Lame duck unleashed – Bulgarian in London asks ‘what next’ on US immigration

London

Careening through the city in a minicab last night, en route to a pub in Bloomsbury that had promised to screen US election results, the mustachioed driver confirmed my accent and inquired: ‘So, what will happen after the elections?’

I issued the run-down: left-ish Democrats lose control of the Senate to right-ish Republicans, who also expand their House majority. The Republican gains won’t be enough to have too much fun (for instance, re-reforming health care) without meeting the President‘s veto pen; but should prove enough to justify more executive action from the White House, bypassing Congress in areas such as immigration and border control, if Mr Obama’s pre-election promises can be believed.

Yes, yes – the driver nodded and waved me along; a Bulgarian native with strong English, he was aware of the preliminaries. But what next?

Who knows, I told him. Washington did try the legislative route to immigration reform in 2010 – with a Democrat-controlled House and Senate, and measures to ease legalisation for the children of illegal immigrants.