From NumbersUSA.
http://profiles.numbersusa.com/improfile.php3?DistSend=TN&VIPID=743
Voted in 1996 to continue chain migration
Sen. Thompson in 1996 voted against the Simpson Amendment to S.1664. It was a vote in favor of a chain migration system that has been the primary reason for annual immigration levels snowballing from less than 300,000 in 1965 to around a million. Sen. Thompson supported provisions that allow immigrants to send for their adult relatives. Then each of those relatives can send for their and their spouse’s adult relatives, creating a never-ending and ever-growing chain. The bi-partisan Barbara Jordan Commission recommended doing away with the adult relative categories (begun only in the 1950s) in order to lessen wage depression among lower-paid American workers. The Simpson Amendment attempted to carry out that recommendation. But Sen. Thompson helped kill the reform by voting with the 80-20 majority against the amendment. Sen. Thompson’s vote helped continue a level of immigration that the Census Bureau projects will result in a doubled U.S. population in the next century.See detailed description
Voted to strip legal reforms from 1996 bill
Sen. Thompson helped defeat legal immigration reform when he voted for Senator Spencer Abraham’s amendment to remove the legal immigration reforms from S.1664, the Immigration Control and Financial Responsibility Act of 1996. This vote effectively killed any chance of Congress considering the Jordon Commission recommendations on easing legal immigration levels.
Voted in favor of chain migration in 1996
Sen. Thompson voted in 1996 against the Feinstein Amendment to S.1664. The Feinstein Amendment would have reduced annual admission of spouses and minor children of citizens to 480,000 and significantly reduced annual limits other categories of chain migration such as parents of citizens and adult unmarried children of citizens. By voting against the Feinstein Amendment, Sen. Thompson voted in favor of a system of chain migration that has been the primary reason for annual immigration levels snowballing from less than 300,000 in 1965 to around a million today. In 1996 the bi-partisan Barbara Jordan Commission recommended doing away with the adult relative categories (begun only in the 1950s) in order to lessen wage depression among lower-paid American workers. The Feinstein Amendment attempted to carry out that recommendation. The Feinstein Amendment would have had an overall impact of reducing U.S. population growth by about 1.2 million over 10 years, but it was defeated by a vote of 26 to 74. Click here to seea detailed description.
Major Numbers in All Categories
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Sen. Thompson has taken no action to reduce
major numbers in all categories.
Importing Specific Foreign Workers
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Voted for a foreign worker bill with no anti-fraud measures in 2000.
Sen.Thompson voted for S.2045, the Abraham foreign worker bill to nearly triple the number of foreign high-tech workers. On the heels of the release of a GAO report finding no proof of a high-tech worker shortage and evidence of abuse in the H-1B program, Sen. Thompson voted for this foreign worker bill that contained no worker protections or anti-fraud measures. The bill passed the Senate 96-1.
As Committee member,
produced H-1B doubling bill in 1998
Sen. Thompson was a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee that created the Abraham H-1B doubling bill in 1998, S.1723. He voted with the 12-6 majority to send the bill to the floor of the Senate without safeguards for American workers.
Nearly doubled H-1B foreign high-tech workers in 1998
Sen. Thompson helped the Senate pass S.1723 in a 78-20 vote. Enacted into law, it increased by nearly 150,000 the number of foreign workers high-tech American companies could hire over the next three years. Although the foreign workers receive temporary visas for up to six years, most historically have found ways to stay permanently in this country. Sen. Thompson voted for more foreign workers even though U.S. high tech workers over the age of 50 were suffering 17% unemployment and U.S. firms were laying off thousands of workers at the time.
Voted in committee against including
worker safeguards in H-1B bill in 1998
Sen. Thompson joined 9 of his Senate colleagues to keep employee safeguards from inclusion in S.1723. A Kennedy-Feinstein Amendment would have accomplished two important goals: ensuring no American was laid off or displaced prior to hiring an H1B employee; and, that employers demonstrate they had previously taken timely and effective steps to hire a qualified American. 10 Senators helped defeat this amendment.
Voted to allow firms to lay off Americans
to make room for foreign workers in 1998
Before the Senate passed the H-1B doubling bill (S.1723), Sen. Thompson had an opportunity to vote for a measure requiring U.S. firms to check a box on a form attesting that they had first sought an American worker for the job. Sen. Thompson voted against that, joining those who said the requirement would give government too much authority over corporations’ right to hire whomever they please from whatever country.
Voted to allow firms to lay off Americans
to make room for foreign workers in 1998
Before the Senate passed the H-1B doubling bill(S.1723), Sen. Thompson had an opportunity to vote for a Kennedy amendment that would have prohibited U.S. firms from using temporary foreign workers to replace Americans. Sen. Thompson opposed that protection. The Amendment failed 38-60.
