The Senate’s pending immigration bill includes roughly 400 exemptions, exceptions, waivers, determinations and grants of discretion.
The bill’s complexity is forcing opponents and supporters to comb through its 844 pages before they can declare their conditional support or opposition to the high-stakes measure.
“WAIVER.—The Secretary, in the Secretary’s sole and unreviewable discretion, may waive the application of subparagraph (A) on behalf of an alien,” says one passage on page 71 of the complex document.
The prospective beneficiary of that discretion by a political appointee, according to the bill, is “an alien who departed from the United States while subject to an order of exclusion, deportation, or removal.”
The document mentions “discretion” or “discretionary” 41 times.