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Immigration See other Immigration Articles Title: Border Fight Divides G.O.P. WASHINGTON, May 25 — The negotiations between the White House and Congress that will follow the Senate's passage on Thursday of an immigration bill could decide not just how the nation confronts illegal immigration but also what strain of conservatism the Republican Party carries into the midterm elections and beyond. Will it be the compassionate brand Mr. Bush considers crucial to the party's future, in this case by signaling support for a provision in the Senate bill that would give most illegal immigrants an opportunity to become legal? Or will it be the more doctrinaire variety embraced by much of Mr. Bush's party in the House, one that shuns anything that smacks of amnesty for illegal immigrants and seeks to criminalize them further? The 62-to-36 vote in the Senate was a victory for a fragile bipartisan coalition. [Page A17.] It will now be challenged in negotiations with the House. While the Senate bill calls for tougher border security, the establishment of a guest worker program and a plan to allow millions of illegal immigrants a chance to become citizens if they meet certain conditions, the House bill is focused on tighter control of the border. As on several issues, especially the increase in federal spending under Mr. Bush, immigration has shown Republicans to be struggling to define what they stand for. Since Mr. Bush's influence among Republicans has ebbed with his poll numbers, the outcome of the intraparty battle rests in large part with the House leadership, especially the speaker, J. Dennis Hastert of Illinois, and the new majority leader, John A. Boehner of Ohio. They have kept their options open, but neither has shown enthusiasm for moving substantially toward the Senate position. Some well-known Republicans came out in support of a comprehensive plan, and argued that progress was possible. But it does not help the prospects for a deal that relations between the administration and Republican leaders on Capitol Hill are especially chilly at the moment because of the showdown about whether the Justice Department overstepped constitutional bounds over the weekend by raiding the office of a member of Congress. Mr. Bush has made clear that he wants to sign an immigration bill this year, and his ability to pull his fractured party together on the issue may be the starkest test yet of whether he has enough remaining strength to drive any agenda at all for the remainder of his second term. Mr. Hastert has indicated he will go only so far for the president. He has expressed some openness to Mr. Bush's guest worker proposals, but has more often emphasized enforcement against illegal immigrants and their employers, and securing the border, as top priorities. That Mr. Bush has chosen to put so much capital behind an issue so divisive within his own party — and during an election year in which Republican prospects seem particularly grim — has bewildered some conservatives. "Clearly, Bush is not in tune with where I think the bulk of the Republican Party is today," said Bruce Bartlett, a conservative critic of the president who worked for Mr. Bush's father's administration and that of Ronald Reagan. "He's getting hammered on a lot of the talk-radio shows, and I kind of wonder what the motivation was." Mr. Bartlett said he could only surmise that the issue was so close to Mr. Bush's heart that he was willing to risk further division within his party to see his plan, or some close version of it, become law. Mr. Bush's aides and allies are only too happy to agree that the president's personal conviction is at play. They clearly see a chance to show the president as leading on principal. "He's got to lead his country and the party in a direction he thinks is right," Dan Bartlett, the White House counselor. But some allies have argued in interviews that Republicans who are pushing solely to criminalize illegal workers are failing to understand that Mr. Bush's approach will broaden the party and make it more appealing to Hispanic voters. "The party can't be a dominant party without reaching out to minority communities, especially Latinos," said Matthew Dowd, Mr. Bush's chief strategist in the 2004 campaign, who has also worked for Democrats. But Mr. Dowd and others acknowledge that the president and Congress will have to proceed carefully as they try to craft an immigration overhaul that legalizes a foreign work force, which business leaders want badly, even as it strictly enforces the law and seals the border. Some Republicans suggest that the solution is to jettison the citizenship provisions of the Senate bill, but retain its guest worker program, which was the focus of Mr. Bush's original proposal. But it is not clear that the Senate would accept such a deal. "If we have the right mix of border security and a guest worker or temporary worker program," said Ed Gillespie, a Republican lobbyist who is a close White House ally, "we can continue to hold rank-and-file conservative Republicans, as well as continue to gain votes with Hispanics as we have in the past two cycles." Aides to Mr. Bush liken their strategy to that of arms negotiators during the cold war: by first bringing the two sides together on matters of agreement and then moving onto the issues that divide them. But as of now all indications are that once the negotiators move from the border security measures that both sides can support to guest worker and citizenship provisions that conservative House members oppose, they will hit a wall. And it is unclear how much Mr. Bush, with the lowest approval ratings of his presidency, will be able to prevail upon hard-liners who face tough campaigns this fall. Though Mr. Bush's allies argue that those most vocally opposed to anything beyond border security are in the minority of the party — and indeed the country — they matter especially in elections. And they are angry. "He's facing an open rebellion," said Richard A. Viguerie, a conservative direct-mail veteran and one of those openly rebelling. "And he's determined to force something down the throats of the conservatives that's going to cause them to abandon him in droves in 2006." With so many in the House agreeing with Mr. Viguerie's view, it is difficult to handicap whether the president will get a comprehensive immigration law before fall. That possibility has prompted a frenetic round of discussions among Republicans about whether it would be best to put the House-Senate negotiations off until after the elections. There is no clear consensus about how to proceed, but few argue that delay would be good for Mr. Bush, who badly needs a victory right now. "If he can bring this one off, it won't necessarily save his presidency," said William A. Galston, a former adviser to President Bill Clinton who is now a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, the liberal-leaning research organization. "But if he doesn't, I think he loses everything except the title of the office."
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