Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz. (left), and Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass.,
are working together on an immigration plan.
Posted on 05/12/2005 8:46:37 AM PDT by Scenic Sounds
Sweeping measures face an uphill fight
WASHINGTON – Democrats and Republicans in the House and Senate will introduce legislation today that could grant legal status to an estimated 10 million to 12 million illegal immigrants now in the United States.
The bills, which would dwarf previous programs to provide legal status to foreign workers, would give illegal immigrants work permits and the opportunity to apply for permanent residence and eventually citizenship once they pay a fine and fees.
The legislation is certain to raise the temperature of a national debate already simmering over the Minuteman Project's volunteer border patrols and just-passed legislation to deny driver licenses to undocumented immigrants.
The legislation is expected to face an uphill fight in Congress. But it would be a landmark event if enacted.
Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., and John McCain, R-Ariz., will introduce the bill in the Senate. In the House, Rep. Luis Gutierrez, D-Ill., will team with Arizona Republicans Jeff Flake and Jim Kolbe to introduce the measure.
The sponsors have scheduled a news conference today to kick off a publicity campaign. It will be coordinated with immigrant advocates and church groups as well as business and farming organizations that want to stabilize their work forces.
Flake said the bills seek to bring immigration law in line with job markets that have become increasingly dependent on illegal immigrants because legal workers aren't filling the jobs.
"The bottom line is we're going to have a need for foreign workers in the foreseeable future," Flake said.
He said Congress has not provided federal officials with the tools to enforce the law because it doesn't want to cut off the flow of workers.
"We can make it legal through some mechanism or we can keep it illegal and keep on pretending we are going to enforce it," he said.
While details are still being negotiated, according to the Denver Post, major provisions include:
After a criminal background check and medical examination, most of the illegal immigrants now in the country would be allowed to apply for a new visa legalizing their status. They would have to pay $2,000 in fines and processing fees for having entered the country illegally. After six years, these workers and their families could apply for permanent residency.
A guest-worker program would allow employers to bring in 400,000 foreign workers in its first year. After that, the cap would be adjusted annually based on demand. The cap could change no more than a fixed percentage a year, sources said, and those workers could eventually apply to permanently reside in the United States.
A new system would be designed to require employers to electronically verify whether their workers are in the country legally and eligible to work. Fines for employers caught hiring illegal workers would double.
"Once a program is in place for employers to get workers, there's no excuse for them not to cooperate," Flake said. "You get a good program and you enforce the heck out of it."
But Frank Sharry, executive director of the National Immigration Forum, said the program must provide enough foreign workers to meet labor needs and enough enforcement to win the support of a public increasingly skeptical about the government's ability to manage immigration.
"Any proposal will rise or fall on whether the legal channels are wide enough and the enforcement effective enough," Sharry said. "In the past it was, 'Let's keep legal channels small, but let's not enforce them too much.' "
The bills' advocates hope that the $2,000 fine will soften the angry reaction that has accompanied past amnesties, such as the sweeping 1986 measure that gave legal status to 2.7 million immigrants, most of them Mexican.
Almost 20 years later, the illegal immigrant population is expanding by nearly 500,000 people a year, according to Pew Hispanic Center demographer Jeffrey Passell.
In 1986, amnesty meant a green card for immigrants who were eligible, either because they had lived in the United States several years or – in a major concession to California farmers – because they had worked 90 days in the fields.
A fight to update that definition has already broken out.
"An amnesty is an unconditional pardon for a breach of law," Flake said.
"That's semantics," said Jack Martin of the Federation for American Immigration Reform, which wants to clamp down on illegal immigration. "Any program that gives legal status to people who entered the country illegally or have stayed here illegally after being admitted is an amnesty."
Both sides will eagerly await reaction from President Bush, who last year proposed a program to provide temporary legal status for undocumented workers already here and to match "willing workers" from around the world with "willing employers."
Although the president said he rejected amnesty, he left open the possibility that some of the workers could get in line for a green card. That coveted document confers permanent residence status and the eventual opportunity to apply for citizenship.
Yesterday, White House spokeswoman Maria Tamburri responded carefully to a question about the Kennedy-McCain bill.
"The president will work with Congress on enacting legislation that is consistent with the principles he announced last year," she said.
Mark Krikorian, who directs the Center for Immigration Studies, said the White House was stunned at many conservatives' furious reaction at Bush's proposal.
Krikorian, whose organization favors restrictive immigration policies, predicted that Bush will wait to gauge public reaction to the legislation before announcing his position on it.
"There is already a match burning because of the Minuteman program," he said, referring to the volunteer patrols in Arizona near the Mexican border. "They should be afraid that this would throw gas on the fire."
I started by hanging ads on door knobs at 4 cents per door. I've literally walked to the front door of every single family home from the Mexican border to I-8 (N/S) and the Pacific ocean and Johnson Ave in El Cajon. I often started at 3 AM and worked all day long. That was 1972.
In 1973 I washed dishes, cooked, worked the fountain and waited tables at Farrell's Ice Cream Parlour. That's how I paid for my car and all the expenses during my senior year in high school. I made $1.45 per hour washing dishes. Cooking was paid $1.55. Waiter was $1.30 plus tips.
In 1976 I was carrying 16 units of graduate work in pathogenic bacteriology AND working 42 hours per week at Radio Shack. Radio Shack paid me minimum wage of $2.25 per hour plus sales commissions that varied by season. Not a fabulous income for a 19 year old graduate of UCSD with a degree in Molecular Biology. The RS job covered my books, car and food.
