Nancy Pelosi visits border and says immigration reform unlikely

House minority leader Nancy Pelosi said on Saturday she saw little hope for comprehensive immigration reform this year.

Following a visit to a Border Patrol facility in Brownsville where unaccompanied children are being held, the California Democrat said she was more optimistic a few days ago. She also said the Republican speaker of the House, John Boehner, gives little reason to be hopeful now, but did not elaborate.

"A few days ago I would have been more optimistic about comprehensive immigration reform," Pelosi said. "I thought that we had been finding a way because we have been very patient and respectful of [Speaker Boehner] trying to do it one way or another.

“I don't think he gives us much reason to be hopeful now, but we never give up. There's still the month of July."

More than 52,000 unaccompanied children, most from Central America, have been apprehended entering the US illegally since October. It has created what President Barack Obama called an “urgent humanitarian situation”.

Immigration reform represents one of the Obama administration's last best chances for a major domestic policy achievement in the final two years of the president's term, and many Republicans eager to woo Hispanic voters back the idea. But while the Senate passed a sweeping bipartisan immigration bill last year, legislation never got off the ground in the Republican-controlled House.

The Senate bill offers eventual citizenship to many of the 11.5 million people in the US illegally, billions of dollars to beef up border security, and a remaking the legal immigration system to allow more workers into the country legally. House Republican leaders said repeatedly that they wanted to get it done, but opposition from a small but vocal group seemed to derail every attempt.

The border patrol in south Texas has been overwhelmed for several months by an influx of unaccompanied children and parents traveling with young children from Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador. Unlike Mexican immigrants arrested after entering the US illegally, those from Central America cannot be as easily returned to their countries.

The US had only one family detention centre in Pennsylvania, so most adults traveling with young children were released and told to check in with the local immigration office when they arrived at their destination. A new facility for families is being prepared in New Mexico.

Children who traveled alone, like those visited by Pelosi in Brownsville, are handled differently. By law, they must be transferred to the custody of the Health and Human Services Department within 72 hours of their arrest. From there, they are sent into a network of shelters until they can be reunited with family members while awaiting their day in immigration court.

On Saturday, Dallas County judge Clay Jenkins said up to 2,000 unaccompanied immigrant children could be transferred from overcrowded facilities in McAllen to his county by the end of next month. He said the plan was to have youngsters spend about three weeks in Dallas County before hopefully being placed with relatives who are elsewhere in the US. The federal government will cover the costs, Jenkins said.

"This is not a commentary on the immigration debate," Jenkins said on the sidelines of the Texas Democratic convention in Dallas. "This is about scared and lonely children who are trapped in not good conditions on the border, and what we can do in this county to be a part of the solution."

Republicans have criticized Obama's immigration policies, arguing that they have left the impression that women and children from Central America will be allowed to stay in the US. The administration has worked to send a clear message in recent weeks that new arrivals will be targeted for deportation. But immigrants arriving from those countries say they are fleeing pervasive gang violence and crushing poverty.

Pelosi said Congress needed to put politics aside in addressing the child immigrants, and added: "The fact is these are children, children and families. We have a moral responsibility to address this in a dignified way."

She said: "We have to take it on a case-by-case basis. We don't want our good nature abused by those who would misrepresent what's happening in the United States on the subject of immigration to affect how we deal with a refugee problem."