Is immigration reform dead in the Senate? North Dakota Senator Byron Dorgan introduced what Mickey Kaus has referred to as the killer amendment (i.e. ending the guest worker program after a period of time), and clearly the anti-immigration Republicans feel the same way, since a few have signed on, like Jim DeMint of South Carolina, who at least was candid about why he voted for the amendment.
Is this amendment a killer? Quite possibly. It will send Republicans scurrying, might potentially get a presidential veto, and it might break the Democrats' resolve to pass this wildly unpopular bill through if they aren't going to be able to share the blame with Republicans. It isn't going to help this Congress's reputation for being do-nothing, but in this case, a plurality of voters prefer the "do-nothing" approach.
I guess it depends on how bad Pelosi wants to bring Hispanics into the Democratic Party, and how hard she feels she has to work on it. My reading at this point is that she isn't going to have to try too hard. The GOP has been the producer of so much anti-immigrant rancor in recent times that Hispanics are probably already in the clutches of the Democrats for quite some time, and actually getting the bill passed isn't necessary at this point. From a tactical point of view, this bill has become so contentious and so identified with Bush that getting it passed might not even hurt the Democrats too much in 2008--it might just hurt the Republicans, and it will hurt much more if it gets passed. Then, it becomes like NAFTA is for the Democrats, only way angrier.
Despite the temptation, I think that Pelosi and Reid should let the bill fold for now. You can always bring it back up later--like in September, when that Iraq status report is going to be due...
