A Focus on Border Security and Temporary Visas as Senators Return to Immigration

The Senate Judiciary Committee continued to plow through amendments to an immigration overhaul bill on Tuesday, revisiting border security provisions before moving on to measures related to temporary guest worker programs.

Here is a look at some of the more interesting and important amendments offered, and how they fared in committee:

- SESSIONS 4, Requiring the use of a biometric entry and exit data system at ports of entry â€" Failed 6-12

Senator Jeff Sessions, Republican of Alabama, offered an amendment that would have required the implementation of a biometric entry and exit system before anyone could apply for legal status.

“The reason is very simple â€" at most seaports and airports, you clock in with a system, but it’s biographic, which is easily forgeable and not secure,” Mr. Sessions said. “This is one reason the American people have so little confidence in the promises we make.”

Democrats on the committee agreed with Mr. Sessions in broad theory â€" that a biometric identification system would be effective â€" but said that the logistics and cost concerns were prohibitive and that tying the legal status of undocumented workers to getting such a system up and running could delay that status indefinitely.

“We would all concede that the biometric approach is a more sophisticated and perhaps a better approach,” said Senator Richard J. Durbin, Democrat of Illinois and a member of the bipartisan group that drafted the legislation. But, he said, Mr. Sessions’s measure was “not attainable, not affordable.”

The two Republican members of the bipartisan group who serve on the committee â€" Senators Jeff Flake of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina â€" joined with their Democratic colleagues to defeat the amendment.

- SESSIONS 1, Limiting the number of nonimmigrant aliens who can work in the United States â€" Failed 1-17

Mr. Sessions also offered an amendment that would have restricted the future flow of legal immigrants, effectively limiting the number of immigrants and foreign workers to 33 million over a 10-year period and the total number of green cards to 1.2 million a year.

The measure failed, 1 to 17, with only Mr. Sessions voting for his amendment.

- GRASSLEY 58, Requiring additional information in Internet job postings for H-1B eligible jobs â€" Passed by voice vote

Senator Charles E. Grassley of Iowa, the ranking Republican on the committee, introduced an amendment that would require employers to post additional information about open positions online before filling a slot with a worker hired on an H-1B visa â€" a visa reserved for high-skilled workers. The measure passed with a voice vote.

- HATCH 9, Increase the labor certification fee for an employment-based visa â€" Passed by voice vote

Senator Orrin Hatch, Republican of Utah, offered an amendment that would increase the labor certification fee for an employment-based visa to $1,000 from $500, and put that money in a new fund that would go toward education in the STEM â€" science, technology, engineering and math â€" fields.

“This bipartisan amendment makes sense,” Mr. Hatch said. “It addresses the long-term need to invest in American STEM education.”

Mr. Hatch is considered a Republican who could be persuaded to vote yes on the legislation, provided the committee votes for some of his high-tech provisions, and this amendment passed with a voice vote.

Senator Charles E. Schumer, Democrat of New York, hailed the bipartisan spirit of Tuesday’s markup in an e-mailed statement that referred to Mr. Hatch’s and Mr. Grassley’s amendments.

“These bipartisan amendments are good-faith improvements to the bill,” Mr. Schumer said. “This is as open a process as any I’ve seen since entering the Senate, and it is making for a better bill.”

But not everyone in Congress was pleased with the direction of the debate.

As the Senate committee considered various provisions in earnest, Representative Steve King, Republican of Iowa, led a news conference in front of the Capitol, rallying fellow House Republicans who, like him, are opposed to the broad immigration overhaul currently making its way through the Senate.

Mr. King, long an opponent of President Obama’s health care plan, said that if forced to choose between accepting the Affordable Care Act or the Senate’s immigration bill, which he called “amnesty,” he would choose the health care law. “Here’s how bad this is,” he said. “You all know how badly I despise Obamacare.”

“I would take Obamacare and try to live with that before I’d ever accept this amnesty plan,” Mr. King said. “Because the amnesty plan is far, far worse than Obamacare. That genie cannot be put back in the bottle. We can repeal Obamacare, we can overtime pay for it, we can overtime get back our doctor-patient relationship. But if this amnesty goes through, there’s no undoing it. The genie of the left will have escaped from the bottle, and he will be as amorphous as a puff of smoke.”

