Could immigration bill set off another backlash?

WASHINGTON (AP) — As a Senate committee prepares to begin voting this week on far-reaching immigration legislation, advocates are watching warily to see whether opposition, thus far subdued, builds into the same kind of fierce backlash that shut down Congress' last attempt to remake the nation's immigration system.

That time around, in 2007, angry calls overwhelmed the Senate switchboard and lawmakers endured raging town hall meetings and threats from incensed constituents. The legislation ultimately collapsed on the Senate floor.

"I've been through this battle, and it's ugly," said former Sen. Trent Lott, R-Miss., who supported the bill. "My phones were jammed for three weeks and I got three death threats, one of which I turned over to the FBI. So it's rough business."

Supporters of the immigration bill, released last month by a group of four Republican and four Democratic senators, have been cautiously optimistic about their prospects because of factors including public support for giving citizenship to immigrants, a large and diverse coalition in support of the bill, and a growing sentiment among Republican leaders that immigration must be dealt with if they are to regain the backing of Hispanic voters. Backers have been working hard to build alliances and strategies aimed at avoiding the mistakes of 2007, when critics largely defined the bill and some supporters ended up turning against it.

Opponents acknowledge that supporters started out better organized and mobilized than last time around, and they also anticipate that outside groups pushing the legislation — including efforts headed by New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg — will outspend them. Supporters include large and influential groups including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, AFL-CIO and the Catholic Church, while opponents include lesser-known think tanks or advocacy organizations such as NumbersUSA, the Federation for American Immigration Reform and the Center for Immigration Studies. Both sides have already begun running ads.

But critics also have important grass-roots influence, including from talk radio hosts who were instrumental in defeating the bill in 2007, and opponents argue that as the public absorbs the content of the legislation, the tide will turn against it. They say that there are already signs that it's happening. Although conservative commentators on Fox News Channel and elsewhere have been more muted so far than in 2007, some talk radio hosts including Mark Levin and Rush Limbaugh have begun to voice deep unease about the bill despite the efforts of its conservative standard bearer, Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., to sell the legislation to them and other conservative opinion leaders.

"The supporters promoted the bill aggressively before anybody saw the language, and certain Republicans and conservative voices sort of held their fire, but that's beginning to change," said Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., who was a leading voice in the Senate against the bill in 2007 and is reprising that role this time around, making floor speeches, issuing press releases and holding briefing calls with reporters to argue that the bill would unlock a much larger volume of immigration into the U.S. than advertised, to the detriment of U.S. workers and jobs.

"It's going to be like that mackerel in the sunshine — the longer it's out there the worse it smells," Sessions said.

The bill would aim to boost border security, fix legal immigration and worker programs, require all employers to check their workers' legal status and offer eventual citizenship to the estimated 11 million immigrants already living in the country illegally.

Joyce Kaufman, a host on a Florida radio station, WFTL, said that opposition to the bill was soft at first but grows daily.

"Yes, we believe this is amnesty," Kaufman said. "Citizen activists are outraged."

Lott said that supporters of the legislation still haven't come up with an argument as concise and effective as that one word — "amnesty" — from opponents. He said he's spoken with Rubio, among others, to make clear that supporters of the bill need to hone their arguments.

"Last time our explanation was three paragraphs. Theirs was a word," Lott said. When that happens, he said, "You're dead."

The Democratic-led Senate, where the Judiciary Committee takes up the bill on Thursday, is already going to be a tough challenge. But if the bill does pass the Senate, opponents are betting it gets stopped in the Republican-led House. A bipartisan group of House lawmakers has been promising for months to release their own bill mirroring elements of the Senate legislation but taking a tougher tack. So far they haven't delivered.

Meanwhile, to the dismay of immigration advocates, the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee has announced plans to move forward with individual, single-issue immigration bills, rejecting the comprehensive approach in the Senate that's backed by President Barack Obama, who's made immigration legislation a top second-term priority. The legislation was also a priority in 2007 for then-President George W. Bush, but he was unsuccessful in persuading Republican lawmakers to get behind the bill, and Democrats who at the time controlled Congress were divided, too.

