Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), co-author of the Senate immigration bill, said June 13 he would revoke his support of the bill if an amendment passes that allows gay unauthorized immigrants to apply with same-sex partners as family.
“If this bill has something in it that gives gay couples immigration rights and so forth, it kills the bill. I’m done,” Rubio said on the Andrea Tantaros Show on Fox News Channel. “I’m off it, and I’ve said that repeatedly. I don’t think that’s going to happen and it shouldn’t happen. This is already a difficult enough issue as it is.”
Rubio has made repeated threats to walk away from his own comprehensive immigration reform bill over the amendment to provide the same immigration benefits to LGBT couples as heterosexual ones.
A recent poll show that 7 out of 10 Florida voters favor the concept of the bipartisan immigration reform plan, according to a new survey released by the Republican-leaning Harper Polling and Democratic-leaning Public Policy Polling.
Rubio had received pushback from the conservative media elite and immigration hardliners, according the Miami Herald. Yet Florida Republicans overwhelmingly back the proposal: 71-22 percent, with 43 percent saying they “strongly support,” according to the poll of 500 voters.
An amendment from Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) would allow same-sex married couples to petition for green cards for foreign-born spouses in the same way heterosexual married couples can, which currently is banned because of the Defense of Marriage Act.
The status quo means many same-sex couples are either forced to live apart or to leave the country to be together, but could be rectified if the Supreme Court overturns the DOMA.
Democrats seem to be taking Republicans at their word, and even if the amendment comes up for a vote, most advocates have resigned themselves to the likelihood it will fail.
