WEEK IN REVIEW: WASHINGTON, D.C.

Lisa Mascaro, Sun Washington Bureau

Sunday, May 13, 2007 | 7:02 a.m.

WASHINGTON - Who really wants to tackle immigration reform this week in Congress?

Is it Senate Republicans, who say they are close to finishing a bipartisan plan with Democrats but say they need just a few more weeks to seal the deal?

Or Senate Democrats led by Majority Leader Harry Reid, who has vowed to take up the issue the last two weeks of May whether or not Republicans are ready?

The colliding timetables threaten chances for immigration reform again, with the fate of thousands of immigrants living in Southern Nevada hanging in the balance. After year last year's immigration debate unleashed big immigrant rights protests nationwide, including the largest in Las Vegas history, this year's attempt to reform the law is happening quietly, behind closed doors.

Senators from both parties have been meeting for weeks, struggling to figure out what to do with the 12 million people living illegally in the United States as well as the millions more who want to come into the country every year.

So far the deal that is closest is no bargain for Nevada's immigrants, their families or the casino industry on the Strip, immigration advocates say.

The proposal would create a new, temporary-worker program that allows unskilled laborers into the country on a limited, three-year visa. Afterward, they would have to head home.

Naturalized citizens could no longer bring their extended families into the country, although members of immediate families could come.

The nation's 12 million undocumented immigrants would be allowed to remain, although they would not automatically be on a path to citizenship. That step has extra hurdles. But they could remain here as legal residents.

Republicans see it as a fair trade: They are giving in on a big item by allowing legality for those who broke the rules to come into this country. (To satisfy conservatives, who are furious at the prospect of granting amnesty to illegal immigrants, anyone applying for citizenship would be required to return home before applying.) The proposal also contains provisions for border security and employee verification.

Immigrant rights' groups see nothing but another broken system emerging from the attempt to fix the current one.

"We have people from all over the world who come to Vegas, from war, poverty, a flood or disasters - they want to bring their whole family," said Pilar Weiss, political director at the Culinary Union, which represents 60,000 workers on the Strip. "We've been very adamant that comprehensive reform has to include the whole family.

"The other piece we've been very adamant about is there has to be a real pathway to citizenship," she said. The union objects to any system, which would include the three-year visas, that creates a second-class citizenry of people allowed to "come here, live here and ... establish their lives here" but are then asked to leave.

Nevada's tourist industry will not likely be too pleased about what one national immigrant rights group calls the "churn and burn workforce."

The opposition is what leads Republicans to believe the heat has been turned too high on the issue, and what has some Democrats wanting out.

Reid wants to bring the bill up only to let it die, one Republican aide said. "Reid has surveyed the landscape and he's calculated that a deal at this point might not provide a benefit to Senate Democrats."

But Reid won't be the one to kill it. Republicans have been rumbling about a filibuster to prevent action until they are ready to proceed - a move that could leave them looking like obstructionists.

Angela Kelley, deputy director of the National Immigration Forum, an advocacy group, said she believes "Democrats are serious and want to get something done.

"We'll see who wins the blame game," she said. "It's a little bit about who's going to blink first."