WASHINGTON — The House passed a bill Thursday to mandate deportation and block entry into the United States for immigrants with uncertain status who are convicted of or admit to sex crimes or domestic violence, as a bipartisan majority approved the latest piece of a step-by-step crackdown being imposed by Republicans.

GOP leaders on Capitol Hill have been hammering at the issue of stricter immigration enforcement in the first days of the new Congress.

So far, the strategy appears to be working. The bill passed by a vote of 274-145, with 61 Democrats joining all Republicans in backing the legislation. Last year, 51 Democrats voted to back the bill.

That was the case even though the bill approved Thursday in many ways duplicates existing law.

The legislation would mandate deportation or denial of entry into the United States for any immigrant without legal status or foreign national who is convicted of or admits to committing a sex crime, domestic violence, stalking, child abuse or violating a protection order. It adopts the definition of domestic violence used by the Violence Against Women Act, which established a grant program to reduce domestic violence by addressing various forms of abuse, not all of them considered criminal.

Proponents of the measure argued that the new legislation, which has a more expansive definition of domestic violence than is in current law, was necessary to ensure that people who might commit such acts are kept out of the country or immediately removed.

Many Democrats argued that the measure could actually harm immigrants who are victims of domestic crimes.

There is no exception for people who fight back in self-defense against their abusers or have been accused by their abusers of violence themselves, as there is in current statute. Several advocacy groups for domestic violence victims have also opposed the legislation on those grounds.

Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., said on the floor: “This bill will only make the immigration laws much harsher on the victims of domestic violence, sexual battery and rape, which is the opposite of what we should be doing.”

The legislation was one of a series of narrow immigration bills that passed the Republican-led House in the last Congress but died in the Democrat-led Senate, including measures to deport migrants accused of minor crimes, require proof of citizenship to vote and deny funding to cities that limit cooperation with federal immigration enforcement agencies.