Will E-verify get more funding in November? Some in Washington are making moves now to try to keep the system afloat.

House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers and Judiciary Immigration Subcommittee Chairwoman Zoe Lofgren say they’ll bring a bill to the House floor before the August recess to extend the program through 2018. Their real goal: to buy some time – and get some funding – before Congress’ hand gets forced by the November deadline. Conyers and Lofgren figure if they can get an extension of funding, the lawmakers can later work out a compromise law that’s likely to get widespread support.

Whatever compromise gets worked out, it won’t be in the bill presented by Lofgren and Conyers. They say they’ll bring the bill to the House floor under suspension of the rules, meaning members wouldn’t be allowed to amend it. House Judiciary ranking member Lamar Smith supports an extension of E-Verify and won’t object to the bill going to the House floor, according to statements from his office.

The choices
The program, also known as the Basic Pilot/Employment Eligibility Verification Program, expires Nov. 1 unless Congress reauthorizes it. It’s now a voluntary program employers can use to check the immigration status of their workers. Nearly 70,000 employers are enrolled in it.

Some in Congress want to either:

• kill the program
• make it mandatory, or
• replace it with a different mandatory system coupled with comprehensive immigration reform legislation, some of which would create a temporary guest worker program.