In the 2007 debate, a turning point came when the conservative Heritage Foundation released a report saying that the legislation would cost taxpayers $2.6 trillion, including benefits to immigrants and other expenditures. Although the analysis was disputed it carried weight with GOP lawmakers. Now under the leadership of former Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C., another lead opponent of the legislation in 2007, Heritage is preparing to release an updated version of that report.

In a sign of how supporters of the bill are working hard not to repeat mistakes from the past, conservative groups that support the legislation have already sought to pre-empt the Heritage report, with the Cato Institute deriding it ahead of time as "fatally flawed," and Cato and others arguing that immigration reform would boost the economy by growing the labor market. Nonetheless officials with Heritage argue their report could have the same impact this time around as in 2007.

"There's been a lot of posturing, a lot of talk. We haven't really gotten to the heart of the debate yet," said Dan Holler, communications director for Heritage Action for America, the Heritage Foundation's activist arm. "We have the right policy, the numbers are going to be there, and the debate is going to shift. And no amount of ads will be able to shift it back."

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Follow Erica Werner on Twitter: https://twitter.com/ericawerner

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Lawmakers: Syria chemical weapons could menace US

WASHINGTON (AP) — Syria's stockpile of chemical weapons could be a greater threat after that nation's president leaves power and could end up targeting Americans at home, lawmakers warned Sunday as they considered a U.S. response that stops short of sending military forces there.

U.S. officials last week declared that the Syrian government probably had used chemical weapons twice in March, newly provocative acts in the 2-year civil war that has killed more than 70,000 people and displaced hundreds of thousands more. The U.S. assessment followed similar conclusions from Britain, France, Israel and Qatar — key allies eager for a more aggressive response to the Syrian conflict.

President Barack Obama has said Syria's likely action — or the transfer of President Bashar Assad's stockpiles to terrorists — would cross a "red line" that would compel the United States to act.

Lawmakers sought to remind viewers on Sunday news programs of Obama's declaration while discouraging a U.S. foothold on the ground there.

"The president has laid down the line, and it can't be a dotted line. It can't be anything other than a red line," said House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Mich. "And more than just Syria, Iran is paying attention to this. North Korea is paying attention to this."

Added Sen. Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga.: "For America to sit on the sidelines and do nothing is a huge mistake."

Obama has insisted that any use of chemical weapons would change his thinking about the United States' role in Syria but said he didn't have enough information to order aggressive action.

"For the Syrian government to utilize chemical weapons on its people crosses a line that will change my calculus and how the United States approaches these issues," Obama said Friday.

But Rep. Jan Schakowsky, an Illinois Democrat, said Sunday the United States needs to consider those weapons. She said that when Assad leaves power, his opponents could have access to those weapons or they could fall into the hands of U.S. enemies.

"The day after Assad is the day that these chemical weapons could be at risk ... (and) we could be in bigger, even bigger trouble," she said.

Both sides of the civil war already accuse each other of using the chemical weapons.

The deadliest such alleged attack was in the Khan al-Assal village in the Aleppo province in March. The Syrian government called for the United Nations to investigate alleged chemical weapons use by rebels in the attack that killed 31 people.

Syria, however, has not allowed a team of experts into the country because it wants the investigation limited to the single Khan al-Assal incident, while U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has urged "immediate and unfettered access" for an expanded investigation.

One of Obama's chief antagonists on Syria, Sen. John McCain, R- Ariz., said the United States should go to Syria as part of an international force to safeguard the chemical weapons. But McCain added that he is not advocating sending ground troops to the nation.

"The worst thing we could do is put boots on the ground," McCain said.

His friend, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., also said the United States could safeguard the weapons without a ground force. But he cautioned the weapons must be protected for fear that Americans could be targeted. Raising the specter of the lethal bomb at the finish line of the Boston Marathon, Graham said the next attack on U.S. soil could employ weapons that were once part of Assad's arsenal.

