Posted on 11/22/2004 5:26:41 AM PST by Marine Inspector
Vow comes during meeting with Mexican president in Chile
SANTIAGO, Chile -- President Bush vowed Sunday to push a plan that would allow undocumented immigrants to remain in the United States as guest workers even though it appears less likely to win backing in a Congress that grew more conservative in this month's elections.
Bush made the commitment during a half-hour meeting with Mexican President Vicente Fox in the Chilean capital, where the two leaders are attending the annual Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation conference. But neither Bush nor his aides could offer any details of where the plan stood on Capitol Hill.
"I told President Fox that I had campaigned on this issue," Bush told reporters as he sat with Fox in the Hyatt Regency hotel in an upscale Santiago neighborhood with views of the snow-capped Andes mountains.
"I made it very clear my position that we need to make sure that where there's a willing worker and a willing employer, that that job ought to be filled legally in cases where Americans will not fill that job," Bush said.
The encounter brought the two neighbors full circle on the most complex and contentious issue between them. Bush and Fox began their terms within months of each other promising reforms to ease the flow of migrants across their 2,000-mile border. But the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, quickly pushed immigration off a Washington agenda that came to be dominated by security.
On Sunday, Bush conceded a point that Fox and his aides have been making: that legalizing the flow of large numbers of immigrants would free the U.S. Border Patrol to concentrate on terrorists, drug smugglers and other security threats.
"We share a mutual concern to make sure our border is secure," Bush said. "One way to make sure the border is secure is to have reasonable immigration policies."
Bush said Sunday he was undeterred by congressional opposition and intended to change minds by "working it."
"I'm going to find supporters on the Hill and move it," he told reporters Sunday night, during a news conference with Chilean President Ricardo Lagos at the presidential palace.
Asked about a letter sent to him by 21 U.S. lawmakers claiming the plan was essentially an amnesty program for undocumented workers, Bush said he was unfazed.
"I get letters all the time from people that are trying to steer me one way or the other when it comes to legislation," the president said. "But I'm going to move forward. In the letter, I noticed that they said, well, this is because ... they're objecting to the program because it's an amnesty program. It's not an amnesty program; it's a worker program."
A senior U.S. official, who briefed reporters on condition that his name not be used, said the administration had begun "consultations up on the Hill, and this is going to be part of the president's legislative agenda for this coming session of the Congress."
Bush's plan, not yet written into a bill, would be the first overhaul of U.S. immigration rules in 18 years. It would allow three-year work visas for an undetermined number of the millions of immigrants living illegally in the United States.
Guest workers could then apply for permanent legal status, but their applications would have to include letters from employers assuring that the migrants were filling jobs that could not be filled by U.S. citizens.
Bush announced the plan in January, when it appeared that states with heavy Latino populations -- Florida, Nevada, New Mexico and Arizona -- would be crucial to his re-election. Republican strategists hoped that having the president back a moderate immigration policy would boost the party's performance among that fast-growing bloc of voters.
But the plan quickly came under criticism from within Bush's party. Rather than alienate his conservative Republican base, Bush did not pursue the issue in Congress and mentioned it only occasionally during the campaign, mostly to Latino audiences.
Exit polls showed the strategy might have worked, with Bush's 45 percent share of traditionally Democratic Latino vote, a 7 percent increase over 2000.
Conservatives and labor-union officials oppose Bush's plan because they believe it would help immigrants take jobs from U.S. workers. Immigrant advocates fear that the plan would give too much power to employers in deciding migrant workers' fate. And some congressional Republicans also worry that it would encourage more Mexicans to cross into the United States.
Rep. Thomas Tancredo, R-Colo., one of the leading GOP critics of the Bush plan, said earlier this month that, "without first securing our borders from the mass flow of illegal immigration, any guest-worker proposal is totally unworkable."
Mindful of such opposition, Secretary of State Colin Powell cautioned Mexican officials this month that progress on immigration issues would depend as much on the new Congress as on the administration.
"We don't want to over-promise," Powell said.
Members of Congress who support immigration reform say that no change is possible without strong presidential leadership.
Asked Sunday about the strength of Bush's commitment, Fox told CNN: "He is willing to lead and conduct ahead with the appropriate political timing. He has the will in trying to work this thing out."
Fox, who supports legalized status for the estimated 5 million undocumented Mexicans living in the United States, said he hopes to travel to Washington as early as February to "finish off some of these issues we've been discussing, perhaps putting them in the shape of some form of agreement."
Wallsten reported from Chile and Boudreaux from Mexico City.
He knew Americans don't a guest worker program, but he also knew that he could shove it down our throats after he was reelected. Hence I didn't vote for the fool.
It seems like the Republicans in congress are holding the line.
The day President Bush initiates such crap before Congress, I will sign and help distribute a petition calling for his impeachment.
That's 100% correct. Some here still think the Hispanics voted for Bush because of illegal alien amnesty. It just isn't true.
In Arizona, 47% of the Hispanics voted to cut off welfare to illegal aliens. The vast majority of legal Hispanic immigrants despise illegal aliens.
He said it again. He said that enraging, insulting thing..."Willing workers for willing employers."
I live in a county with 9% unemployment, with a "godfather" coyote who vans 'em in by the dozens...
Wrong. Oil had nothing to do with Iraq.
As for Mexico, oil has a lot to do with immigration.
