Key facts
- Representative Veronica Escobar said any comprehensive immigration reform must be bipartisan without a Senate supermajority.
- Senator Ruben Gallego said there is still time this session for a deal on immigration.
- The Dignity Act has 35 Democratic and 20 Republican sponsors, per the lawmakers, with Maria Salazar as lead sponsor.
- Escobar said she and colleagues plan to reshape the Dignity Act over coming weeks before reintroducing it next session.
- Representative Henry Cuellar expects to chair the House appropriations homeland security subcommittee in the new year.
- No detailed talk on November 11, 2026 addressed abolishing or significantly reforming ICE, despite it being an election topic.
A group of congressional Democrats gathered outside the US Capitol in Washington on November 11, 2026 to press for bipartisan immigration reform, just over a week after midterm elections in which Republicans lost ground and Democrats won control of both legislative chambers from January.
Representative Veronica Escobar of Texas, whose district includes El Paso on the US-Mexico border, said any comprehensive reform must be bipartisan because Donald Trump remains in the White House and Democrats lack a Senate supermajority. Senator Ruben Gallego of Arizona said there is still time this session for a deal and that Republicans' stated condition of a safe, secure border had been met.
Lawmakers highlighted two existing bipartisan bills as starting points. The American Dream and Promise Act would provide legal pathways to a green card for undocumented immigrants brought to the US as children, known as Dreamers, and for people with temporary protections. Representative Sylvia Garcia of Texas said work could start on that bill before the new Congress is sworn in in January.
The Dignity Act, which lawmakers said has 35 Democratic and 20 Republican sponsors, couples border security measures with some protections for undocumented people. Representative Maria Salazar of Florida, its lead sponsor and the one Republican slated to attend, did not appear. Escobar said she and colleagues plan to reshape the bill over the next few weeks before reintroducing it next session.
Representative Henry Cuellar, another Texas border-area Democrat, expects to chair the House appropriations homeland security subcommittee in the new year, giving him control of Department of Homeland Security funding. He said he has a list of guardrails to return ICE, which sits under DHS, to its role before Trump's second term. Lawmakers gave no detailed talk on November 11 of abolishing or significantly reforming ICE.
The remarks followed Trump's mass deportation campaign, which began when he re-entered the White House in January 2025. Trump said after the midterms that his enforcement had been too tough in certain aspects and tentatively offered a deal to help longstanding, law-abiding undocumented immigrants, shortly before naming Stephen Miller as his new chief of staff. Trump has also signaled he intends to use his veto power often against Democratic-supported legislation.