Sometimes employers that aren’t up on the law might be reluctant to hire a refugee because they might not have a green card.”

If they are not able to find employment, single people are in an especially bad situation after government cash assistance ends. Some refugees have struggled to support themselves and pay rent. Panning says she knows of several refugees who have become homeless over the years, but typically secondary issues beyond unemployment contribute to the problem.

Panning says she worked with one refugee who nearly became homeless after her family dispersed around the country. The woman had a war-related disability that was difficult to show to employers and kept her from working steadily, and eventually was placed in subsidized housing.

“She never went on the street, but it was through the blood, sweat and tears of volunteers that kept her in housing,” Panning says

The government has attempted to stave off homelessness among refugees. The State Department provided $5 million in emergency housing funding last year. For next year, the Department of Health and Human Services requested an additional $25 million from Congress for case management and emergency housing.

But local communities often take on that task as well. Delp charges a refugee $200 per month — “not even enough to cover utilities,” he laughs — to stay in his house while he stays in a local retirement home. He also helps a seven-person family pay the rent on a five-bedroom house nearby. (They were living in a two-bedroom apartment until he helped them move out a few weeks ago, Delp says.)

He says he and the other members of his church see helping the refugees as something they must do. “Those of us who have been given resources, it’s up to us to reach out to these people,” Delp says. “I can afford to reach out, so I want to help as much as I can.”

DREAM Act supporters at a May rally in Michigan (Detroit Free Press/ZUMApress.com)

On Tuesday, about 300 students — many non-citizens who have been living in the U.S. for years — filed into a church near the Capitol for a mock graduation ceremony. Clad in caps and gowns, they came from as far as California to lobby members of Congress to pass the DREAM Act, legislation that would help students who immigrated to the U.S. as children obtain citizenship. Their goal is to see the bill pass this year, with or without comprehensive immigration reform.

[Immigration1] “We cannot wait one more year,” said Virginia Gonzalez of the Immigrant Youth Justice League. The other students joined her in a chant: “Undocumented and unafraid.”

As comprehensive reform looks increasingly unlikely to pass this year, many immigration activists have shifted their focus to the DREAM Act. But the legislation, introduced in this session by Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) last March, is caught in a tenuous middle ground. It’s too much for conservatives, who call it a form of amnesty that would encourage others to break immigration laws. Yet it’s too little for Democratic leaders in Congress, who are still holding out hope — at least in public statements — that comprehensive reform is possible, and arguing that the DREAM Act should be incorporated into a larger reform bill rather than pushed on its own.

Immigration activists, such as the ones gathered at the Capitol, see the DREAM Act as a way to move forward as comprehensive immigration reform stalls. “If we have the DREAM Act here and it’s alive and it has support, why not give the youth that opportunity?” said Juan Escalante, communications director for the DREAM Activist mobilization. The activists have chosen to push for smaller reform to cut their losses. It’s not that they don’t want to see comprehensive reform pass, he said — they just don’t want to go down with the ship if it doesn’t.

The Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors (DREAM) Act was first proposed in 2001 and fell eight votes short of overcoming a filibuster in 2007. Critics call it amnesty for illegal immigrants, but there are conditions: To be eligible, the immigrant must enter the country before the age of 16, live five consecutive years in the U.S., earn a high school diploma or the equivalent, and demonstrate good “moral character.” (There are no specifics on what that means, but it is generally interpreted as the absence of a criminal record.) Applicants would be limited to those between the ages of 12 and 35.

Once eligible, participants would be required to put in at least two years in college or the military in order to eventually become citizens. Of the 2.1 million unauthorized immigrant youth and young adults who would be eligible to apply for legal status under the DREAM Act, only about 825,000 would eventually gain citizenship, according to estimates released this month from the non-partisan Migration Policy Institute.

Critics argue that the DREAM Act would reward illegal behavior. “What you’re doing is creating an incentive for people to come here,” said Ira Mehlman of the pro-enforcement Federation for American Immigration Reform. Instead, he argued, the government should focus on enforcing the laws already in place.

But supporters of immigration reform see the DREAM Act as a good way to help fix a broken system without adding harsh enforcement measures that could be lumped in with a comprehensive reform bill. Ali Noorani, executive director of National Immigration Forum, said the DREAM Act or AgJOBS, a reform bill that focuses on immigrant farm workers, could be a good step toward reforming immigration policy. “Whether it’s the DREAM Act or AgJOBS that passes, we have to make sure that neither passes with enforcement measures,” he said.

