Gutierrez on the House Side

While most focus on immigration reform has been on the Senate of late, Jim Tankersly of the Chicago Tribune is looking ahead to the House, where the lead negotiator will likely be Luis Guiterrez:

Most members of Congress focus their tenures on two or three big issues, but for Rep. Luis Gutierrez, for 14 years there has been only one.

Now, as he prepares to retire after eight terms and dozens of failed attempts to even tweak America’s immigration laws, the Chicago Democrat finally finds himself tantalizingly close to a career-capping victory — or to the sort of disappointment that can only come from chasing a dream and falling short.

Gutierrez is a lead House negotiator in the bipartisan attempts to pass immigration reform this year. Perhaps more than any other lawmaker in the discussions, he is subject to the competing tugs of principle and compromise that threaten to derail any deal.

Because for Gutierrez, this is his last chance. And he is willing to walk away empty-handed.

“The value of getting something done that is not worthy of our immigrants is not anything,” he said in an alternatively smiling and table-pounding interview last week. “It’s more important to get it done right.” Click here for the rest of the story.

bh