"The next bomb that goes off in America may not have nails and glass," he said.

Rogers and Schakowsky spoke to ABC's "This Week." Chambliss and Graham were interviewed on CBS's "Face the Nation." McCain appeared on NBC's "Meet the Press."

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Follow Philip Elliott on Twitter: https://twitter.com/Philip_Elliott

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Rush to help airlines, travelers could crack open budget door

By David Lawder and Doug Palmer

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Congress got rid of a headache on Friday when it rescued the flying public from flight delays caused by its budget cutting. But in the view of many lawmakers, the pain is just about to begin.

Members of Congress and groups representing people hit by across-the-board budget cuts, ranging from cancer patients to welfare recipients, say the quick action on air traffic control staffing underscored the importance of being visible to millions of Americans.

"What are we going to do, every time there's a fire we're going to put it out by moving some funds around? That's a shell game," said Representative Gerald Connolly, a Democrat from northern Virginia.

"I'm going to predict that there's going to be more weeping and gnashing of teeth, as sequestration sets in and we're going to continue to approach this on a piecemeal basis," he said.

Next in line for individual funding relief will be advocates for national parks, low-income housing, AIDS funding, meals on wheels and Community Development Block Grants, Connolly said, adding that budget cuts for these and other safety-net services will be felt severely by local communities.

Representatives for some of these other programs said it was the television images of lines in airports and the interviews with angry passengers that led to action, combined with the lobbying power of the travel industry.

"It means we worry about who's going to scream the loudest now," said Chris Hansen, president of the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network, which has been lobbying against cuts in federal funding of medical research.

A heavy dose of lobbying from the airline and travel industry preceded the legislation enacted Friday, which permitted the Federal Aviation Administration to move money to avoid the furloughs of air traffic controllers that were causing the delays.

Sequestration - the $109 billion in automatic across-the-board budget cuts enacted by Congress and signed by President Barack Obama - formally took effect in March and barring Congressional action to replace it may continue for a decade.

Some programs won relief from Congress in March, notably the meat and poultry industry, which fought successfully to prevent furloughs of U.S. Department of Agriculture meat inspectors.

But because the furloughs in other programs, such as the FAA, were not immediately implemented, the impact was slow to build.

TRAVEL LOBBY

The travel industry began to accelerate its lobbying effort after it learned early last week from the FAA that as many as 6,700 flights per day could be delayed, potentially reducing capacity at major airports by 30 to 40 percent.

Nicholas Calio, president of Airlines for America, or A4A, the main airlines industry group, worked the phones throughout the week, said Jean Medina, senior vice president for communications at A4A.

"He certainly was in very close contact with a lot of people to make sure they understood what needed to happen," she said.

Its first course of action was to ask the administration for a 30-day delay.

When that was denied, the industry group began focusing on a legislative fix that would clear both houses with bipartisan support and be signed into law by Obama.

US Airways Chief Executive Doug Parker, who would head the world's largest airline if his carrier's merger with AMR Corp's American Airlines is approved, said he spent the past week making calls to government officials in his airline's hub markets to express concern about the furloughs.

"What I know is we're doing great disservice to the flying public and to the citizens of the United States and we need for this to get resolved," Parker told Reuters from Arizona earlier this week.

The non-profit U.S. Travel Association said it mounted its own "sequester offensive" in response to the furloughs and began a consumer texting campaign that connected travelers who had been delayed at airports to members of Congress.

The association also asked industry workers to contact their representatives in Congress to explain that the travel delays put their jobs at risk.

"We were in frequent contact with Congress urging them to solve this problem as soon as possible," Erik Hansen, director of domestic policy at the U.S. Travel Association, said on Friday. "We were able to generate hundreds of calls and emails to Congress and we're hoping that helped to move the ball forward," Hansen said.

VISIBILITY

Airlines for America reported about $6.3 million in lobbying expenses in 2012 according to the Center for Responsive Politics; the U.S. Travel Association spent about $1.7 million; US Airways and Delta about $2.8 million each.