A Focus on Border Security and Temporary Visas as Senators Return to Immigration

The Senate Judiciary Committee continued to plow through amendments to an immigration overhaul bill on Tuesday, revisiting border security provisions before moving on to measures related to temporary guest worker programs.

Here is a look at some of the more interesting and important amendments offered, and how they fared in committee:

- SESSIONS 4, Requiring the use of a biometric entry and exit data system at ports of entry â€" Failed 6-12

Senator Jeff Sessions, Republican of Alabama, offered an amendment that would have required the implementation of a biometric entry and exit system before anyone could apply for legal status.

“The reason is very simple â€" at most seaports and airports, you clock in with a system, but it’s biographic, which is easily forgeable and not secure,” Mr. Sessions said. “This is one reason the American people have so little confidence in the promises we make.”

Democrats on the committee agreed with Mr. Sessions in broad theory â€" that a biometric identification system would be effective â€" but said that the logistics and cost concerns were prohibitive and that tying the legal status of undocumented workers to getting such a system up and running could delay that status indefinitely.

“We would all concede that the biometric approach is a more sophisticated and perhaps a better approach,” said Senator Richard J. Durbin, Democrat of Illinois and a member of the bipartisan group that drafted the legislation. But, he said, Mr. Sessions’s measure was “not attainable, not affordable.”

The two Republican members of the bipartisan group who serve on the committee â€" Senators Jeff Flake of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina â€" joined with their Democratic colleagues to defeat the amendment.

- SESSIONS 1, Limiting the number of nonimmigrant aliens who can work in the United States â€" Failed 1-17

Mr. Sessions also offered an amendment that would have restricted the future flow of legal immigrants, effectively limiting the number of immigrants and foreign workers to 33 million over a 10-year period and the total number of green cards to 1.2 million a year.

The measure failed, 1 to 17, with only Mr. Sessions voting for his amendment.

- GRASSLEY 58, Requiring additional information in Internet job postings for H-1B eligible jobs â€" Passed by voice vote

Senator Charles E. Grassley of Iowa, the ranking Republican on the committee, introduced an amendment that would require employers to post additional information about open positions online before filling a slot with a worker hired on an H-1B visa â€" a visa reserved for high-skilled workers. The measure passed with a voice vote.

- HATCH 9, Increase the labor certification fee for an employment-based visa â€" Passed by voice vote

Senator Orrin Hatch, Republican of Utah, offered an amendment that would increase the labor certification fee for an employment-based visa to $1,000 from $500, and put that money in a new fund that would go toward education in the STEM â€" science, technology, engineering and math â€" fields.

“This bipartisan amendment makes sense,” Mr. Hatch said. “It addresses the long-term need to invest in American STEM education.”

Mr. Hatch is considered a Republican who could be persuaded to vote yes on the legislation, provided the committee votes for some of his high-tech provisions, and this amendment passed with a voice vote.

Senator Charles E. Schumer, Democrat of New York, hailed the bipartisan spirit of Tuesday’s markup in an e-mailed statement that referred to Mr. Hatch’s and Mr. Grassley’s amendments.

“These bipartisan amendments are good-faith improvements to the bill,” Mr. Schumer said. “This is as open a process as any I’ve seen since entering the Senate, and it is making for a better bill.”

But not everyone in Congress was pleased with the direction of the debate.

As the Senate committee considered various provisions in earnest, Representative Steve King, Republican of Iowa, led a news conference in front of the Capitol, rallying fellow House Republicans who, like him, are opposed to the broad immigration overhaul currently making its way through the Senate.

Mr. King, long an opponent of President Obama’s health care plan, said that if forced to choose between accepting the Affordable Care Act or the Senate’s immigration bill, which he called “amnesty,” he would choose the health care law. “Here’s how bad this is,” he said. “You all know how badly I despise Obamacare.”

“I would take Obamacare and try to live with that before I’d ever accept this amnesty plan,” Mr. King said. “Because the amnesty plan is far, far worse than Obamacare. That genie cannot be put back in the bottle. We can repeal Obamacare, we can overtime pay for it, we can overtime get back our doctor-patient relationship. But if this amnesty goes through, there’s no undoing it. The genie of the left will have escaped from the bottle, and he will be as amorphous as a puff of smoke.”

