Marking Up the DREAM

Marking Up the DREAM: Recalling the DREAM Act in 2003

Young staffers in Congress have a lot more power than the media recognizes.

Marking Up the DREAM is a documentary feature in a series called How Democracy Works Now that explores the behind-the-scenes Senate battle for the DREAM Act in 2003, which would have laid out a pathway to citizenship for certain undocumented students. The documentary features several well-known non-profit and Congressional actors, while exposing how certain young staffers were key to marking up the language of a bill from just their notes and transcripts of what their bosses agreed to during a legislative hearing.
The DREAM Act then passed the Senate Judiciary Committee with an overwhelming vote of 16-3. Ironically, the documentary is making the rounds seven years later at a time when undocumented students around the country are calling for a standalone DREAM Act to pass through the very same committee.

A statement from Lavita Strickland, the principal staffer for Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) on the bill, particularly stood out: "Do we want a really good strong bill that would help these kids or do we want it so big and fat that it is going to get slaughtered and just killed and there is no possibility of helping anybody?" Advocates for an omnibus comprehensive immigration legislation would do well to take note.

"This is not a partisan bill. Not a liberal or conservative bill," boomed Senator Orrin Hatch, a staunch conservative Republican in favor of the legislation. "This is a good bill." But Marking Up the DREAM shows how a good bill got watered down by unexpected forces. Sen. Feinstein and Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-NC) stripped the DREAM Act of the provisions allowing undocumented students Pell Grants and eligibility based on community service. Later, eligibility for citizenship through military service would be added on.

After the DREAM Act sailed through the Senate Judiciary Committee with little opposition, it took staffers three months to determine the exact language of the bill. They finally decided on no grants for undocumented students, but left in the option of federal work study. By the time the bill was ready for the floor, Senate Majority Leader Bil Frist was in no mood to put it up for a vote. Had he done so, the DREAM Act would have passed in 2003 with 48 cosponsors in the Senate and 152 in the House of Representatives — more legislative support than it has at this point.
Strickland appeared frustrated, asking, "Do we want to keep having this same debate for the next 5 years?" Make that seven years and counting.

Since 2003, many of the staffers have moved on to other roles. Lavita Strickland is now LaVita Strickland LeGrys, back in government service as Assistant Administrator for Legislative Affairs at the Transportation Security Administration. Joe Jacquot, the Chief Republican staffer on the Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration in 2003 is now the Deputy Attorney General of the state of Florida.

Joe Zogby is one of the central figures who has remained on the Hill, still working for Senator Durbin as Chief Counsel for the Senate Judiciary Committee. I was taken aback by how Zogby looked like a boy out of high school in the documentary, only to realize that seven years had passed and we have all grown up fighting for the DREAM Act to pass.

One thing the legislation didn't have back then that it does now: a vibrant grassroots movement led by undocumented students.

Marking Up the DREAM is a must-watch for anyone interested in learning more about how good ideas can turn into legislation through the work of a few unelected key staffers who command power in Congressional offices on Capitol Hill. That's part of how democracy works — or maybe doesn't work — now.


http://immigration.change.org/blog/v...am_act_in_2003

-This is why I don't dare reply to the ridiculous posts some people make here excusing and accepting that waiting to pass legislation in the future is a good thing. Waiting killed DREAM in 2003; waiting has killed CIR for this year. There is no more clear example for why DREAM should pass as a separate bill from CIR at this point. And it must be brought to a vote before the end of July. Where would we all be had this passed seven years ago?

now is the perfect time!

They had this documentary on HBO OnDemand the other day.

Near miss, what is the next step , is the question ?

the old days. seven years later and nothing. umm... don't really agree with the vibrant movement thing. we just didn't have facebook or youtube or things like that. there is nothing new being done now that we didn't do. pound per pound the pioneers have zero to be ashamed of and might even be as good if not better. heck, they got it out the cmte with a republican president and congress. and now some of those pioneers might be out thanks to the age limit. epic fail. the age limit is pure evil.

at least the wait has added new people. those that came after the events have been here for five years and fighting for DREAM. those who come next week will be doing the same for DREAM 2015 if we don't get our act together. and in the meantime the pure evil of the age limit will get new victims. btw, saw orrin hatch? those are the ones we need.

I am sorry, but by 2015 won't a large majority of beneficiaries be aged out; the generation whom inspired dream. ?

depends of the age limit, but a large chunk will be out. the first official age limit was 30, but it went up to 35 this time so it wouldn't get as many people that worked on DREAM. what? it will be going to 50 later? how about no age limit? those that are 18 have little to worry unless they really go old school and get the age limit of 21 that the original DREAM/student adjustment act had. after all, is about the youth and high school students. isn't it?

this documentary is about DREAM. but before that there was the student adjustment act of 2001. it had an age limit of 21 and one needed to be at least in the seventh grade and enroll in college within four years.

was thinking about it and the old timers did some awesome work. they took DREAM further than anyone else has since. in 2007 DREAM didn't get 60 votes in the senate, but that was after being carried by CIR into and out of the cmte. in 2003 there was no CIR and they got it out of cmte on its own merits. to think of what could have been had all of us had a blackberry, facebook, digital camera, laptops, wifi, youtube, and other things such as being able to fax our senators via computer. all of those things were very expensive or in their infancy or not even around.