While other interest groups have a lobbying presence in the national capital, they are hard pressed to match the visibility of air travel.

Compared to "longer lines at airports," said Cynthia Pellegrini, a vice president at the March of Dimes, which raises funds to improve the health of mothers and babies, "you can't see that a child's belly is emptier because her family couldn't get food assistance."

"We are not as well-heeled as the travel industry," said Deborah Weinstein, executive director of the Coalition on Human Needs, an alliance of social welfare organizations. "But I think as more people learn of this appalling choice," that Congress made on Friday, "they will get as mad as I am."

Senator Amy Klobuchar, a Democrat from Minnesota, home to a major Delta Air Lines hub in Minneapolis, was among the members backing an FAA budget fix on Thursday when the Senate passed it.

She called it a "practical, pragmatic answer to an immediate problem," but acknowledged that it does nothing to get Congress closer to fixing the problems caused by sequestration. More effects of the cuts, demonstrated dramatically to the public, could do that, she added.

She may not have long to wait. Organizations that have been more quietly protesting the budget cuts were rethinking their strategy on Friday in the wake of Congress' action.

"It is inexplicable why proven and effective Meals on Wheels programs get overlooked from exemption from the sequester when both the business and social case exists," said Ellie Hollander, President and CEO of Meals on Wheels Association of America.

"I guess that's because we need to be a different kind of squeaky wheel."

(Additional reporting by Karen Jacobs, Susan Heavy and Karey Van Hall; Editing by Fred Barbash and Tim Dobbyn)

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Could the NFL soon have its first openly gay players?

Four active players are reportedly considering coming out together on the same day

It's been a good few weeks for gay rights advocates. Lawmakers are rushing to announce their newfound support for same-sex marriage, while the Supreme Court has put the issue in the spotlight in weighing two major cases involving marriage equality.

Now, that momentum may carry over to an unlikely institution: The NFL.

SEE MORE: No more age restrictions on the morning-after pill: 4 takeaways

Former Baltimore Ravens linebacker and outspoken supporter of gay rights Brendon Ayanbadejo told the Baltimore Sun on Friday that up to four current players were considering a plan to come out on the same day — and possibly soon.

"I think it will happen sooner than you think," Ayanbadejo said. "We're in talks with a handful of players who are considering it. There are up to four players being talked to right now and they're trying to be organized so they can come out on the same day together. It would make a major splash and take the pressure off one guy. It would be a monumental day if a handful or a few guys come out." 

SEE MORE: The week's best of the internet

His remarks come one week after CBS Sports' Mike Freeman reported that one gay player was coming out in the next few months. The sources for that report would not say who that player was, but indicated that he feared there would be a lack of acceptance from fans.

Ayanbadejo and others hope that any blowback would be mitigated if four players came out together.

SEE MORE: 'Jew in a Box': Fostering understanding, or anti-Semitism?

"Of course, there would be backlash," Ayanbadejo said. "If they could share the backlash, it would be more positive. It's cool. It's exciting. We're in talks with a few guys who are considering it. The NFL and organizations are already being proactive and open if a player does it and if something negative happens. We'll see what happens."

Vikings punter Chris Kluwe, the league's most vocal — and at times, most colorful — supporter of gay rights, echoed that sentiment Thursday.

SEE MORE: Girls on Film: Why Agatha Christie is ready for a Hollywood revival

"That would be ideal if a bunch of gay athletes came out at the same time, because then you could spread that attention,'' he said, according to Newsday's Tom Rock. "It wouldn't be 'Hey, there's one guy.' It would be 'Oh, there are five or six guys' and this isn't just an isolated phenomenon. There are gay players in the NFL.''

Ayanbadejo and Kluwe were in New York Thursday, where they were honored by the Straight for Equality Gala for their efforts to promote tolerance in sports.

SEE MORE: The daily gossip: Justin Bieber is in trouble for tattooing without a license, and more

The NFL is also reportedly taking steps to ensure that if and when gay players come out, they have as much support as possible within the league. NFL Players Association president Domonique Foxworth said last week that the union has been leading an effort to "educate our guys and be ready for this inevitability."

