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WASHINGTON, May 23 (UPI) — U.S. House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, said Thursday he is “confident” the House will pass immigration reform but he isn’t sure what might be in the bill.

Speaking with reporters on Capitol Hill, Boehner said House leaders have had “private conversations this week on how we might move ahead but we’ve not made any decisions at this point.”

He said immigration reform presents Congress with “a lot of difficult issues” and members from both sides of the aisle have “done their best” to undermine chances for agreement. When asked to whom he was referring, Boehner said, “You can go find out for yourselves because I think you’ll figure it out.”

Boehner insisted the House “is going to work its will on immigration.”

“We’re not going to be stampeded by the White House or stampeded by the president,” he said. “The Senate is working its will, a lot of good work that’s gone on over there, but the House — the House will work its will.

“Don’t ask me how because if I knew I would certainly tell you, but the House is going to — the House is going to work its will. And I’m confident that we’ll have a solid work product that we can go to conference with the Senate.”

Contentious issues include whether a pathway to citizenship would provide healthcare to undocumented immigrants under the Affordable Care Act but House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said the 2010 healthcare reform law already precludes that.

“It is stated very clearly in the Affordable Care Act, [and] it is our position in the immigration bill: no access to subsidies in the Affordable Care Act. Secondly, no access to Medicaid; no cost to the taxpayer,” Pelosi said Thursday. “That has always been the Democratic position.”

Pelosi said she was concerned about a proposal involving the E-Verify system of determining, for purposes of employment, whether someone is in the country legally.

“They have a trigger in there that says if E-Verify is not fully accomplished in five years … then all of these people revert to the status that they have now,” she said. “I think that’s pretty drastic.”

Article source: http://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2013/05/23/Boehner-confident-House-will-pass-immigration-reform/UPI-60461369334572/

WASHINGTON — House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) said Thursday he’s confident the House will “work its will on immigration” reform and come to a deal — he’s just not sure how.

“We’re not going to be stampeded by the White House or stampeded by the president,” Boehner said at a press conference. “The Senate is working its will, a lot of good work that’s going on over there, but the House will work its will. Don’t ask me how, because if I knew I’d certainly tell you, but the House is going to work its will.”

Boehner has stayed largely out of the immigration debate, stating his support for the members working on a deal but without weighing in on the details. A bipartisan group in the House is currently working on an immigration bill, but although they have said they agreed on major principles, there are still details to be ironed out.

When asked whether he thinks the group is on the brink of collapse, Boehner said, “Well, I’ve heard that before, too.”

“We’ve got a problem with legal immigration, we’ve got a problems with illegal immigration, and they’ve been through an awful lot,” he said of the House group. “But I’ve got to say, there are people on both sides of the aisle who have done their best to try to undermine their ability to get to an agreement.”

“Whether they actually finish and agree on everything or not, they’ve done a lot of really good work,” he added later.

Despite his support for the group, Boehner said he is also encouraged by work outside the House’s bipartisan team. He commended House Judiciary Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.) in particular for holding hearings and offering piecemeal immigration legislation.

“There are a lot of efforts that I’ve encouraged, because if we’re going to solve this problem, we’ve got to educate our members,” he said. “We’ve got to help educate them about the hundreds of issues that are involved if we’re truly going to have immigration reform.”

Boehner gave a further response on his view for immigration reform — albeit still a vague one — in a joint statement later Thursday with other House GOP leaders. Part of the statement, from Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.), Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), Republican Conference Chairman Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-Wash.), and Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.), is below:

“While we applaud the progress made by our Senate colleagues, there are numerous ways in which the House will approach the issue differently. The House remains committed to fixing our broken immigration system, but we will not simply take up and accept the bill that is emerging in the Senate if it passes. Rather, through regular order, the House will work its will and produce its own legislation. … The House goal is enactment of legislation that actually solves these problems and restores faith in our immigration system, and we are committed to continuing the work we’ve begun toward that goal in the weeks and months ahead.”

Also on HuffPost:

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• Reform Would Help Curb The Deficit

  Immigration reform would a href=”http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2013-04-08/business/38371503_1_previous-immigration-bills-immigration-reform-immigration-laws” target=”_blank”reduce the federal deficit by $2.5 trillion/a over the next 10 years, according to an April analysis by the American Action Forum, a conservative think tank.

• Expelling Immigrants Is Expensive

  Expelling the approximately 11 million undocumented immigrants currently in the United States would cost $2.6 trillion over the next 10 years, a href=”http://www.cnbc.com/id/100449802″ target=”_blank”according to CNBC/a. That’s because it costs the government more than $8,000 to deport each person.

• Reform Would Help Fix The Social Security Problem

  Immigration reform would help bolster Social Security because more legal workers would mean more people contributing payroll taxes to its trust fund, a href=”http://www.huffingtonpost.com/huff-wires/20130508/us-immigration/?utm_hp_ref=artsir=arts” target=”_blank”according to an analysis from the Social Security administration/a. Undocumented workers a href=”http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/18/immigration-reform-social-security_n_3103500.html” target=”_blank”already contribute $15 billion per year/a to Social Security.

• Immigrants Start Successful Businesses

  More than a href=”http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/01/31/worried-about-the-economy-then-pass-immigration-reform/” target=”_blank”a quarter of technology and engineering firms/a started between 1995 and 2005 had a foreign-born owner, according to the Washington Post. One a href=”http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/22/american-companies-founded-by-immigrants_n_3116172.html#slide=2357880″ target=”_blank”of the founders of Yahoo!/a, Jerry Yang, is an immigrant from Taiwan.

