The Republican-controlled House is poised to pass one of the toughest border security measures in more than a decade, cracking down on illegal immigrants and their employers and defying President Bush's call for a comprehensive bill that would grant millions of illegal immigrants already in the United States a right to work here temporarily.
The measure, expected to clear the House this week, would for the first time make it a federal crime to live in the United States illegally. That provision would turn millions of immigrants into felons, ineligible to win any legal status. Currently, living in this country without a document like a visa or a green card is a violation of civil immigration law, not criminal law.
The bill would also broaden the immigrant-smuggling statute to embrace those who shield or offer support to illegal immigrants. Offenders, including employees of social service agencies and church groups, could face up to five years in prison.
The legislation would require the mandatory detention, until removal from the country, of non-Mexican immigrants who are entering the United States illegally; would increase financing for local sheriffs in border states to allow them to detain illegal immigrants; and would toughen penalties for employers who hire them.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/14/politics/14border.html