The general consensus at this time is that immigration reform will not actually happen until after the mid-term elections in November 2014. However, a new theory has surfaced which indicates that immigration reform might in fact happen in early 2014 before the election.
One of the many reasons for the delay in immigration reform is the reluctance of House Republicans to be involved with any type of “amnesty”. Leaving aside the merits of the arguments on both sides of the “amnesty” issue, the fact remains members of the “Tea Party” do not support any type of immigration reform especially if it involves any type of amnesty. Mainstream Republicans on the other hand have indicated a willingness to at least address immigration reform on an issue by issue basis. The important thing to understand from a political standpoint is that most if not all of these Republican House members are in districts which are heavily Republican to begin with. Therefore, they are not concerned with a Democratic challenger but are concerned with a more conservative Republican challenger during the primary. So, if you are a mainstream Republican concerned with whether or not a Tea Party challenger will declare his or her candidacy in your district, you do not want to do anything which would encourage voters in your district to vote for a Tea Party candidate. Expressing some type of interest in immigration reform might cause voters in your district to favor the Tea Party candidate who they know will not be in favor of any type of immigration reform at all, thereby causing a Tea Party candidate to register in that district.
The new theory which supports immigration reform in early 2014 is based on the fact that all candidates for the mid-term election must declare their candidacy by February or March at the latest. Therefore, if you are a mainstream Republican you simply must wait until after the deadline for registering. If no Tea Party candidate has declared, they will be unable to enter the race even if you have voted for some type of immigration reform before the mid-term election.
It will be interesting to see if this theory has any validity. If it does, we should start to see some movement on immigration reform after March and prior to November 2014. If it turns out this is just another of the many theories trying to predict the unpredictable, then we will simply have to wait until after the mid-term elections to see if immigration reform will have a chance.