Roll forward to 2000. My #2 son wanted to work at a fast food place to earn money for his senior year. The jobs were filled by Mexicans and a variety of Asian minorities. No room for a white boy. My son was not deterred. He pressed hard on fluency in Spanish. That made the difference. He got hired in time to cover some of his senior year expenses.
Today, my #2 son exploits that Spanish fluency as a real estate agent. He runs an office in Chula Vista where the customer base is principally Spanish speakers. He will have his broker's license shortly and full run of the office.
In both cases, working the low end jobs was a way to cover early educational costs to get ahead. Many kids don't even have a shot at that anymore. The fast food places a full of Spanish speakers and senior citizens. The Spanish speakers don't wear a label of "legal" or "illegal". You can tell. The point is that the opportunity that was available when I was in high school has been usurped.
BTW, before I could take a job that paid on an hourly basis, I mowed lawns, raked leaves, shoveled snow and washed cars. My parents didn't provide an "allowance". Mowing the lawn, washing dishes and vacuuming the house was considered a "family responsibility". I was permitted to use the family lawn tools to work at other people's homes for pay. That was the sole source of my money as a kid.
That avenue is now closed off completely to our kids. Those are 100% "Mexican jobs" today.
We don't need to kick all of them out of the country. Instead, cut illegal aliens off from all taxpayer funded services while at the same time crack down hard on businesses that hire illegal aliens. With no jobs and no taxpayer funded freebies available to them, many illegal aliens will begin to voluntarily "deport" themselves back to their home countries. If there is a need for more foreign workers to fill jobs in the American workforce, we can increase the number of legal immigrants that we let in.
Traitorous bastards.
Prior to this, that was merely our collective opinion; now, it is a fact
This announcement has just decimated the populations of hundreds of Mexican cities, villages, and towns.
I second that - all in favor say "Hang them".
Appears Jackel John has been sipping from the same flask as Krazy Kennedy.
Cut illegal aliens off from all jobs and all taxpayer funded services and no roundup of illegal aliens would be needed. They would start leaving on their own.
"$2000 a year would be the American dream."
I was thinking a one time tax of $2000.00, not annually.
Bush will wait to gauge public reaction to the legislation before announcing his position on it.
The President wants to hear from us about all this. ;-)
Here's my letter:
Dear Mr. President,
I have supported you for President each time you ran for office. But now, I am greatly concerned that liberal forces within the GOP and all of the Democratic Party are preparing to seek an amnesty bill to grant legal status to 10 to 12 million ILLEGAL Hispanic immigrants. I strongly urge you to reject that approach! Veto that bill if and when it comes for your signature!
Please focus on sealing our borders with both Mexico and Canada by creating a cilivian corps like the recent Minutemen (who were NOT vigilantes as you said, but patriots doing what the Federal government needs to have done all along!) and call out the National Guard to aid the Border Patrol until the Border Patrol can be increased in size and retrained to truly protect all our borders. The INS needs a complete overhaul as well, Mr President. An part of the Homeland Security, there is a need to focus on finding and deporting current illegals as well as identifying employers of illegals. Those employers must face stiff fines and prison terms for using illegals in their companies.
Otherwise, Mr President, the US faces an even more divided country racially, culturally, and politically in the near future. Mexico's social and economic problems are not our problems. But they will continue to be if you continue to leave the borders open and grant amnesty to these hordes of illegal immigrants. Stop them NOW!
My very first thought after reading the first paragraph. I can't begin to count the number of times I've tried to tell people, Jim Kolbe included, that you absolutely must secure the border before you announce to the third world that we're going to legalize our illegals.
That's it, folks...game, match, set. Y'all better start learnin' to speak En Espanol real quick.
Assuming this insanity continues to be proposed in anything like its presently described form, we need to be sure to: (1) raise more hell than ever before through organizations like NUSA and FAIR, beginning right now; and (2) in whatever form both bills may ultimately arrive for a Senate/House conference, carefully record the vote of each one of our Washington crapweasels so that we know who they are and can begin donating to whoever opposes these traitors when they stand for reelection.
Most illegals and their criminal employers will just ignore any new law too.
Either way, it is just a dream.
The President wants to hear from us about all this."
And so he shall. Likewise, Sen. McSwine, the RNC and anyone else who I think (or any of you astute Freepers consider worthy of my time and effort) may be inclined to support this idiot legislation.
This could very well be the death knell of the Pubes.
Did I read/interpret the proposed language correctly with regards to the 6-year requirement and $2000 fee?
If so, we will be "charging" these illegal aliens approx. $1.09 per day for whatever services/benefits/handouts, etc., they were provided with, both at the state and fed level.
Not a bad deal, if you ask me! /sarc.
There are two rather large buildings under construction near my home. The framing and roofing workers are Mexican or local white meth addicts who can't get any other job. The major exception is the skilled labor doing plumbing and electrical that will be inspected by the city inspectors.
Pocatello doesn't have a large Mexican population yet. The fast food places are mostly the local high school kids from the majority white population. The population of Mexican laborers was seasonal a few years ago. Now we see them year round at Walmart and Winco Foods. The low riders with ridiculous hydraulics arrived last summer. The Mexican gang culture has found a following at the nearby Shoshone reserveration. The gang task force has identified around 300 active members on the reservation.
Until Tancredo and his ilk stop holding up 99% of the immigration bills (Tancredo only wants his bills passed so he can indulge in his megalomania) in the House, nothing but a Democrat/RINO bill is going to get through. Just enough Republicans are drinking Tancredo's koolaid to divide the House and make a liberal bill the only type that can be passed.
Very good post at #92.
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