• Reform Would Save $410 Billion Over The Next 10 Years

  The immigration reform bill proposed by the “gang of eight” senators would save a href=”http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/05/15/immigration-reform-save-billions_n_3280145.html?utm_hp_ref=business” target=”_blank” $410 billion over the next decade/a, according to an analysis from Gordon Gray, the director of fiscal policy at the American Action Forum, a conservative think tank. The savings would come largely from a boost in GDP resulting from undocumented immigrants gaining citizenship and in turn likely making more money.

• High-Tech Companies Say Reform Would Boost Their Bottom Line

  Companies like Microsoft and Google have said that immigration reform would help them by a href=”http://www.bizjournals.com/sanjose/news/2013/01/29/facebook-microsoft-back-senate.html” target=”_blank”allowing for more H1B visas/a, a special kind of visa geared toward highly-skilled immigrants. The tech giants say they can’t find enough qualified people in the U.S. to fill their staffing needs.

• Reform Would Boost The Wages Of Native-Born Workers

  U.S.-born workers see between a 0.1 and 0.6 percent boost in wages on average with an increase in immigration, a href=”http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/01/30/immigration-reform-workers_n_2583576.html” target=”_blank”according to a January report from the Hamilton Project/a, an economic policy initiative of the nonpartisan Brookings Institution. That’s because immigrant workers bring skills with them that complement those of native-born workers, leading to new jobs.

• Immigrants Are Entrepreneurial

  Immigrants are a href=”http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2013/03/13/economic-case-commonsense-immigration-reform” target=”_blank”more than twice as likely/a than native-born Americans to start new businesses, according to a White House report on immigration reform.

• Reform Would Boost GDP By More Than $1 Trillion Over 10 Years

  Immigration reform a href=”http://www.cnbc.com/id/100449802″ target=”_blank”would boost GDP by $1.5 trillion/a — or about 1 percent — over 10 years, according to an estimate from UCLA professor Raul Hinojosa-Ojeda cited by CNBC.

• Immigrants Create Jobs

  Businesses owned by immigrants a href=”http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2013/03/13/economic-case-commonsense-immigration-reform” target=”_blank”created 4.7 million jobs/a in the U.S. in 2007, according to a White House report on immigration reform.

• Reform Would Bring In More Money Than It Costs In Benefits

  Though many critics of immigration reform argue against the cost of providing increased public benefits, analysts say higher spending is not a likely consequence. A Congressional Budget Analysis of George W. Bush’s 2007 immigration reform proposal found that it would cost the government $23 billion in more public services, but bring in $48 billion in revenue, a href=”http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/01/31/worried-about-the-economy-then-pass-immigration-reform/” target=”_blank”according to the Washington Post/a.

Article source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/05/23/john-boehner-immigration_n_3326449.html

The poster reads, “It ends.” The critics reply, “Good. And don’t let the door hit you on the way out.” The Wolfpack Saga comes to a close as “The Hangover Part III” opens in theaters Thursday, May 23, and so … Continue reading →

Article source: http://movies.yahoo.com/news/stephen-colbert-channels-inner-john-boehner-channeling-inner-143840535.html

Ongoing reports of sexual assault in the military are a “national disgrace,” House Speaker John Boehner said on Thursday.

“This is outrageous, and frankly, it’s a national disgrace,” he said.

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New reports surfaced this week that more women in the military have been victims of sexual assault, reviving an already controversial issue that Congress began examining in more depth last year.

(PHOTOS: Female war veterans: From uniform to Congress)

House Armed Services Committee Chairman Buck McKeon (R-Calif.) will be addressing this in the Defense spending bill, Boehner said.

Boehner also said that House committees will continue to investigate how the Obama administration used drones in the wake of an acknowledgement from the White House on Wednesday that four Americans were killed in drone attacks.

“Our committees will work to determine the appropriateness of that action,” Boehner said. “I will wait to see what the president has to say about the revised drone strategy.”

Article source: http://www.politico.com/story/2013/05/john-boehner-military-sexual-assaults-91823.html

House Speaker John Boehner said the debate is “healthy” over whether emergency aid for the Oklahoma tornadoes should require offsets.

“Members on both sides of the aisle understand that we have programs in place to help people in the event of a disaster,” Boehner told reporters on Thursday. “Members on both sides of the aisle want these programs to be administered in a responsible and a fair way.”

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But Boehner said that the nation has a spending problem and it’s reasonable to be concerned about it, even for a good purpose.

(PHOTOS: Oklahoma tornado)

“That debate will continue,” Boehner said. “It’s a healthy debate and frankly ought to continue.”

The need for offsets for aid to Oklahoma has been a hot topic this week after Republicans have split over whether they should be required.

During the debate over sending aid to New York and New Jersey in response to Superstorm Sandy, many Republican members pressed for offsets.

(Also on POLITICO: Tom Coburn on Oklahoma tornado aid: ‘Typical Washington BS’)

Oklahoma Republican Sen. Tom Coburn has insisted that there be offsets, and argued the Sandy bill included unrelated spending and that’s why he opposed the legislation.

Article source: http://www.politico.com/story/2013/05/oklahoma-tornado-offsets-john-boehner-91819.html