Cruz wants something in the bill that would bar new illegals from applying for DACA, Obama’s 2012 amnesty for DREAMers. DACA’s the root of the problem, says Cruz; the huge spike in kids coming from Central America didn’t begin until after Obama announced that policy. If you want to reduce illegal immigration, take away the incentive by making sure that O can’t expand his program to other kids.

Boehner’s resisting that because he’s nervous about attacking a program that helped Obama consolidate Latino support in 2012, especially one that deals mainly with kids. The stakes here are low — Democrats will kill Boehner’s bill in the Senate even if Cruz and tea partiers don’t kill it in the House — so it’s an easy opportunity for conservatives to score points at Boehner’s expense. They’re not derailing a bill that would otherwise become law, they’re simply showing righty voters that the leadership’s bill is a sellout.

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.), an influential tea party leader, will meet with a group of House Republicans Wednesday to urge them to oppose House Speaker John A. Boehner’s plan to stem the flow of migrant children at the U.S.-Mexico border, according to several House members who plan to attend the 7 p.m. gathering at Cruz’s office… Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) and Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-Tex.) will be at Cruz’s closed-press session, as will more than a dozen other House Republicans. Rep. Matt Salmon (R-Ariz.), a member of the House GOP’s working group on the border, is also planning to attend… Cruz has said he would like House Republicans to defund Obama’s Deferred Action for Child Arrivals (DACA) program, a suggestion Boehner has so far resisted. At Wednesday’s meeting, Cruz is expected to ask House Republicans to tell Boehner to include this in his plan or risk defeat on the floor and outrage from grassroots activists.

Harry Reid also wants the House bill to fail, naturally. If the bill passes, both parties will be blamed for the resulting stalemate over their competing bills. If the bill fails to get to 218, Reid gets to say that the Senate did something productive, passing its own bill to handle this crisis, but once again Republican internal divisions mean that there’s no opposition to work with. Politico suspects that’s why Democrats are trying to revive the Gang of Eight bill: They know that House conservatives will be nervous about passing something and letting Boehner go to a conference committee when Reid already has comprehensive immigration reform on his mind. That’s another reason for House conservatives to vote no.

Is the House bill a sellout, by the way? Assuming this analysis by conservative groups is accurate, sure is:

The bill appears to abolish voluntary return for UACs [unaccompanied children]. Under current law, UACs from contiguous countries are subject to voluntary return, which can be accomplished by Border Patrol in as little as one day. Thus, the bill appears to put the majority – if not all – in the new court proceedings, where they are permitted to withdraw their application for admission to the U.S. at any time “in the discretion of the Attorney General.”… Perhaps most troubling, the House bill states that the DHS Secretary “shall permit” UACs who have received Notices to Appear (issued since Jan. 1, 2013) to appear before an immigration judge in the new proceeding created by the bill, move to have the NTA “replaced,” and apply for admission to the U.S. While the language is not entirely clear, it very well could result in UACs who have been ordered removed or who have failed to appear for removal proceedings and thus are fugitives to get another bite at the apple to remain in the U.S.

Under the House’s scheme, illegal immigrant children would get no fewer than five chances at various points, starting with apprehension by the Border Patrol, to convince authorities that they have a credible fear of being returned home and therefore qualify as refugees. The current scheme for returning kids from neighboring countries, i.e. Mexico, allows the feds to send them home expeditiously if they agree to be deported. Immigration advocates hate that, partly because they fear that the agreement is being coerced and partly because they know that the more convoluted the legal process is, the more illegals will be able to elude it once they’re here. They loathe voluntary deportations. And apparently, so does the House bill. Go figure.

Here’s Jeff Sessions anticipating the executive mega-amnesty to come.