Several former players have come out after retiring, though none have done so while still in the league. Most recently, Kwame Harris, who retired in 2008, came out this year after news broke that he'd been in an altercation with his boyfriend.

SEE MORE: KFC going boneless is a terrible idea

"No, not while I was playing," he told CNN when asked if he'd considered revealing his sexual orientation while in the NFL. "I didn't see those two things as being compatible."

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Other stories from this section:

• The robotic exoskeleton that could turn you into a real-life Iron Man
• Football as ballet: 11 surprisingly graceful images from the Super Bowl
• The Super Bowl power outage: 5 conspiracy theories

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The Man Who Could Put Climate Change on the Agenda

Denis McDonough, the White House chief of staff, is best known for two things: his national security chops—he had key roles on the White House National Security Council—and the high regard in which he’s held by President Obama. McDonough has been part of Obama’s inner circle for nearly a decade, and the president has called his new chief of staff one of his “closest and most trusted advisers.”

Here’s what a lot of people don’t know about McDonough: He has a background on climate change, and he takes the issue very seriously. “Denis McDonough understands the threat posed by climate change to national security more than any White House chief of staff in the 21st century,” said Daniel J. Weiss, director of climate strategy at the Center for American Progress, a liberal think tank where McDonough worked as senior fellow in 2006 and 2007; while there, he wrote and contributed to several papers on climate change.

Jason Bordoff, who served as the president’s special assistant for energy and climate change on the National Security Council, wrote in an e-mail to National Journal, “When Denis was deputy national security adviser … we worked together on several energy and climate-related issues. Denis recognizes that climate change is a serious problem, and that strong U.S. leadership and action is needed to address the challenge.”

Here’s why that’s important: If Obama wants to follow through on his 2013 Inaugural Address pledge to make climate change a cornerstone of his legacy, he’ll need to make a series of tough, highly controversial executive decisions. There is almost no chance Congress will pass climate-change legislation in his second term, which means that the White House will have to drive any meaningful policy action. That action will probably come in a series of aggressive Environmental Protection Agency regulations to slash pollution from coal-fired power plants, and in the president’s decision on the Keystone XL pipeline, the $7 billion project that would bring carbon-heavy tar-sands oil from Alberta, Canada, to U.S. Gulf Coast refineries. Obama will also need to act ahead of a United Nations summit in 2015, at which the world’s nations are expected to sign a binding treaty to tackle climate change.

The pushback—from industries such as oil, coal, and manufacturing, and from powerful business groups such as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce—will be strong, as will be the political and legal repercussions. Even some Democrats, particularly those from coal and Rust Belt states, aren’t enthusiastic about the White House moving forward with tough regulations that could hurt their economies. And some senior administration staffers think climate change is far from a top-tier issue and is a sure political loser.

People close to the White House say that’s where a chief of staff committed to the issue can have a big impact. Carol Browner, who was Obama’s top energy and climate-change adviser during his first term and headed EPA during the Clinton administration, said the chief of staff can help determine whether environmental policy gains traction. She cited John Podesta, President Clinton’s top staffer and a strong advocate for clean energy and environmental issues. “When I was in EPA, it made all the difference in the world when Podesta showed up and gave my issues a fair hearing,” she said.

During Obama’s first term, each of his three staff chiefs had areas of expertise, but none had much of a background in environmental issues. Former Rep. Rahm Emanuel brought congressional and political experience; William Daley a former chairman at JPMorgan Chase, was hired to win trust from the business community—and was slammed by the environmental community for advising the president to delay a key set of clean-air regulations until after the 2012 election; Jacob Lew, with his background on the federal budget, prioritized economic issues.

By comparison, Browner said, “Denis has spent a lot of time thinking about climate change in the context of national security and the military. He’s well informed and well versed on this.”

