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BREAKING NEWS
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Employer updates
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Thursday, 13 April 2006 |
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By Thomas Ferraro Following huge nationwide protests, Republicans on Tuesday moved to possibly change two key provisions in a get-tough immigration bill passed by the U.S. House of Representatives. One would turn millions of illegal immigrants into felons and the other has raised concerns that people who provide them humanitarian relief would be punished. Top Republicans insisted that neither is their intent.
Their verbal commitments to revisit those provisions came a day after hundreds of thousands of people held demonstrations nationwide, provoked by the bill that would also erect a fence along much of the U.S.-Mexican border.
Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, a Tennessee Republican, and House Speaker Dennis Hastert, an Illinois Republican, issued a joint statement, saying: "It remains our intent to produce a strong border security bill that will not make unlawful presence in the United States a felony."
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Immigration Reform
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Thursday, 13 April 2006 |
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By SUZANNE GAMBOA, Associated Press Writer The Senate's top Democrat asked Majority Leader Bill Frist on Wednesday to return to work on immigration legislation immediately after the Senate completes a bill with more money for military operations in Iraq and hurricane relief. Congress is on a two-week recess and the Senate is scheduled to consider the war spending bill when it returns April 25.
Minority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada said in a letter to Frist that the need for an immigration bill was highlighted by rallies across the nation this week protesting a House bill that would subject illegal immigrants to prosecution as felons.
Reid labeled as "confusing" Frist's position on a compromise put together by Sens. Chuck Hagel, R-Neb., and Mel Martinez, R-Fla., that collapsed last Friday after Democrats refused to allow votes on several amendments to it.
"I can only conclude that you had second thoughts about Hagel-Martinez after right-wing members of your caucus made known their strong opposition to it," Reid wrote.
Frist, R-Tenn., responded with a statement saying Reid "needs to stop clogging up the Senate with procedural gimmicks and let members have fair up and down votes on amendments"
"Every day he stalls, we are less safe and less secure," said Frist, who is on a congressional trip in Eastern Europe.
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Employer updates
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Tuesday, 11 April 2006 |
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By Bernd Debusmann, Special Correspondent Some call it "the browning of America." Others see it as an economic necessity. Hispanics have become the largest minority group in the United States and the target of anger in a national debate over immigration.
The country built and populated by immigrants is wrestling with ways to tighten border controls and weighing the future of an estimated 11 million, mostly Mexican, illegal immigrants.
Fresh protests on behalf of the immigrants are planned for Monday in 60 cities nationwide. Immigrant organizations are calling for a general strike on May 1 to show what would happen in the United States without immigrants, legal and illegal.
Last month, more than a million immigrants took to U.S. streets, angry at a bill passed by the U.S. House of Representatives to make illegal immigrants felons and to build a 698-mile wall along parts of the Mexican border.
The huge scale of those protests -- including at least 500,000 people in Los Angeles -- was a departure from the past when fear of being deported made illegal immigrants reluctant to engage in public activism.
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Immigration Reform
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Tuesday, 11 April 2006 |
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The following e-mail was sent by the Peter Schey, the president of the Center for Human Rights and Constitutional Law, citing many problems with the Senate compromise: Immigration Reform: Compromising the Fundamental Rightsand Protections of Immigrant Workers and Families Based upon a review and analysis of the stalemated Senate “compromise” on immigration reform (copy attached in pdf format ), we urge concerned groups, members of the public, and all those supporting the call for rational and humane immigration at public demonstrations throughout the country, to become familiar with the Senate compromise and advocate strongly against its many oppressive and harsh measures, if not oppose the proposal in its entirety unless it is significantly amended. The Senate compromise is, at its heart, an accommodation reached between leading members of the Republican party pushing for an “enforcement-only” approach, and those representing a more moderate block of the party, including President Bush, willing to accept some sort of legalization program. The former believes it increases the party’s chances of success in the critically important November elections by firing up its social conservative base by ramping up the rhetoric about an immigration crisis, the threat of immigrant invasion, and national security risks supposedly posed by hardworking undocumented immigrant families. It predictably proposes a sledge-hammer approach to wiping out the problem. This appeals to those loyal middle class voters who fear multi-culturalism, non-white immigrants, and anything else that may challenge the homogeneity of the country.
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Employer updates
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Monday, 10 April 2006 |
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By JULIANA BARBASSA, Associated Press Writer
Mon Apr 10, 3:38 AM ET
Fourth-generation vegetable farmer Will Rousseau keeps one eye on his crops and another on Capitol Hill, where Congress is debating immigration bills that could mean bounty or bust for farms dependent on migrant labor.
Illegal immigrants make up about 53 percent of the nation's roughly 1.8 million farmworkers, and cutting off the flow of willing workers — legal or not — to the fresh fruits and vegetables that need picking would spell the end for many farmers, Rousseau said.
"We know local folks won't take those jobs, at any price," said Rousseau, who hires up to 700 seasonal workers to harvest his crops in Phoenix.
