Jul 04, 2008  |  By: LOU CHIBBARO J  | COMMENTS     

An effort by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) to secure passage before the July 4 holiday of legislation to repeal the U.S. ban on foreign visitors and immigrants with HIV broke down last week when at least two Republican senators refused to allow a vote on the legislation.

The two senators, Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) and Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), objected to unrelated provisions in a U.S. global AIDS relief bill, to which the repeal of the HIV visitors and immigrant ban is attached.

Similar to lawmakers’ past objections to the legislation, known as PEPFAR (the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief), DeMint and Sessions took issue with provisions in the bill dealing with the level of funding for AIDS-relief programs in developing countries in Africa, Asia and the Caribbean and how much of the funds should go to medical treatment.

The two did not object to the provision in the PEPFAR bill calling for repeal of an existing immigration law that bans foreign visitors who test positive for HIV as well as foreigners with HIV who seek permanent U.S. residency as immigrants.

Congress passed the ban in 1993 when advocates expressed fears that foreign nationals with HIV could spread AIDS in the U.S. and overload health care providers in U.S. urban centers that were already struggling to treat Americans with AIDS. Before Congress passed the ban, the U.S. Public Health Service had used its existing authority under immigration law to ban foreigners with HIV from entering the U.S.

AIDS advocates say that administrative decision by the Public Health Service, which is an arm of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, should also be reversed once Congress repeals the statutory ban on HIV visitors and immigrants.

Gay rights and AIDS advocacy groups pushing for repeal of the HIV visitors and immigrant ban said they remain hopeful that the Senate will pass the repeal soon after it returns from its Fourth of July recess on Monday.

“We’re still quite optimistic about the chances of this passing,” said Adam Francoeur, policy coordinator for Immigration Equality, a New York-based group that advocates for immigration rights for gays and people with HIV and AIDS.

“The repeal effort has not been a controversial issue in the PEPFAR debate,” Francoeur said.
Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.) and Gordon Smith (R-Ore.) led efforts in the Senate to attach the repeal language to the PEPFAR bill, which calls for spending $50 billion on global AIDS relief efforts over a period of five years.

Sens. Joe Biden (D-Del.) and Richard Lugar (R-Ind.), the chair and top ranking GOP member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee respectively, enthusiastically supported attaching the repeal provision to the PEPFAR bill. At their urging, the committee approved the bill in March and sent it to the Senate floor for quick consideration.

Seven Republican senators, led by Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.), then put holds on the bill, preventing a Senate vote until at least 60 senators agree to vote to break the hold. Reid spokesperson Jim Manley said Reid held off on attempting to break the holds because he was uncertain whether supporters could line up 60 votes, even though far more than 60 senators have expressed support in principle for PEPFAR.

Last week, both Reid and Coburn announced they had reached a compromise over key differences between the two parties on PEPAR, including a stumbling block over whether a provision requiring at least 55 percent of the PEPFAR funds should be earmarked for medical care and treatment.

Such a provision is included in the existing PEPFAR law, which Congress passed in 2003 and which has been hailed as one of the Bush administration’s most successful foreign aid programs. Under the Reid-Coburn comprise, “more than half” of PEPFAR funding would go to treatment. The agreement also calls for restricting PEPFAR funds from going to what some senators considered “wealthier” developing countries like China and Russia.

Reid said June 27 that he would attempt to bring the PEPFAR bill to a vote the week after the holiday, when the Senate returns from its recess. But he said he was concerned that a few remaining Republican dissenters would continue to take steps to block the vote.

The House of Representatives earlier this year passed a separate version of PEPFAR that does not include a repeal provision for the HIV visitor and immigrant ban. House Democratic leaders have declined to say why they chose not to add the repeal provision to the bill but have said they would go along with the Senate version in a House-Senate conference committee.