The DREAM Act has another advantage over comprehensive reform: It has bipartisan support. Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.) is the bill’s only Republican co-sponsor, following the resignation of fellow co-sponsor Sen. Mel Martinez (R-Fla.) last year. Lugar’s stance is arguably closest to the that of DREAM Act supporters when it comes to strategy.

“We’re not going to do comprehensive reform this year,” a spokesman for Lugar told TWI. “It’s not in the cards.” He said the senator supports comprehensive immigration reform, but if it’s not possible this session he’s willing to look at other options, such as the DREAM Act.

Still, Lugar’s support distinguishes him from his Republican colleagues. Most Republicans say that tougher border control is necessary before a path to citizenship is laid out. In March, Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Texas) notably called the DREAM Act a “nightmare for the American people,” arguing that it could open citizenship to “millions” if DREAM Act beneficiaries were able to help their families gain citizenship.

Other Republicans’ positions are more difficult to pin down. Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), for example, in 2003 referred to the deportation of young people who grew up in the U.S. as a “tremendous loss to our society.” He was an original sponsor of the legislation, and still speaks about the DREAM Act in positive terms during town hall meetings. But he’s not a sure “yea” vote — Antonia Ferrier, Hatch’s spokeswoman, said in an email that Hatch does not support the current version of the DREAM Act and believes the Senate should prioritize border enforcement.

On the other side of the aisle, Democrats are hesitant to push for the DREAM Act if it means giving up on comprehensive reform this year, even though many of them have said a far-reaching immigration bill is unlikely. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) has said he wants comprehensive, not “piecemeal,” immigration reform. A spokesman declined to comment on Reid’s plans for the DREAM Act or comprehensive reform, saying he would defer to Durbin, the party’s second-ranking senator, on his plans for the bill.

At Tuesday’s event, Durbin told DREAM Act supporters, “We can pass the DREAM Act this year,” but he added that he hopes to see it included in comprehensive reform. Durbin told The Hill in May that he planned to lay low on the act. “I don’t want anyone to think I’m pushing the DREAM Act at the expense of comprehensive immigration reform,” he said at the time.

Durbin spokesman Max Gleischman told TWI there are no definitive plans to move forward with the DREAM Act instead of comprehensive immigration reform. “We’re certainly open to that option, but right now we’re focused on making sure that’s a part of comprehensive reform conversation,” he said, adding that comprehensive reform is still possible this year. (Durbin told The Associated Press last week that it is “very unlikely” that the DREAM Act would pass before November.)

Another advocate of immigration reform, Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-Ill.), has acknowledged that comprehensive reform doesn’t have the votes to pass right now. Still, he said in an email that he is in favor of tying the DREAM Act to a comprehensive reform bill as “a critical component of reform that fixes all aspects of our broken immigration system.”

Some immigration activists are hopeful that if comprehensive reform doesn’t happen this year, the DREAM Act will get a shot instead. Escalante of DREAM Activist said passing the bill would only help the odds of comprehensive reform down the line.

“It’s not like we’re going to pass the DREAM Act today and then tomorrow we’re going to go to Disney World and just live the rest of our lives,” he said. “These students will keep fighting for reform.”

Muzaffar Chishti, director of the Migration Policy Institute at NYU School of Law, said the DREAM Act is one of the few standalone pieces of immigration legislation that has a chance of moving forward. Will it mean a steeper climb for comprehensive reform in the future? Chishti said he suspects those who oppose the DREAM Act would have opposed comprehensive reform anyway.

“At the end of the day in legislative strategy you have to make choices, and this looks like a reasonable call to make,” he said. “Will it have fallout? Sure. But everything has fallout.”

So what does Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.) have to say about it?

“No. I said no cap-and-trade,” said Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.), speaking to reporters in the Capitol.

And … we move one step closer to a climate-free energy bill.

“On almost every major question examined in the latest weekly Society for Human Resource Management/National Journal Congressional Connection Poll,” CongressDaily reports (subs. req’d), “young people lean much more heavily than older adults toward green-tilting positions favored by environmentalists and President Obama.”

Asked, for instance, to identify the top priority for U.S. energy policy, fully 65 percent of young people say the highest goal should be protecting the environment, while just 29 percent say the top goal should be to keep energy prices low.

For older Americans, the balance shifts steadily toward price. Those aged 30-49 also prioritize the environment (60 percent) over price (32 percent); but the numbers shift to 53 percent for the environment and 41 percent price for those aged 50-64. And with seniors, the priorities flip, with 47 percent picking price and just 40 percent the environment.

