Governor will call legislative session

Compromise struck on immigration

Myung Oak Kim And Lynn Bartels, Rocky Mountain News

Wednesday, June 28, 2006

Gov. Bill Owens late Tuesday called a special legislative session to deal with immigration issues, hours after the two warring sides of a proposed ballot measure announced a stunning compromise.

The session will include the compromise proposal, the governor's office said at 9:15 p.m.

Details of the legislative session are expected at a 2 p.m. news conference today.

Earlier Tuesday, leaders of Defend Colorado Now, which wants to deny government services to illegal immigrants, said they reached agreement with their opponents, Keep Colorado Safe.

Both sides issued a joint statement asking lawmakers to pass a package of laws that discourage employers from hiring illegal immigrants and tighten eligibility checks for taxpayer-funded benefits.

Under the agreement, Defend Colorado Now will drop its campaign to ask voters to deny services to illegal immigrants.

"This is a huge development, and it's welcome," said House Speaker Andrew Romanoff, D-Denver, a party to the agreement. "It could be the turning point in this debate."

Former Gov. Dick Lamm, an early and outspoken critic of illegal immigration and leader of Defend Colorado Now, brokered the deal with former Denver mayor Federico Peña, chairman of Keep Colorado Safe.

But Owens and at least one other key Republican were angry.

"I respect Dick Lamm, but on this divisive issue, he speaks only for himself - not for the 40,000 citizens who signed the petition (to deny services to illegal immigrants)," said John Andrews, former Colorado Senate president and co-chairman of Defend Colorado Now.

Andrews said he wants the measure to go to voters.

Peña and Lamm released a statement together Tuesday afternoon calling on lawmakers to pass legislation modeled on Georgia law that would:

• Discourage employers from hiring illegal immigrants by prohibiting them from claiming wages of $600 or more paid to illegal workers as a tax deduction.

• Require a 6 percent state income tax to be withheld from an illegal immigrant's wages when an IRS form 1099 has been filed.

• Require that state and local government agencies verify the immigration status of adults applying for certain taxpayer-provided benefits.

"This law would be more effective and more practical than Initiative 55," Peña and Lamm said, in the statement, about the Defend Colorado Now initiative.

Peña was in New York on business and could not be reached for comment.

Edie Sonn, spokeswoman for Keep Colorado Safe, applauded the deal and called on the governor to "embrace this opportunity."

But it was clear Owens was not pleased with the deal between Lamm and Peña.

Owens knew nothing about the compromise until the pair's press release went out Tuesday, said Dan Hopkins, the governor's spokesman.

Lamm said he asked Owens last week to help announce the agreement, but Owens declined and told him Tuesday he wasn't happy.

"I'm very sorry that I upset him. He is the key," Lamm said of Owens, referring to the fact that only Owens has the power to call lawmakers back into session.

Democrats also have been trying to convene a special session but don't have enough votes.

The compromise puts Owens in an unusual position. He has maintained for two weeks that he wants Coloradans to be given the opportunity to vote on whether government services should be denied to illegal immigrants.

Initiative 55 was headed for the ballot until two weeks ago, when the Colorado Supreme Court disqualified it, saying it violated the single- subject rule.

Initiative 55 would have prohibited illegal immigrants in Colorado from receiving all taxpayer-funded public services except those required by the federal government - K-12 education, emergency medical care and assistance in the event of a public safety emergency.

When the court issued its decision, Owens threatened to call a special legislative session to send the measure to voters.

From the beginning, some pundits said the ballot initiative was meant to be "a wedge issue which Republicans could use to beat up Democrats in an election year," said Bill Thiebaut, a political analyst and former Democratic Senate majority leader. "The politics of the situation is that (the governor) wants to engage the Republican right. They need that cohesiveness going into the election."

Tuesday's development significantly alters the political landscape. Now the two sides appear to be moving forward on a united front. But they remain far apart on many details of the compromise.

Political consultant Katy Atkinson warned that the deal does not mean that the future will be smooth. She said businesses are likely to oppose bills targeting their handling of immigrant workers, which could hurt lawmakers in the November elections. Also, prominent leaders backing get-tough legislation on immigration, including state Rep. Dave Schultheis, R-Colorado Springs, were not brought to the table and could fight back.

"There may be something in this compromise for everyone to hate, in which case they're going to end up back where they started, if not worse," she said.

Lamm said the effort to model Colorado's law on Georgia's took less than a week.

Lamm, with the blessing of most Defend Colorado Now leaders, began talking to Peña and Romanoff last Thursday. Andrews said he was out of town on vacation during the negotiations.

Lamm said he approached Peña with the employer focus after he had heard that Peña shared his view that employers should face tougher enforcement of immigration laws.

Peña and Lamm are old colleagues. Peña served as a minority leader in the state House during Lamm's tenure as governor more than 20 years ago.

Lamm said he and Peña will disagree on other aspects of illegal immigration, but they agreed to put those matters off "to a different battlefield."

This past winter, Democrats in the legislature killed a number of bills introduced by Republicans that targeted employers who hire illegal immigrants. But the Democrat-controlled legislature still passed seven immigration bills, one of which would stop an employer who knowingly hires illegal immigrants from receiving state contracts.

Fred Elbel, co-chair of Defend Colorado Now, said Democrats have the political motivation to pass tougher legislation now because of the November election and public support for tougher enforcement against illegal immigration. His group's 3,400 volunteers collected almost 45,000 petition signatures for the ballot initiative before the Monday court decision that killed the measure for this year's ballot.

"The iron seems to be hot," Elbel said.

The compromise resembles proposed legislation Democratic leaders have been pushing for since Owens threatened to call a special session.

But Democrats balked at putting back on the ballot a proposal they felt was flawed to begin with and began researching other states to see what laws they passed to address illegal immigration.

"We've been scouring the country for the last several weeks," Romanoff said. "The Georgia law provides a good framework."

Romanoff was quick to point out that without Lamm and Peña working together there would have been no solution.

"What these organizations have proven is they're more interested in solving the problem than throwing rocks at each other. That would have been the more predictable path."

kimm@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-892-2361