Lawmakers, White House propose immigration initiatives

Lawmakers and the White House are looking to funnel some fast cash to the growing problems of violence along the U.S.-Mexico border. 

The White House is requesting $500 million in extra funding to deploy 1,200 National Guards troops to the southern border, an Obama administration official said Tuesday. 

Meanwhile, Senate Republicans — Arizona's Jon Kyl and John McCain — are pressing for the addition of two amendments to the war supplemental bill, both requiring the use of stimulus funding to pay for the initiatives. 

The first amendment — as yet without a price tag — calls for 6,000 new National Guard troops to secure the border. 

The second amendment — at a cost of $200 million — would make fully operational Operation Streamline, a 2005 program used along the Arizona and Texas borders. The aim is to expand the program, which prosecutes those crossing the border illegally, to Tucson, Ariz., and other areas that need it, according to a senior Republican aide. 

Republicans argue that the program has worked to reduce — by 94 percent — illegal immigration in the areas where it has been used. 

But several recent studies counter that argument, saying any decline is probably due to the recession and that the program should be scrapped, with focus shifted to prosecuting those who are most likely to cause violence or already have criminal records. The studies found the program jams courts with petty immigration cases, instead of serious ones.