Minister for Foreign Affairs Dermot Ahern has welcomed an immigration bill in the United States that he said would regularise the status of thousands of undocumented Irish immigrants there.
The bill - which was introduced in the House of Representatives yesterday - seeks to combine tough border security and workplace enforcement measures with other programmes that the authors said will end the flow of illegal immigrants into the United States.
Minister for Foreign Affairs Dermot Ahern
"Rather than . . . targeting Windex-wielding cleaning ladies, or wasting millions of dollars on failed strategies of the past, our bill offers real solutions," said Representative Luis Gutierrez, an Illinois Democrat.
The bill would create a new conditional non-immigrant status for millions of illegal immigrants with a visa that would let them work and live in the country while they seek permanent status and eventual citizenship.
Mr Ahern said: "Although the legislative situation is fluid and the final outcome uncertain, the introduction of the bipartisan bill in the House marks a significant advance in the debate."
Dermot Ahern
In an effort to head off opposition from some conservative Republicans and others who said similar legislation last year was an amnesty that rewarded illegal behaviour, bipartisan sponsors pointed to requirements such as paying fines, taxes and learning English.
The bill would require illegal immigrants to exit the United States and re-enter legally during their conditional status period.
That provision drew fire from at least one group that said it it was impractical to force millions of people to do that.
Comprehensive immigration reform failed last year in the face of stiff opposition from a group of House Republicans opposed to giving legal status to those who entered the country illegally.
But with Democrats now in control of Congress and President Bush backing an overhaul of the existing laws, the bill's sponsors see a good chance of enacting legislation this year.
More than half of the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants in the United States are Mexicans. The House last year passed and Bush signed legislation to build 1,100 kilometres of fence along the US border with Mexico.