In a 2007 paper, “Balancing Our Climate Debt: The Group of Eight Have an Obligation,” McDonough and coauthor Rebecca Schultz called on the G-8 industrial nations to focus “on the devastating impact high energy costs and climate change have on the world’s most vulnerable populations.” They argued that the wealthiest economies should “offer the most vulnerable communities in the world the support they need to combat the impact of climate change and help them and the rest of the world transition to a low-carbon global economy.” The paper declared, “This is a climate debt the industrialized world owes to these poor nations.”

McDonough also contributed to a 2007 CAP report titled “Energy Security in the 21st Century,” which warned, “Climate change poses a significant and increasingly imminent security threat to the United States and the world, but the Bush administration continues to block domestic and international efforts to meet this challenge.”

In still another paper from the center, “Cleaning Up China: Opportunities Beckon for U.S. Businesses,” McDonough and coauthor Peter Ogden praised Bush Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson Jr. for acknowledging climate change as a problem, and they urged him to push for promotion of U.S. clean-energy technology in China. “Now is the time to invest in the development of a domestic clean-energy industry that can outperform its international competitors and capture a large share of this rapidly growing market,” McDonough and Ogden wrote. “This is how America can work toward getting its trade deficit back into the black, and how we can help China to get into the green—for the good of both nations and everyone else around the globe.”

Ultimately, of course, the U.S. agenda on climate change will be set by the president himself. But Obama’s selection of a key adviser with such a deep record on the issue suggests he intends to take it seriously.

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North Korea Moves Missile, Could Be Preparing a Test

north korea

U.S. officials suspect that North Korea may be preparing for a test of its Musudan medium-range missile after seeing evidence of it being transported to North Korea's eastern coast. Such a launch would be the latest in a series of provocations by North Korea in recent weeks.

Earlier Thursday, South Korea's defense minister told his nation's lawmakers that a North Korean missile with "considerable range" had been transported to that country's eastern coast. Defense Minister Kim Kwan-jin said he could not explain the movement and added that the missile was not capable of reaching the United States.

U.S. officials have identified the missile as a mobile-launched Musudan missile estimated to have a range of between 1,800 and 2,500 miles that could put U.S. military bases in Okinawa and Guam within its range.

RELATED: North Korea Relocates Long-Range Missile in Latest 'Rhetorical Threat'

The officials said that, two days ago surveillance satellites detected the movement by train of a Musudan mobile launcher as well as fuel and equipment needed for a missile launch.

One official said it is possible that as many as two missiles could be readied for a potential launch because there were more missile components spotted than might be needed if only one missile was being launched.

The U.S. is trying to locate the location on the eastern coast where the launcher and missile components are currently located.

The officials said there is speculation that a missile test could be in the works and that it could occur soon. Unlike long-range missiles, which can spend weeks on a launch pad in preparation for a launch, mobile-launched missiles can be launched fairly quickly and with little warning.

PHOTOS: Inside North Korea

The Musudan is a medium-range missile that has never been tested before, though it has been publicly paraded by North Korea in the past. U.S. officials have been expecting it to be tested at some point over the past few years.

A U.S. official said that, so far, North Korea has not provided a notice to mariners about a potential missile launch. During previous long-range launches, the North Koreans have listed advance warnings to mariners and aviators. In addition to serving as safety warnings that a missile may land near a body of water, they have also served as indicators of a possible launch. The official said launching this missile without such an advance advisory would be seen as a provocation.

READ MORE: N. Korea's Real Power, Kim Jong Un's Aunt, Uncle

One of the officials said there is also concern about how Japan might react if a North Korean missile were to overfly its territory. Placing the Musudan on the eastern coast indicated the trajectory might take it over Japan. Last December, in advance of North Korea's long-range missile test that month, the Japanese government gave orders to its military shoot down a missile should it appear to be headed for Japanese territory.

That did not happen, as the Unha 3 missile was launched on a southward trajectory away from the Korean Peninsula. Japan has both land-based and ship-based missile interceptors like the ones aboard U.S. Navy ships.

