GOP immigration plans don’t have enough support, Arizona’s Gosar says

PHOENIX — U.S. Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona said the GOP’s compromise immigration bill was “far from primetime” ready but added that neither proposal had enough support yet.

“They don’t have votes on either one of these and I don’t know that the president’s twisting arms can actually make it pass,” Gosar told KTAR News 92.3 FM’s Arizona’s Morning News on Wednesday.

Gosar was among House Republicans who met with President Donald Trump on Tuesday to craft a solution to immigration, including the zero-tolerance edict that has been separating children from their parents at the U.S.-Mexico border.

“I’m very clear where I stand on either one of these bills,” he said.

The president said Wednesday he would be “signing something” on immigration and that he didn’t want to split up families.

Republican leaders in the House were trying to put together a bill that would keep immigrant children in detention indefinitely, but housed with their parents.

“There are some interesting takes,” Gosar said. “With the compromise bill, they’re starting to look at some interesting tweaks, particularly going to a merit-based type of immigration-type system.”

Speaker Paul Ryan said the House will vote Thursday on the bills, but he offered no back-up plan to bring an end to family separations at the border if the measure failed to pass.

He said the compromise bill negotiated between Republican conservatives and moderates “is Plan B.”

The speaker said he does not support separating parents from children and wants families detained together.

Two people familiar with the situation reportedly said Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen was drafting an executive action for the president that would direct her department to keep families together in detention.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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