Senate Panel Approves Farm Bill

The Senate Agriculture Committee approved a $955 billion farm bill on Tuesday, the first step toward completing an overhaul of the nation’s food and farm policy that was derailed last year when the House failed to vote on its version of the bill.

The new bill, which was approved 15 to 5, is expected to save $23 billion over the next 10 years by eliminating or consolidating hundreds of agriculture programs.

“Because the Agriculture Committee worked across party lines to streamline programs, we were able to save tax dollars while investing in initiatives that help boost exports, help family farmers sell locally and spur innovations in new biomanufacturing and bioenergy industries,” said Senator Debbie Stabenow, Democrat of Michigan and chairwoman of the committee.

The full Senate is expected to take up the bill next week.

The new farm bill is nearly identical to the legislation passed by the Senate last year. It leaves in place several Depression-era programs like supports for American sugar growers that set prices and limit imports. The bill would also provide relief to the nation’s cattle and poultry producers, who were left unprotected last year during the worst drought in 50 years after several farm programs expired.

The most significant change in the bill is the end of direct payments to farmers and farmland owners, who have traditionally been paid whether they grow crops or not. The program costs about $5 billion a year.

The new farm bill would use the savings from eliminating direct payments to increase financing for crop insurance, a federally subsidized program that pays 62 percent of the premiums for farmers and covers decreases in crop yields or revenue. Several conservative groups and environmental organizations oppose crop insurance, which they say amounts to income protection, rather than protection against crop losses due to drought or other natural disasters. Senators did, for the first time, add conservation requirements and set income limits for the recipients of crop insurance.

While some environmental groups praised the bill for making farmers who receive crop insurance comply with conservation measures, others said they were disappointed.

“The committee left the full Senate a lot of work to do,” said Scott Faber, vice president of government affairs at the Environmental Working Group, a Washington-based research organization. “They failed to rein in unlimited crop insurance and have exposed the taxpayers to more cost for the benefit of some of the most profitable agribusiness.”

One of the biggest differences between the 2013 version of the Senate farm bill and the one passed last year is the addition of price supports for peanut and rice farmers. Last year, those farmers, who have long depended on direct payments, said the Senate bill would not provide adequate protection for them.

Senator Pat Roberts, Republican of Kansas, objected to the supports for rice and peanut farmers, saying they amounted to an “income transfer program, not a risk management tool.”

“I don’t know how we can justify this,” he said.

The most contentious fight during the hearing was over cuts to food stamps. The Senate bill would reduce the food stamp program by about $4.1 billion. Ms. Stabenow said most of the cuts would come from a program overhaul. But Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, Democrat of New York, said the reduction in financing for the program would cause millions to go hungry.

“I don’t believe that we should balance the debt on the backs of families who are just hungry,” Ms. Gillibrand said.

Ms. Gillibrand offered an amendment that would have taken money from the crop insurance program to make up for the cuts to the food stamp program, but withdrew it. She said she would take up the measure when the bill moved to the full Senate. Several Republican senators tried to introduce amendments that would have changed the eligibility requirement for food stamps, but the amendments were defeated or withdrawn.

The House begins work on its version of the farm bill on Wednesday.

Senate Panel Approves Farm Bill

The Senate Agriculture Committee approved a $955 billion farm bill on Tuesday, the first step toward completing an overhaul of the nation’s food and farm policy that was derailed last year when the House failed to vote on its version of the bill.

The new bill, which was approved 15 to 5, is expected to save $23 billion over the next 10 years by eliminating or consolidating hundreds of agriculture programs.

“Because the Agriculture Committee worked across party lines to streamline programs, we were able to save tax dollars while investing in initiatives that help boost exports, help family farmers sell locally and spur innovations in new biomanufacturing and bioenergy industries,” said Senator Debbie Stabenow, Democrat of Michigan and chairwoman of the committee.

The full Senate is expected to take up the bill next week.

