Are Rubio and Reid playing us for fools on immigration reform?

On the June 12th evening edition of the Bill O’Reilly Show Senator Marco Rubio stated,“It depends on border security, and it depends on ensuring that it doesn’t cost the American taxpayer. I think the bottom line is we can secure the border and ensure that this never happens again, and if we can ensure that it doesn’t cost the American taxpayer by people going on welfare and things like that, then I think it will pass. If it doesn’t do those things, it won’t.”

Earlier on that same day an amendment from Senator Grassley to strengthen border security was stopped from coming to the US Senate floor for an up or down vote by Senator Harry Reid. Surely Senator Rubio knew this because he voted against the amendment.

According to Breitbart.com, “On Wednesday, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) blocked a vote on the border security amendment to the “Gang of Eight” immigration bill offered by Senate Judiciary Committee ranking member Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA). Grassley was pushing for an up-or-down vote by the Senate on his amendment, which would have required the border to be secured for six full months before any legalization of illegal immigrants in America began. Reid objected to Grassley’s motion, effectively implementing a 60-vote threshold that completely blocked any attempt at a fair vote on the amendment.”

Is Rubio being played by Reid or are Reid and Rubio playing all Americans for fools?

Eric Erickson from RedState.com in his column “No More Games” states, “… Marco Rubio is being played the fool or we are being played the fool by Senator Rubio. He has become the face of support for this legislation and much of the support of the legislation from those on the right has come because of the good will so many of us have for Senator Rubio.”

Erickson, who is a lawyer and has represented illegals, reports:

Contrary to the Americans for Conservative Reform advertisement in which he appears, the law does not prohibit illegals from getting benefits. Sure, some welfare benefits will be excluded as will, though it is debatable, Obamacare, but a sizable portion of entitlement benefits actually flow through tax credits in the tax code that these immigrants would get.

Contrary to the advertisement, the law does not secure the border in any meaningful way, in fact the “border security on steroids” as the ad claims does not begin until after the citizenship push starts, hence the pretend effort of John Cornyn now that this has been exposed.

Are Rubio and Reid a “Gang of Two” pushing a bill that is eerily similar to Obamacare through the US Senate for political gain? Is Rubio talking about border security but not willing to propose amendments himself to strengthen it? Time will tell.

Senator Rubio on the Bill O’Reilly Show:

UPDATE:

Erick Erickson reports:

Marco Rubio told Sean Hannity yesterday that he had wanted border security before amnesty, but now thinks we need amnesty first so, in paying the government for their amnesty, we can use the illegal aliens’ to pay for securing the border. After all, the border will take several years to secure, so we should encourage people to cross the border illegally and forge documents to prove they’ve met the deadline. Then they can pay the feds to secure the border in even higher numbers. Or something like that.