DREAMageddon II, Judgment Day

Live stream of Senate debate on the DREAM Act (twinned with the repeal of "don't ask, don't tell") is available here ... Senator Schumer insinuates that those voting against DREAM are like the Dutch resisting the British. Not sure this is an analogy he wants to make in what is being presented as a narrow bill to legalize a few hundred thousand kids ... Isn't there something a bit discordant about using posters of brilliant undocumented college and law students while you are complaining that without the DREAM Act undocumented kids won't be able to get an education? Obviously it's at least possible to get a college education, and some undocumented kids take good advantage of it. The effect is a little like those ads on your TV demonstrating how great your picture would be if you bought a new TV ... Senate proponents seem to be laying groundwork for defeat ("it may not pass today" etc.) ... Roll call about to begin ...

Swing votes:  Lincoln—yes ... Brownback—no ... Scott Brown—no ... Tester— no ... Snowe—no ... Nelson—no ... Kirk—no ... Sherrod Brown—yes ... Lemieux—no ... Baucus—no ... Webb—yes ... Voinovich—no ... McCaskill—yes ... Hagan—no ... Murkowski—yes ... Hutchison—no ... Collins—no ...

Final vote: 55 yes, 41 no ... DREAM fails to get cloture. It looks like a close thing. My side's line will (not implausibly) be that the DREAMers fell five votes short of the 60 they needed ... The four senators who ducked having to vote include Manchin, who seems a bit cowardly for that. Maybe he has an excuse. [Update: Politico says he put out a statement opposing DREAM.] Also Hatch, Gregg, and Bunning. At least those last two seem like "no" votes, and none of the three was a sure yes ... All in all, five Dems voted no (Tester, Baucus, Pryor, Ben Nelson, Hagan) ... Semi-surprise "yes" vote: Dorgan, retiring Democrat who has on occasion been a "comprehensive reform" skeptic from the old-school union, anti-cheap labor point of view. During the informative (only 50 percent cheerleading) low-fi NumbersUSA live feed, Rosemary Jenks attributes this to Dorgan's desire to take a university position when he retires. I guess you can't be a college president and oppose DREAM ...

DREAM was the most appealing part of the larger "comprehensive" amnesty, supported by the president, presented to a Democratic Congress with all the guilt-tripping power the immigrant-legalization movement and the MSM could muster. It still failed. At the end of the NumbersUSA webcast, CEO Roy Beck declared the end of a decade-long era of defense against immigration amnesty: "Now we go on offense." He noted the pro-enforcement bent of the incoming Congress.

I tend to see today's vote as something like the defeat of President Nixon's Family Assistance Plan, which was the high-water mark for the idea of a "guaranteed income" solution to the welfare and poverty problem. The next two decades saw the rise of a less mathematically elegant solution, requiring work and then "making work pay." If the comparison holds, we will now see the ascendancy of messy "enforcement first" approaches. Smart advocates of an eventual amnesty will get on board (since amnesty, in the enforcement-first scenario, is what comes second). I don't quite see any of the movement's current leaders making that adjustment ...  7:37 a.m. (last update, 10:20 a.m.)

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"Immigration Enforcement Won't Shift If DREAM Fails": The parade of political appointees endorsing—with hostage-tape levels of conviction—the DREAM Act continued yesterday with a phoner featuring Homeland Security officials:

Immigration officers are unlikely to take extraordinary steps to arrest young people in the country illegally should the DREAM Act fail in the Senate.

Assistant Homeland Security Secretary John Morton said Friday in a conference call with reporters that immigration officers will continue their focus on immigrants who have committed crimes or are a threat to the public.

Am I crazy or did Morton just give the greenlight to vote against DREAM? He seems to be saying: "You know those appealing undocumented kids who bravely outed themselves in support of DREAM? Well, nothing's going to happen to them." You can vote "no" without worries ...

P.S.: The AP story also quotes David Aguilar, a Customs and Border Protection official, endorsing DREAM:

He said about 6 percent to 8 percent of the arrests agents make on the southern border are minors. The workload created when families accompanied by minors enter the country illegally is "tremendous," Aguilar said.

"Passage of something like this would have a positive effect on our ability to address our nation's borders," he said.

Huh? Could Aguilar really have been saying that after DREAM the border patrol won't spend scarce resources trying to stop "families accompanied by minors" entering the country illegally? 'Hey, they've got kids, so they're DREAMers! Leave them alone!' Isn't that an extreme version of the border-vitiating effect DREAM Act supporters swear their bill will never have (because technically if you cross the border tomorrow you're not covered by the statute)? I can only assume the AP report is confused. ... See also this report, which doesn't clear up what the hell Aguilar was trying to say. ... 12:14 a.m.

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Kos says Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.) is a no on DREAM. I can't find lots of hard external confirmation of this, but Kos should know. He isn't happy about it. ... 11:50 p.m.

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