[Jim_Curtis]

This whole speech on the Senate floor by Mr. Sessions is a must read. This is an important aspect of the immigration discussion that is the key to winning the immigration debate.

Even the liberal economics professors can't deny the disasterous effects of illegal and massive legal immigration.

No blue collar worker in his right mind would vote to artificially devalue his own labor. The conservatives will win this issue if they can get through to the working citizens.

[cripplecreek]

Sadly our elected officials live in a fantasy world where everyone should be a PHD and work behind a desk. In the real world there are a lot of people who don't want to be tied to a desk and are proud to wear the blue collar.

[Jille]

Did he talk about high-skill labor and H-1b Visas?

[BW2221]

We have 11 -12 million illegal aliens in the U.S. Today. We will likely have an additional 4 - 5 million before the border is secured. When these people become citizens, they will start bringing family members, which will add 20 -30 million more.

Yet, even after this, Bush and the Senate want a guest worker program.

Just how many jobs are there that "Americans don't want to do?"

[Ben Ficklin]

Sessions is cherry-picking.

There were several economists that testified to the Senate Judiciary Committee in April. Other testimony contradicted Chiswick. I wonder why Sessions is ignoring their testimony?

Testimony on the Economic Impacts of Immigration Before the Senate Judiciary Committee

[Mike Darancette]

Can they put Senators on Mt. Rushmore?

[WayneM]

As an Alabamian, I must say that I'm very proud of Senator Sessions.

He really has fought the good fight on the illegal alien issue.

[durasell]

...and in other news of the obvious, the sun came up today.

[R.W.Ratikal]

It's surprising that any elected official has not before spoken out about the effect of peon-wages on the earning power of American workers.

Labor is a commodity, a raw material. Corporations are legal entities. Lower one of the costs of doing business and the corporation will jump on it.

It's no surprise that businesses go for the cheapest wage. What is surprising is that so many of the very people whose wages are being undermined continue to vote for candidates running on the Democrat/Socialist ticket.


After all, it is mostly Democrat/Socialists who are in favor of unlimited immigration and for exporting American jobs overseas.

Go figure.

[cricket]

Whatever. . .every action has a 'reacton'. . .but that does not change the fact that there remains MANY. . .NUMEROUS . . .jobs that will not, cannot be filled by our own homegrown and available, unemployed.

Perhaps we should just up the ante on minimum wage to. . .$20 or more. . .an hour.

[INSENSITIVE GUY]

This is one reason for legal and illegal immigration is to force down the minimum wage.Real Americans have responsibilities and illegals do not,so Real Americans won't even be able to survive.Another da*n pro business piece of legislation without calling it such.If the da*n American companies can't make it on what they got,then let em go under!!

[mmercier]

it is not just those with low skills that are getting killed off economically.

i have spent a decade becoming a trained proficient carpenter who will shortly be forced from the business because i can be replaced by three illegals for half the rate. and they mostly work for cash by the day, no benefits and no comp and no ss or state tax's paid by their employers, thereby underbidding the shit out of my lawful company owned by the sons of italian immigrants.

i chose this business 15 years back, the biggest mistake i ever made.

[hermgem]

There are depressed wages directly affecting labor.
What is additionally affecting those working in the private sector are health care costs, increasing local taxation from sales to property/real estate taxes.
Public sector employees find themselves shielded in guaranteed jobs, whereas private sector employees compete and carry the load.
And where do the majority of liberals, based on total employment, do their laboring with wages, benefits, pensions assured: in the public sector.
On top of it, those liberals feel sorry for low wage earners and vehemently call for others to increase and up those wages.

[dalereed]

Construction wages haven't gone up in 20 years and what used to be a good middle class income of mostly whites and blacks with talant and good workmanship has been taken over by the illegals working for cash.

I was drivin out of a 56 year old business by the influx of illegals and cash paying contractors by 1992.

Their production is way below par and so is the workmanship but people put up with it because by not paying wages on a check they are saving over 100% and paying $20-25/hr. which what wages were 20 years ago not including the average fringe benefit of $7-8/hr.

If you consider the benefit package, wages still have a ways to go to catch up with what they were 20 years ago.

[A. Pole]

[...] Then perhaps the most significant amendment that was adopted was a Bingaman amendment. It would reduce the incredible escalating number under the new H-2C visa foreign worker program. Under the original bill, the numbers were unbelievable. The amendment reduced the total number of immigrants that would have come into the United States if that bill became law from 78 to 217 million to a lower 73 million to 93 million. That was a strong vote for that provision and we make progress in reducing the numbers.

However, this bill, S. 2611, still enacts a four- to fivefold increase over the current levels of legal immigration into America over 20 years. Current law would bring in 18.9 million over 20 years. Did you get that? This bill, if passed today, even after the Bingaman amendment passed by a substantial majority, would still bring into our country three, four, five times--at least four times, I suggest--the number of people who can come into our country legally today.

That is a huge number and will lead us at the end of 20 years to have the highest percentage of foreign-born Americans this Nation has ever had in its history, including the great migration period between 1880 and 1925. It is a colossal bill still in terms of those numbers.

The Senate also accepted, after rejecting it 3 weeks ago when the bill first came up--the bill was pulled from the floor because we couldn't get a vote on Senator Kyl's amendment to make certain that criminals are not given amnesty under the bill. It was a simple amendment to say criminals, felons, couldn't be given amnesty, and we couldn't get a vote on that amendment.

[...]

I recently took a trip with Chairman Specter of the Judiciary Committee to South America. We were provided State Department news clips. There was an article about a poll in Nicaragua that said 60 percent of the people in Nicaragua would come to the United States if they could. Sixty percent of the people of Nicaragua said they would come to the United States if they could.

We next stopped in Peru, and I asked one of the officials at the Embassy about that poll and asked him did he think it was true. He said they just had a poll in Peru earlier this year--I mean this year, both these polls were this year--earlier this year, he said, and 70 percent of the people of Peru said they would come to the United States if they could. [...]

[SamAdams76]

News bulletin: If your job can be done by a low-skilled, uneducated immigrant, than perhaps you aren't challenging yourself very much.

[VOA]

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