A coalition of businesses and the Kansas Chamber of Commerce wants a program allowing undocumented immigrants to help fill state-certified labor shortages in agriculture and other industries.

The program would cover undocumented immigrants who’ve been here at least five years and haven’t committed more than one misdemeanor, not counting traffic violations.

Blasted by Kobach and others as “amnesty” for illegal immigrants, the proposal’s future is uncertain. Leading senators seem more amenable to the measure, although some lawmakers don’t think it will even get out of a House committee.

The reluctance of some lawmakers to embrace the immigration issue comes as there’s some political blowback to similar measures that have been enacted in states such as Arizona, Alabama and Georgia.

At a time when lawmakers are trying to make the Kansas economy grow, it doesn’t help for them to see headlines predicting that Alabama’s immigration law — written by Kobach — could result in the loss of up to $264 million in state income and sales taxes because of illegal immigrants forced to leave the state.

And there are already signs that lawmakers there may rewrite portions of the law, which is being challenged by the federal government.

“The more people are learning about what has happened in Arizona, the more people want to shy from the direction (Kobach) wants to go,” House minority leader Davis said.

Reports from Arizona about the recall of the state Senate president who backed that law, also drafted by Kobach, were on the mind of Senate President Steve Morris when he recently discussed immigration bills with reporters.

“I think that’s the first time in history that a Senate president’s ever been recalled, and it was strictly because of the support for that very punitive bill,” Morris said.

Asked about the prospects of the more aggressive immigration proposals backed by Kobach, Morris said, “I don’t sense support in the Senate for that kind of legislation.”

In the House, Rep. Steve Brunk, a Bel Aire Republican who’s chairman of the committee evaluating the immigration proposals, wouldn’t predict how receptive his committee might be toward the bills.

But the fact that last year’s single immigration bill was broken into separate pieces of legislation this year meant leadership didn’t think the entire bill had a chance of passing, said state Rep. John Rubin, a Shawnee Republican.

“I think the bill this year that has the greatest likelihood of getting out of committee to the floor of the House is the E-Verify portion,” Rubin said.

He noted that the bill requiring law enforcement to check the citizenship of people they detain would probably be the most problematic.

Capt. Tom Hongslo of the Lenexa Police Department warned legislators that the law could create a perception that authorities are targeting people based on skin color rather than their behavior, and that such detentions would take cops off the street for long periods of time.

“It is the time and it’s the manpower,” Hongslo told the committee. “Its not as simple as some people may think.”

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