In light of North Korea's recent threats to launch missiles at the United States, the Pentagon has assigned two of its missile-defense-capable Navy destroyers to provide missile defense if needed.

On Tuesday, the Pentagon confirmed the destroyers USS John S McCain and USS Decatur had been sent to pre-determined locations in the western Pacific.

The USS Decatur will soon be replaced by the destroyer USS Fitzgerald so that it can return to its homeport of San Diego after a seven-month deployment.

RELATED: U.S. Troops Stand 'Poised to Respond' at NKorea Border

Japan and South Korea both have short-range air missile defense systems, the U.S. Navy ships can provide backup if the trajectory is beyond that range and pose a threat to other partners in the region and U.S. territory.

In the wake of North Korea's missile threat on Wednesday, the Pentagon announced that it was sending a land-based missile defense system to Guam.

North Korea also has a mobile-launched, long-range missile known as the KN-08. North Korea has never tested the missile, but it is of particular concern because it can be launched with little warning and is believed to be able to reach parts of the United States.

One official said there has been no worrisome activity related to the KN-08.

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Could Mark Sanford Lose House Race?

Mark Sanford has overcome his past-for now. The disgraced former South Carolina governor ran a successful Republican primary campaign for the House seat he held in the 1990s, besting attorney and former Charleston County Council member Curtis Bostic Tuesday night in a runoff.

Sanford's win followed a 16-way first round of the GOP primary, in which he rose above a large and varied field of South Carolina politicos.

But more importantly, it followed nearly four years in the political wilderness. In 2009, Sanford revealed an extramarital affair with Maria Belen Chapur, now his fiancee, during one of the most memorable and strange political press conferences of the century, punctuated by personal openness and tears, after going AWOL for seven days, leading staff and public alike to believe he was hiking on the Appalachian Trail. It seemed he would never surface in politics again.

Sanford said as much, two years later: "No, I'm not," Sanford told Fox News' Sean Hannity in 2011, when asked if he was considering a return to politics.

It's difficult to say whether Sanford's win on Tuesday night was triumphant.

He took 57 percent to Bostic's 43 percent-a substantial margin, but perhaps not what one would expect of a former statewide officeholder with near-universal recognition in the district.

Forgiveness was an early theme in Sanford's campaign, featured in his first TV ad in the district, and Sanford will now test voters' forgiveness against Elizabeth Colbert Busch, the sister of Comedy Central host Stephen Colbert.

The question now becomes: Could Sanford blow it?

The First District favors Republicans, in a big way. No Democrat has represented it in Congress since 1981.

Still, Sanford brings his unique problems to the race.

Aside from the question of whether Sanford's highly public extramarital affair will damage his standing, particularly among female voters, one South Carolina Republican insider suggested to ABC News that voters would forgive his personal conduct-but not his "abandoning" the state while on his then-mysterious Argentinian trip.

Another South Carolina GOP politico, who worked for Sanford primary rival Larry Grooms, suggested Colbert Busch has a real shot.

"Yes, very much so," said Hogan Gidley, a former state party director and former consultant for Rick Santorum's presidential campaign. "She's well-known, she's well-liked and she's well-respected. It's just a political reality that it will be very difficult for Sanford to attack her in any way … [that] could trump party loyalty as a motivator. If it does you'll see the fiscal conservatives and social conservatives sending a loud message we are not just about winning, principals really do matter."

No poll has been conducted in the district that meets ABC's standards for reliability. Although Colbert Busch claims to lead Sanford both in horse-race polling and in favorability, based on a survey her campaign commissioned, she hasn't yet endured the withering attacks sure to come her way, almost certain to paint her as an Obama-loving liberal who lacks fiscal-conservative cred. The National Republican Congressional Committee is already criticizing Colbert Busch for her support for parts of the president's health law, although not yet in paid advertising. On top of that, Mitt Romney won the district handily over President Obama in the fall.

One South Carolina Republican questioned whether Colbert Busch's star power, and the attention that Democrats from other states will give her, would help or hurt her in a heavily Republican district.

