New York Times, Washington, June 26 — President Obama told a bipartisan group of lawmakers on Thursday that Congress should begin debating a comprehensive immigration plan by year’s end or early next year, but Republicans said they would support a measure only if it included an expansion of guest worker programs.
Leading the call for that provision was Senator John McCain of Arizona, who told Mr. Obama he would have to take his “political lumps” and stand up to labor unions that oppose the idea. The president praised Mr. McCain for paying “a significant political cost for doing the right thing.”
In the State Dining Room, Mr. Obama met with about 30 lawmakers for the first substantial discussion on immigration since he took office. Mr. Obama named a group to work with Congress that will be led by the homeland security secretary, Janet Napolitano, a former governor of Arizona.
“I think the American people are ready for us to do this,” Mr. Obama said, “but it’s going to require some heavy lifting. It’s going to require a victory of practicality, common sense and good policy making over short-term politics.”
The last time Congress considered sweeping immigration legislation, in 2007, Democrats and some Republicans pushed a three-part agreement that would have essentially provided legal status to the millions of people living here illegally, strengthened enforcement of immigration laws and expanded guest worker programs.
In April, the nation’s two largest labor unions, the A.F.L.-C.I.O. and its rival, Change to Win, joined together to promote a comprehensive plan but said they would oppose giving employers more power to bring in foreign workers. That agreement led business groups, a stronghold of Republican support, to leave the coalition.
Mr. McCain, speaking to reporters outside the White House on Thursday, said an immigration overhaul had a fresh urgency because of the surge in violence along the border with Mexico. But he said a guest worker program must be part of any immigration bill.
“I would expect the president of the United States to put his influence on the unions in order to change their position,” Mr. McCain said. As he left the White House, he said Mr. Obama needed to show leadership, saying, “That’s why he was elected president.”
Mr. Obama made no commitments in the meeting, administration officials said, but noted that all options were on the table, including a guest worker program. The White House chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, had told reporters earlier Thursday that there was not enough support for an immigration bill this year.
“If the votes were there,” Mr. Emanuel said, “you wouldn’t need to have the meeting.”
