WASHINGTON — Timothy Cardinal Dolan is calling on Congress to hurry up and pass immigration reform.
With one of President Obama’s top agenda issues stalled in the Republican-controlled House, Dolan — who has clashed with the president on insurance coverage for abortion — weighed in with House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) in a letter Thursday.
Passage of an immigration bill is a matter of “great moral urgency” that can’t wait any longer, Dolan wrote to Boehner, saying that reports of delays in the House were troubling.
Dolan, who heads the Archdiocese of New York, is also president of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops and is considered the leading voice of the Catholic Church in the United States.
The Senate passed a comprehensive immigration bill this summer. House GOP leaders have said they plan to move immigration legislation piecemeal, but don’t have much to show for it, and haven’t scheduled a bill for consideration.
The issue, billed as an opportunity for Obama to score a major policy change and for Republicans to rebrand with Hispanics and moderates, might not even come up for a vote in the House this year, according to a key Republican lawmaker.
“We have very few days available on the floor in the House, so I don’t think we’re going to be able to do it this year,” Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart of Florida told The Washington Post Thursday.
Diaz-Balart, who backs immigration reform, said that because of the 2014 elections, if legislation doesn’t move early next year: “Then it’s clearly dead.”
Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), who helped hammer out a bipartisan compromise that passed the Senate, backed away from his own measure late last month.