Emanuel hopes that by emphasizing energy in the fall, Democrats can attract more young voters to the polls. Generally, the share of the national vote coming from voters under 30 is a third lower in midterm congressional elections than in contests with presidential candidates on the ballot.

In an interview, Emanuel said that while it’s not possible to fundamentally reshape traditional turnout patterns, “at the margins” more young people could be inspired to vote by a legislative debate that shows Democrats committing to moving toward alternative energy and Republicans resisting the change. “It’s a way to get them engaged in the coming election,” he said. “They see it as being about the future, and less about energy policy.”

Of course, what shape that commitment to alternative energy takes is up for debate. Eric Pooley writes in The Climate War that while Obama and “energy czar” Carol Browner have pushed for comprehensive climate legislation, Emanuel and some other advisers (including David Axelrod) have advocated a more cautious approach. With cap-and-trade now all but dead, it’s likely that what Emanuel wants is an energy-only bill modeled on proposals by Sens. Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.) and Richard Lugar (R-Ind.) — and it’s questionable whether such a limited attempt to tackle the country’s energy problems will be enough to galvanize young voters.

Marianna Day Massey/ZUMApress.com

President Obama is stepping up his engagement on the Gulf of Mexico oil spill this week, conducting a two-day tour of the Gulf states and returning to make his first speech from the Oval Office on Tuesday, in which he’ll lay out his plan to force BP to create an escrow account to compensate people for losses they’ve suffered as a result of the spill.

[Environment1] Environmentalists will no doubt cheer the president’s full-court press against the oil giant, and some are growing more optimistic that they can use the spill as a rallying point to clamp down on offshore drilling. But the biggest issue for environmental advocates still looms large, and the oil spill is unlikely to be its savior.

That, of course, would be comprehensive climate legislation. Despite initial hopes in the green movement that the spill would spur a move away from the country’s reliance on oil, the disaster has had the opposite effect. An expansion of offshore drilling was supposed to be one of the key compromises that would bring oil-state Democrats and moderate Republicans on board. Now, with the country’s appetite for offshore rigs vastly diminished, the compromise has collapsed — and so has the key support of Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), one of three initial sponsors of the Senate’s climate bill, who announced his plan last week to vote against the bill as a result of its new restrictions on drilling in the wake of the spill.

On Thursday, Senate Democrats will meet to discuss the next steps for energy legislation, and the most likely result will be that climate gets dropped from the equation. The eventual bill will probably focus on incentives to boost the country’s renewable energy portfolio, and will draw mostly from two existing energy-only proposals: one by Sen. Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.), the chairman of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, and one by Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.), unveiled last week and endorsed by Graham.

But environmental advocates point out that the two proposals don’t purport to tackle climate change. Neither of them imposes a cap on greenhouse gas emissions, and it’s dubious that the renewable energy targets they set would be anything more than the projected renewables use under the status quo.

One hope for the left could come in the form of plan being unveiled this morning by Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.). Like the other proposals, it doesn’t try to cap carbon emissions; instead, it’s a more progressive energy bill with an emphasis on ending our oil addiction — a pragmatic attempt to capitalize on anger over the spill.

Dave Roberts reports:

Merkley’s proposals are all focused on oil, and for now that’s probably the right strategic play. (If there’s anywhere Reid will be feeling bold, it’s on oil.) His plan would radically ramp up electric vehicle deployment, create ambitious 2030 fuel efficiency goals for vehicles and heavy trucks, ramp up production of advanced biofuels, and shift some heavy trucks to natural gas. Those are all, while ambitious, fairly familiar goals. Added on are some more interesting and overdue progressive initiatives: reform land use to serve people rather than cars, shift freight from trucks to rail and ship, and reduce the use of heating oil in homes through efficiency retrofits.

Perhaps most intriguingly, Merkley suggests the creation of a National Council on Energy Security, similar to the National Economic Council, located in the office of the president. The NCES would insure that energy goals don’t get lost from administration to administration. They would monitor progress, determine whether things could me moving faster, and make recommendations to the President and Congress. This, more than anything else, would count as elevating oil reduction to genuine national priority.

Of course, it’s too soon to leave climate legislation for dead. But Republicans are trying hard to put the final nail in the coffin. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell continued to harp on the push for cap-and-trade legislation late last week.

“What I believe most of my members, if not all of them, and a substantial number of Democrats in the United States Senate will not be interested in is seizing on the oil spill in the gulf and using that as a rationale, if you will, for passing a national energy tax referred to down here at the White House as cap and trade,” McConnell said Thursday.