The Bush family makes it money from oil, Mexico has more oil then it knows what to do with, and if you don't think Bush and Fox have made concessions about what they will be doing after their terms as President, you’re sadly mistaken.
In about 6 years, I’ll try and remember to come back on this thread and say I told you so.
Agreed.
I also believe that the PACs trying to encourage the enforcement of immigration law need to explore some legal theories to take these employers to court. It is clear that civil rights are being violated, and lawful citizens being discriminated against.
We won't be getting oil, Bush will after he is out of office, years from now. It has nothing to do America; it has to do with how Bush will make money after his term is up.
That will never happen. Bush and the Senate will ensure all guest workers will be legal residents at the end of their work visas.
Only in the House. The Senate is lock step in line with Bush. If it were not for the House, this would have been a done deal three years ago. I completely support my House members. My Senators can hit the road.
It comes from the American discomfort with hiring servants in the first place.
Was at a party the other night listening to some golf course whitehairs and bluebloods talk about the issue, "Geeee, they work so haaaard..." Oh, aren't they cute. So sweet and helpful and subservient. Makes me feel like a real generous massa and missus for letting them have the privilege of scrubbing my toilet.
Noblesse oblige. Oh, and Manuel...you missed a spot.
If all this legalization crap gets passed, I've probably voted my last time.
What would be the point?
Of all the inanities you've uttered on this thread, the one above is the single dumbest thing I've read all day.
Bush is worth $20 million. He doesn't need to "make money" after his term is up, especially with a half-million dollar annual presidential pension.
LOL. Name on rich person that is not out and about trying to make more money.
Sorry, like the vast majority of all poeple, he wants more and is working to get it.
I may be wrong, but I doubt it. Anyway, we'll know in about 6 years.
BS.
From all I saw, Bush would repeat the "willing worker and a willing employer" line only when directly asked about his amnesty plan. There was never any daily campaigning on the border issues, AFAIK.
Barlowmaker only posts antagonistic comments. This thread is eaten up by the usual apologists for illegals and promoters of the breakdown in U.S. culture and values.
This is a good idea.
But I respond from a broader perspective. Asking for opinions and input from the folks who know.
Bush has been pushing this thing from the day after his first election. We all know it, we all know it's important to him and few of us like it.
September 11 of 2001 likely derailed his wish but we should read the handwriting on the wall, the man wants this and he's using his precious but dwindling political capital for it.
Is is possible, let me throw it out there, that Bush has seen all the facts and figures on illegal aliens currently in this country? There are millions, yea multi-millions, or illegal aliens and no government organization can possibly find them all, make them become citizens, ensure that they have jobs...yada, yada. The whole concept is a huge buraucratic nightmare, bound to take dozens of years.
So Bush decides the only way to deal with the problem is to start now. Give every current illegal alien a chance to step forward, get a worker's permit, assuming they have a job, and continue on to become a legal citizen.
He says it's not amnesty but what punishment is offered for their "crime", which I say softly because listen guys, there are many, many, many, just soooo many, illegal aliens in this country that are working, productive citizens.
Sure, they shouldn't be here. It's a crime for them to be here, but who knows how many different ways it happened? Maybe they came to visit their Aunt Concita and didn't go home. Perhaps they were but adolescents when their parents brought them here. Their parents weren't citizens so neither are they.
However the holes in our buraucracy not to mention Clinton encouraging these folks for their vote, these people are HERE and they're HERE by the millions.
I'm betting a huge percentage of them are working jobs Americans won't take. Here in Delaware we've probably got a million of these illegals working the chicken factories.
I see these people. They are normal families, happy, laughing, living their lives and mostly, hey, you don't have to believe me, working hard.
If you've walked into a mess before, sometimes the best course of action is to START SOMEWHERE.
We don't have the twenty years it would take to document and follow through on all these people. We have terrorists coming into this country now. 20 years, that is, assuming the government workers actually work and discounting their 237 or so days of government leave.
Please understand this is not necessarily my argument. I have been thinking about this for the past four years and with the increased talk about this thing, I again am desperately trying to understand Bush's logic. He doesn't seem like a vain man out on some personal mission on this thing, especially with its unpopularity.
What we have here is a nation with millions of illegal people living within and maybe the ONLY way to get some handle on it is to START HERE. From this point forward, technology will handle the thing. I hear talk of rays of stuff that will detect trespassers to our borders. At the point we document the current illegal aliens we can then use our amazing technology to keep it straight.
If I'm right, then maybe the problem lies with the President himself. Because he could certainly present his rational argument from his bully pulpit. We'd understand that in the past it was impossible to patrol such a large country. That the very largeness of this country is the reason we are so wealthy and powerful but, hey, there's a downside. He could expound about how all of these illegal aliens can't get driver's licenses, can't be counted in the census, that they are all, essentially, breaking laws everyday, unable to get car insurance, that they are general problems that must be dealt with.
More important, the President could offer that tracking terrorists is almost impossible with so many other illegal aliens clouding the vision.
Or does he just not want to admit the country blew it when it paid no attention to its borders for almost its entire history?
I'm betting we'd roundup about 80% of the illegal aliens with this one step. There's always that evil 20%.
All in one fell swoop, think about it.
There you go, I smell bipartisanship a brewin'. McVain on the Today show, etc.
Please give us the BOHICA alert when you post these amnesty articles.
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