Legislation like the other bill passed by the House this week, the No Sanctuaries for Criminals Act. The bill is needed because the Justice and Homeland Security departments have limited ability to fight state and local nullification of federal immigration law, but Congress has more. The potential efficacy of this bill is suggested by the fact that only three House Democrats voted for it, as opposed to the 24 Democrats who voted for Kate’s Law in order to pretend that they care about immigration enforcement. (Only one Republican – Justin Amash – voted against both bills.)

Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte shepherded these two bills, and has several other important pieces of legislation queued up, including the Davis-Oliver Act, which would tighten immigration more broadly, rather than specifically regarding sanctuary cities. But since these bills would need support from eight Senate Democrats to pass (unless the filibuster is returned to its traditional talking format rather than requiring a supermajority for almost all legislation), I don’t see how they become law. When the overwhelming majority of a party’s lawmakers can vote against a symbolic measure like Kate’s Law because they object to the symbolism – opposition to illegal immigration – groups like the newly formed Advocates for Victims of Illegal Alien Crime (AVIAC) still have a lot of work ahead of them.