Sanford will have until May 7 to tell voters about his opponent, as the focus now shifts from his own improbable comeback to a race against a Democratic opponent who, some think, could turn a deep red district blue.

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Congressional inaction could cost college students

WASHINGTON (AP) — Congressional inaction could end up costing college students an extra $5,000 on their new loans.

The rate for subsidized Stafford loans is set to increase from 3.4 percent to 6.8 percent on July 1, just as millions of new college students start signing up for fall courses. The difference between the two rates adds up to $6 billion.

Just a year ago, lawmakers faced a similar deadline and dodged the rate increase amid the heated presidential campaign between President Barack Obama and Republican challenger Mitt Romney. But that was with the White House up for grabs and before Washington was consumed by budget standoffs that now seem routine.

"What is definitely clear, this time around, there doesn't seem to be as much outcry," said Justin Draeger, president of the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators. "We're advising our members to tell students that the interest rates are going to double on new student loans, to 6.8 percent."

The new rates apply only to those who take new subsidized loans. Students with outstanding subsidized loans are not expected to see their loan rates increase unless they take out a new subsidized Stafford loan. Students' nonsubsidized loans are not expected to change, nor are loans from commercial lenders.

But it translates to real money for incoming college freshmen who could end up paying back $5,000 more for the same maxed-out student loans their older siblings have.

House Education Committee Chairman John Kline, R-Minn., and the committee's senior Democrat, George Miller of California, prefer to keep rates at their current levels but have not outlined how they might accomplish that goal. Rep. Karen Bass, D-Calif., last week introduced a proposal that would permanently cap the interest rate at 3.4 percent.

Adding another perspective to the debate, Obama will release his budget proposal on April 10.

Neither party's budget proposal in Congress has money specifically set aside to keep student loans at their current rate. The House Republicans' budget would double the interest rates on newly issued subsidized loans to help balance the federal budget in a decade. Senate Democrats say they want to keep the interest rates at their current levels, but the budget they passed last week does not set aside money to keep the rates low.

In any event, neither side is likely to get what it wants. And that could lead to confusion for students as they receive their college admission letters and financial aid packages.

"Two ideas ... have been introduced so far — neither of which is likely to go very far," said Terry Hartle, the top lobbyist for colleges at the American Council on Education.

House Republicans, led by Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan, R-Wis., have outlined a spending plan that would shift the interest rates back to their pre-2008 levels. Congress in 2007 lowered the rate to 6 percent for new loans started during the 2008 academic year, then down to 5.6 percent in 2009, to 4.5 percent in 2010 and then to the current 3.4 percent a year later.

Senate Democrats, led by Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., say their budget proposal would permanently keep the student rates low. But their budget document doesn't explicitly cover the $6 billion annual cost. Instead, its committee report included a window for the Senate Health, Education and Pension Committee to pass a student loan-rate fix down the road.

But so far, the money isn't there. And if the committee wants to keep the rates where they are, they will have to find a way to pay for them, either through cuts to programs in the budget or by adding new taxes.

"Spending is measured in numbers, not words," said Jason Delisle, a former Republican staffer on the Senate Budget Committee and now director of the New America Foundation's Federal Budget Project. "The Murray budget does not include funding for any changes to student loans."

Some two-thirds of students are graduating with loans exceeding $25,000; 1 in 10 borrowers owes more than $54,000 in loans. And student-loan debt now tops $1 trillion. For those students, the rates make significant differences in how much they have to pay back each month.

The Congressional Budget Office estimates that of the almost $113 billion in new student loans the government made this year, more than $38 billion will be lost to defaults, even after Washington collects what it can through wage garnishments.

The net cost to taxpayers after most students pay back their loans with interest is $5.7 billion. If the rate increases, Washington will be collecting more interest from new students' loans.

For some, though, the interest rates seem arbitrary and have little to do with interest rates available for other purchases such as homes or cars.

"Burdening students with 6.8 percent loans when interest rates in the economy are at historic lows makes no sense," said Lauren Asher, president of the Institute for College Access and Success.

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