"I’m not interested in that legislation," Sen. John McCain said. | Getty GOP bill to slash legal immigration faces intraparty resistance

Republican Sens. Tom Cotton and David Perdue faced pushback from fellow lawmakers on Tuesday after rolling out legislation to slash legal immigration – a controversial proposal for the business wing of the GOP, which has long seen more foreign workers as a boon to the U.S. economy.

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), a member of the bipartisan Gang of Eight that crafted a sweeping immigration reform bill in 2013, said instead of an “arbitrary number of green cards,” he would prefer to see a system that “fluctuates based on the economic needs of our country.”


“Over the next 20 years, one thing I can say for certain is America is getting older and the number of workers coming up in the system is not where it has been in the past,” Graham said. “We’re going to need to replenish our workforce.”

His fellow Gang of Eight Republican – Sen. John McCain of Arizona – was a bit more blunt.

“I haven’t looked at it,” McCain said of the new bill. “But I’m not interested in that legislation.”

When asked why, McCain responded: “Because I’m not interested.”

Under the legislation, many avenues for U.S. citizens and permanent residents to sponsor foreign family members for green cards would be eliminated. Cotton and Perdue would also limit the number of refugees admitted to the United States to 50,000 per year, and get rid of the diversity visa lottery program.

Its backers have championed the bill as a way to begin re-orienting the nation’s immigration system from one based primarily on family ties toward one focused on skills of immigrants. At a news conference Tuesday, Perdue called the measure a “first step.”

“It’s not a sweeping comprehensive attempt to solve all legal immigration problems, nor does it address illegal issues,” Perdue said. “We are simply trying today to bring a rational, compassionate approach to this different issue within the immigration conversation.”

Indeed, many components of their legislation unveiled Tuesday echo ideas from past immigration bills. The Gang of Eight bill also scrapped the diversity visa lottery, and it no longer allowed U.S. citizens to sponsor their siblings for green cards.

But the authors gave away those concessions in order to obtain other major reforms, such as a pathway to citizenship for millions of undocumented immigrants and a new visa program that would admit up to 200,000 low-skilled temporary workers into the country every year.

“In the Gang of Eight bill, what few people realize is that in that, we kind of diminish the family reunification visas – or narrow it down a little – and expand skills-based. So some of that was done in a broader context,” said Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.), another member of the group. “I don’t know how you’d get support just to do one side of it in the Senate. I just don’t.”

Flake also argued in favor of a “more robust” guest-worker program, arguing that there was an economic demand for it. Cotton and Perdue argue that more low-skilled workers have a detrimental impact on the wages and job prospects of working-class Americans.

“I mean, if you go to Arizona, try to get a house delivered on time, whether it’s roofers or masons or anything else,” Flake said. “There’s a huge shortage of labor. So we gotta take care of that.”

Democrats immediately slammed Cotton and Perdue’s bill, with Sen. Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire calling it “unquestionably a job-killer” and said “cutting successful visa programs and needlessly separating immigrant families is just wrong and senseless.”

But other Republicans were open to the plan.

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), whose powerful panel oversees immigration issues, said he hasn’t reviewed the new bill, but spoke in generally favorable terms about shifting the U.S. immigration system from being family-based to merit-based.

“Considering the fact that we have slow growth economy, we ought to be looking more at the economy,” said Grassley, who said he’d be “glad” to speak with Cotton and Perdue about their proposal.

Still, there is likely to be significant resistance from Republicans if Cotton and Perdue’s legislation advances to a full-blown debate in the Senate.

Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) said he wanted assessments from the new administration on how to reform the nation’s immigration laws. From there, he would “take some good ideas that Sen. Perdue and Sen. Cotton have, and have it be instructed by the reality.”

Tillis has pushed for more low-skilled immigrant workers, particularly for the seafood industry that is critical in his home state of North Carolina. He argued Tuesday that despite relatively low levels of unemployment in his state, seafood companies were still struggling to fill jobs.

“That’s why the industry is disappearing. And if it disappears, that’s at the expense of commercial fishermen who are generations-old American workers,” Tillis said. “If you fail then to compete globally, then be prepared to buy more Argentinian shrimp. Because East Coast wild-caught shrimp is gonna be hard to actually sell.”

Elana Schor contributed to this report.