The bills include a House-approved version calling for military enforcement of the border that would make it a felony to be in the country illegally. Rousseau and other farmers believe that would be disastrous for the industry.
On the opposite end of the spectrum, a bill approved by the Senate Judiciary Committee would allow some illegal immigrants to apply for citizenship while expanding an existing but burdensome guest worker program.
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Immigration Reform
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Sunday, 09 April 2006 |
Immigration reform expected to take some time
A policy expert says it will 'cost billions and take five to 10 years'
By PATTY REINERT and GEBE MARTINEZ
Copyright 2006 Houston Chronicle Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON - When the U.S. Senate returns from spring recess in two weeks, lawmakers will struggle against long odds to hold together a delicate compromise on immigration reform that collapsed last week in a heap of partisan bickering.
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To succeed, they will have to not only resolve sharp political differences but also address concerns that their plan to deal with nearly 12 million immigrants in the country illegally may be impractical and too costly to work.
"As a nation, we seem to be suffering from collective amnesia," said William King Jr., a former Border Patrol agent and regional director for the Immigration and Naturalization Service who tried to implement a landmark amnesty law in 1986 that turned out to be a miserable failure. King said attempts to legalize millions of undocumented workers "have never and will never work."
Others, however, insist the country can still solve its immigration woes. But it will take more than political will.
"It's going to cost billions and take five to 10 years," said Tamar Jacoby, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research. "But do we want to get a grip on this or not? I think we do."
On Thursday, senators from both parties rejoiced in announcing a breakthrough on the emotional and divisive issue — a compromise that would toughen border enforcement and put about 10 million illegal immigrants on the road to eventual citizenship.
By nightfall, the plan remained intact, but bickering over floor procedures sank the bill. It now goes back to the Senate Judiciary Committee without a date for full Senate action.
Under the stalled bill, about 1.5 million illegal immigrants who entered the country after January 2004 would be forced to return home within three years. They could then apply for temporary worker visas without a promise of green cards or citizenship.
Those who arrived less than five years ago but before January 2004 — about 3 million people — would have to leave the country but could turn around immediately and be processed at a land port of entry.
Illegal immigrants in this category would have their green card applications placed ahead of future migrants who enter through a temporary worker program. Even so, it would take them about 14 years to gain citizenship after the program is launched.
The remaining 7.5 million illegal immigrants who have been in the country more than five years would not be forced to return home. They would embark on an 11-year citizenship program requiring them to pass background checks, pay fines and back taxes, learn English and meet other requirements.
Critics of the plan say it will create a bureaucratic nightmare for the Department of Homeland Security, which now handles border enforcement and immigration, and divert it from its mission of keeping out foreign terrorists.
Homeland Security would not comment on pending legislation. But Senate aides who have been drafting the immigration bill said their instructions from the agency came down to two points: Keep it as simple as possible, and keep it electronic-based as much as possible.
Even if the Senate compromise can be salvaged, it still would have to be reconciled with a House bill passed in December, which focused on border security and increasing penalties against illegal immigrants and the firms that hire them.
Part of the reason the Senate negotiations broke down is that the bill's sponsors, especially the Democrats, were looking for guarantees that their bill would serve as the framework for the final version. Conservative House leaders have insisted that Congress first approve a border enforcement bill before helping illegal immigrants.
Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee of Houston, the ranking Democrat on the House Immigration Subcommittee, said getting a plan that everyone can agree on — and will actually address the problem — could require a whole new bureaucracy. Congress would have to be willing to increase border security "two- to three-fold," she said.
"I think it's extremely cumbersome," she said, adding that Homeland Security is already overburdened.
Jackson Lee said a comprehensive bill requires a broader debate on the fate of immigrants, the economic impact on businesses and native-born workers, and the viability of the proposed programs. It especially needs stepped-up involvement from the White House, she said.
"All of the conversation and talk (by President Bush) has been just that," she said.
Others predicted the differences on Capitol Hill are so wide that there will not be a final bill during this legislative session.
"I think it's a lead-pipe cinch that nothing will happen," said Sen. Ben Nelson, D-Neb., who wants a border security bill passed before the rest of the immigration system is overhauled.
Still, Jacoby and other experts in favor of a more comprehensive bill said they haven't given up hope.
"If we need half a million (migrant workers), let's allow half a million to come," she said. "Right now, if you are an unskilled Mexican worker with no family ties here, there are only 5,000 visas available. That's not realistic."
Jacoby concedes that true immigration reform, assuming it eventually comes to pass, will be "a big bureaucracy, a big pain in the neck."
"Just shaking hands with 12 million people is a big process," she said. "But if we want to get control of our borders, we have to do it.
"Do we really know we can get control of this? No," she added. "Can we do a lot better? Yes."
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HoustonChronicle.com -- http://www.HoustonChronicle.com | Section: National
This article is: http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/nation/3781488.html
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