The new farm bill is nearly identical to the legislation passed by the Senate last year. It leaves in place several Depression-era programs like supports for American sugar growers that set prices and limit imports. The bill would also provide relief to the nation’s cattle and poultry producers, who were left unprotected last year during the worst drought in 50 years after several farm programs expired.

The most significant change in the bill is the end of direct payments to farmers and farmland owners, who have traditionally been paid whether they grow crops or not. The program costs about $5 billion a year.

The new farm bill would use the savings from eliminating direct payments to increase financing for crop insurance, a federally subsidized program that pays 62 percent of the premiums for farmers and covers decreases in crop yields or revenue. Several conservative groups and environmental organizations oppose crop insurance, which they say amounts to income protection, rather than protection against crop losses due to drought or other natural disasters. Senators did, for the first time, add conservation requirements and set income limits for the recipients of crop insurance.

While some environmental groups praised the bill for making farmers who receive crop insurance comply with conservation measures, others said they were disappointed.

“The committee left the full Senate a lot of work to do,” said Scott Faber, vice president of government affairs at the Environmental Working Group, a Washington-based research organization. “They failed to rein in unlimited crop insurance and have exposed the taxpayers to more cost for the benefit of some of the most profitable agribusiness.”

One of the biggest differences between the 2013 version of the Senate farm bill and the one passed last year is the addition of price supports for peanut and rice farmers. Last year, those farmers, who have long depended on direct payments, said the Senate bill would not provide adequate protection for them.

Senator Pat Roberts, Republican of Kansas, objected to the supports for rice and peanut farmers, saying they amounted to an “income transfer program, not a risk management tool.”

“I don’t know how we can justify this,” he said.

The most contentious fight during the hearing was over cuts to food stamps. The Senate bill would reduce the food stamp program by about $4.1 billion. Ms. Stabenow said most of the cuts would come from a program overhaul. But Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, Democrat of New York, said the reduction in financing for the program would cause millions to go hungry.

“I don’t believe that we should balance the debt on the backs of families who are just hungry,” Ms. Gillibrand said.

Ms. Gillibrand offered an amendment that would have taken money from the crop insurance program to make up for the cuts to the food stamp program, but withdrew it. She said she would take up the measure when the bill moved to the full Senate. Several Republican senators tried to introduce amendments that would have changed the eligibility requirement for food stamps, but the amendments were defeated or withdrawn.

The House begins work on its version of the farm bill on Wednesday.

Video: Watching Washington This Week

The Times’s Ashley Parker and Jeremy W. Peters, Congressional correspondents, analyze the key players to watch on Capitol Hill this week.

Black Male Turnout Higher Than Official Data Suggest

Although a recent Census Bureau study showed a stark gap between black male turnout and black female turnout in the 2012 election, the large number of black men ineligible to vote because of felony convictions explains much of the gap.

In its tabulations, the Census Bureau counts any American citizen of voting age as an eligible voter. But nearly one in 10 black men are ineligible to vote because of state laws that apply to people with felony convictions.

The census report listed the turnout rate for black men as 61.4 percent, compared with 70.4 percent for black women. However, once noninstitutionalized felons â€" people who are not in prison but lost the right to vote as punishment â€" are removed from the tally of eligible voters, the turnout rate among black men rises to 68 percent, according to Bernard L. Fraga, a political scientist at Harvard, and the rate among black women rises to 71.4 percent.

The equivalent turnout rate is 65.9 percent for white women and 64.1 percent for white men â€" only slightly higher than the turnout rates listed in the census report for those categories.

“Black men look like the lowest turnout group of the four if we don’t take into account felons,” said Mr. Fraga, who recalculated the turnout rates for the 2008 and 2012 elections. In fact, he said, black men have a higher turnout rate than white men or white women.

Turnout among Latinos and Asian-Americans is substantially lower than among whites and blacks. Latinos and Asian-Americans, both men and women, have turnout rates around 50 percent.

Removing disenfranchised felons makes men look like better voters across all races. Only 0.6 percent of women are disenfranchised felons, compared with 3.3 percent of men. For black men, the figure jumps to 9.7 percent, according to Mr. Fraga, who obtained data from the Sentencing Project, an advocacy group. For black women, the rate is 1.8 percent.