Citizenship for Illegal Alien Babies
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Sen. Thompson has taken no action to reduce
the rewarding of illegal immigration by giving citizenship
to anchor babies.
Inviting/Repelling Illegal Aliens
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Voted for comprehensive alien tracking and
identification system in 2002
Sen. Thompson voted in favor of H.R. 3525, the Enhanced Border Security and Visa Entry Reform Act of 2001. H.R. 3525 will significantly reduce future population growth from illegal immigration by making it much harder for temporary visa holders to stay in the country illegally after their visa expire. H.R. 3525 provides for an entry-exit system in which every visa holder is checked with a biometric identifier when heshe enters and leaves the country. This information is included in an integrated database that is shared by the appropriate law-enforcement officials. H.R. 3525 passed the Senate unanimously by a vote of 97-0 and is expected to be signed into law by President Bush.
Voted against an amnesty for illegal aliens in 2000
Sen. Thompson voted against a procedural vote to include an amnesty for illegal aliens from El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Haiti in the Senate H-1B bill (S.2045). This was not necessarily a vote against the amnesty but rather a vote against including it with the H-1B bill. The move to include the amnesty with the H-1B legislation failed43-55 in a procedural vote on the Senate floor.
Voted to grant amnesty to close to one million
illegal aliens from Nicaragua and Cuba in 1997
Sen. Thompson voted to grant legal status to Nicaraguans and Cubans who had lived in the United States illegally since 1995, along with their spouses and minor unmarried children. The overall ten year impact of this legislation will be the addition of some 967,000 people to U.S. population. There was no separate vote on the amnesty, as it was inlcuded in the DC Appropriations bill. The only opportunity Senators had to vote in favor of or against the amnesty was the Mack Amendment to S.1156. The Mack Amendment passed 99-1.
Voted in 1996 for major law that cracked down on illegal aliens.
Sen. Thompson was part of a 97-3 majority which passed S.1664. It was a large omnibus bill with dozens of provisions aimed at reducing illegal immigration. It authorized major increases in the border patrol forces. But it also had many provisions aimed at making life more miserable for illegal aliens who manage to get into the country, half of whom arrive with legal visas but then illegally overstay. Until passage of the bill, a person could be apprehended as an illegal alien, be deported and then turn around and come back to the U.S. on a legal student, tourist, worker or relative visa. After the bill, an illegal alien was barred from any kind of legal entry for 10 years.
In 1996, removed higher fines for businesses which hire illegal aliens
Sen. Thompson, in committee consideration of S.1664 protected businesses from having to pay higher fines when they are caught hiring illegal aliens. Under the idea that current fines were not enough of a deterrent against businesses cutting their labor costs by hiring illegal aliens, the Senate immigration subcommittee approved higher fines. Various study commissions have found that the willingness of U.S. businesses to hire illegal aliens is the No. 1 incentive for foreign workers to become illegal aliens here. But Sen. Thompson voted with a 10-8 majority in the Judiciary Committee to remove the higher fines from the 1996 legislation against illegal immigration.
Tried to kill voluntary pilot programs
for workplace verification in 1996
Sen. Thompson voted IN FAVOR of the Abraham Amendment to S.1664. He was part of a coalition of pro-business conservatives and liberal civil libertarians who tried to use the amendment to kill the establishment of voluntary pilot programs in high-immigration states. The programs were intended to assist employers in verifying whether people they had just hired had the legal right to work in this country. Such verification is considered by many experts to be an essential tool for withdrawing the job magnet from illegal aliens. The verification system established by S.1664 did not involve an ID card. Rather it provided that when new workers wrote down their Social Security number on an application, employers could phone into a national verification system to help assure that the number was a real number and belonged to the person giving it. In earlier smaller pilot programs, businesses had hailed the verification system for making it easier for them to avoid hiring illegal aliens. Sen. Thompson was unsuccessful in stopping the voluntary verification system. The Senate tabled the by a 54-46 vote.
But other than that, what do you think about Fred? ;-)
Duncan Hunter is on CNN Wolf Blitzer now doing a great job.
From Laura Ingrahams website:
http://www.lauraingraham.com/
SOUNDBITE OF THE WEEK
“The world is watching our southern border, as long as they realize that it’s open. When we pass a bill that gives people the impression that there are new benefits to be had in the United States, and that’s the Senate bill, you will have a stampede for the U.S. border that will overwhelm our border forces.” Duncan Hunter
Thompson is McCain-lite. Hunter has more conservative credentials.