Mr. Fraga’s numbers also show that the black turnout rate first exceeded the white turnout rate in 2008, rather than in 2012, as the census reported.

App Smart Extra: More Ways to Stay Fit

This week I wrote about apps that can take the place, at least in part, of a personal trainer. These fitness apps can coach and provide encouragement as you try to get fit. With summer fast approaching, now may be a great moment to take advantage of these apps to improve your overall fitness, lose some weight or tone your muscles.

The free Android app Fitness Flow is designed to be more cheerful and quirky than many of its peers. Its text is written in playful-looking fonts, and to pause the app you hit the “take a rest” button, and to stop you hit the red “that's enough” button. Tapping on the “quick start” button on the app's home page takes you straight into a random workout. As you exercise, the app's main display shows a video of what you're supposed to be doing. Along with the video, a voice tells you how to move properly and relays other information like the time elapsed.

You can adjust the app's settings to focus your workouts on particular body sections, but the free edition only comes with a short list of exercises and coaching videos. For the full experience of over 100 different exercises you have to pay $3.99. The app displays video only when your device is connected to the Internet, but you can exercise to the audio cues alone when you're offline.

The free iOS and Android Alpha Trainer app is almost the opposite. It's very sophisticated, and has a much more serious tone about working out and getting fit. It's centered around the idea of a 14-week program, which it builds for you based on the goals you enter into its settings menu. You can tell the app you work out at home or in the gym, and it will adjust - for example, recommending that you use simple hand weights at home or that you use a particular piece of bodybuilding equipment in the gym.

The free part of the app is limited, however, and to access the full functions you have to pay for in-app purchases that vary, from individual workouts (for example, plyometrics jump training costs $9.99) to “elite” membership that unlocks the app for $9.99 a month or $59.99 a year.

On the other hand if you prefer a simpler type of workout, like going for a bicycle ride, taking a fast walk or going for a jog, then there are apps like the $2.99 Run Tracker Pro for iOS. This is one of the training apps I use because I prefer not to be “nagged” or even motivated by a trainer (albeit in video form) and instead I make my own targets. The app also lets you try out interval training workouts, such as alternating your pace every minute as you run. But its main purpose is to track you through GPS and monitor your pace. The app can show you each workout on a map, and it stores information like your pace and split times so you can see how your current times compare with your previous ones. For a similar alternative app, check out Endomondo free on iOS or Android; you may find its interface better suits your tastes.

Have fun getting fit!

Quick call

Rovio has added 100 new levels to its Angry Birds game on the Windows Phone platform. The game is a classic of the touch-screen smartphone era and if you've not played Angry Birds before, now is a good time to try it out. It's free for Windows Phone 8 devices and for those running the 7.5 version.

Q.& A.: Hanging out on Google+

Q.

Is there a minimum broadband connection speed needed to get Google+ Hangouts to work properly?

A.

Google+ Hangouts, Google's service for video chats and virtual meetings between two to 10 participants, does have some bandwidth requirements. As a general rule, the more people participating in the Hangout, the faster the connection you'll need for consistent video quality.

If you and one other person are having a simple video chat, Google suggests at least a connection speed of at least 1 megabit-per-second (mbps) for streaming the video to and from the computer. The absolute minimum bandwidth requirements are listed as 256 kilobits-per-second (kbps) for data going from the computer and 512 kbps for streaming the data down to the machine. But the experience will probably be much better with faster connection speeds, like 1 mbps for outbound video and 2.5 mbps inbound to the computer.

If more than two people are participating in the Hangout, an outbound speed of 900 kbps is considered ideal, while inbound data speeds should be 2 mbps for five people in the Hangout, and up to 3 mbps for 10 people participating in the video conference. If you are unsure of your network connection speed, tester sites Speakeasy Speed Test, or similar offerings from your broadband provider, like Comcast's speed-test page or Verizon's own test page, can give you an idea.

In addition to video conferencing, Google+ Hangouts recently gained a new tool that can help with long-distance family computer support through the service. The Remote Desktop feature, which has been a Google Chrome browser extension for the past year or so, has been integrated into Google+ Hangouts. For more information on using the Remote Desktop tool with Google+, check out the guide on the PC World site.