Immigration is added atop heavy agenda

Immigration is added atop heavy agenda By Alexander Bolton Posted: 06/04/09 08:17 PM [ET] Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) added yet another huge task to his 2009 agenda, saying the chamber would take up a broad rewrite of the nation’s immigration laws in a year already crowded with debates on healthcare, climate change and a Supreme Court nominee.

Passing immigration reform, which has eluded Congress in two of the past three years, is a mighty task and is being led this time by Sen. Charles Schumer (N.Y.), the third-ranking member of the Democratic Conference leadership team.

It also comes with a strong push from Hispanic advocacy groups that want President Obama to take up the highly contentious issue early in his administration, when his popularity and political capital are high.

Reid added another challenge to the mix Thursday by saying he wants a guest-worker program included in the legislation, a move that may win him some Republican votes and support from business groups but alienate liberal Democrats and organized labor.

Taking up a sweeping rewrite of immigration laws this year is ambitious because it is likely to occupy precious time in a year when the window for legislative action is shrinking. The past two efforts took months to negotiate and weeks to debate on the Senate floor.

“That would take significant floor time,” Sen. Ben Cardin (D-Md.), a member of the Judiciary Committee, said of immigration reform. “It’s a time-consuming issue and it’s controversial.

“It depends on how much energy the president puts into [it],” said Cardin. “There is no question in my mind that this will take the president’s personal involvement.”

President Bush gave a primetime address and traveled to the Senate to lobby members of his party, but failed to get legislation passed during his time in office.

Reid announced his intentions at a news conference Thursday with Hispanic advocacy groups the National Council of La Raza, the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund (MALDEF), and the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC).

They had gathered to promote Sonia Sotomayor, who is nominated to become the first Hispanic justice on the Supreme Court, but the discussion soon turned to immigration reform.

“As far as I’m concerned we have three major issues we have to do this year, if at all possible: No. 1 is healthcare; No. 2 is energy, global warming; No. 3 is immigration reform.

“It’s going to happen this session, but I want it this year, if at all possible.”

The effort rests with Schumer, who is pushing immigration onto the fall agenda and stepping into a void left by Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.).

Kennedy, who is battling brain cancer, resigned as chairman of Judiciary’s Immigration subcommittee to focus his time and energy on healthcare reform.

“”The way I see things happening is that it seems Schumer is driving the ball forward at the moment,” said Brent Wilkes, the executive director of LULAC. “Once Reid has freed up his calendar on healthcare and energy, he’ll turn to immigration reform.”

He has since told activists that he would like to draft legislation over the summer and pass a bill through the Senate in the fall, if possible.

Obama has invited Schumer and other pivotal lawmakers to attend a meeting devoted to immigration reform at the White House on June 17.

“We’re going to try,” Schumer said. “If we can get it done, we always try to move when you can. That’s why I took the Immigration subcommittee, because I think it’s doable.”

Schumer said it might be tougher to pass reform next year, an election year. He added that he has “talked to the White House on a bunch of occasions.”

To pass a bill, Schumer may look for a Republican partner on the issue, a role that Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) filled opposite Kennedy in 2006 and 2007, the last two times the Senate debated the issue.

Reid said he wants legislation to secure the borders with Mexico and Canada and create a pathway to citizenship for an estimated 12 million illegal immigrants in the U.S.

The AFL-CIO staunchly opposes expanding guest-worker programs and withheld support from the past two legislative pushes over this issue.

“We have to have a guest-worker program that is meaningful,” Reid said. “A guest-worker program is more than agriculture. We need it in the food industry, we need it in the tourism [business]. So we have to have a good guest-worker program.”

“Guest-worker programs in their current form do not accomplish this goal and we continue to oppose expansion of them,” said Sonia Ramirez, legislative representative for the AFL-CIO.

Ramirez clarified the labor organization’s position, saying it would support a system for admitting foreign workers based on labor shortages determined by an independent commission.

Sen. Byron Dorgan (N.D.), chairman of the Democratic Policy Committee and an opponent of the past two immigration bills, said “immigration has proven to be a very difficult subject.”

He said it has been on the list of things to do but that timing has remained unresolved.

The push in Mexico & Central America is fierce for amnesty. Our ‘leaders’ are meeting with their leaders. Too bad they don’t ask the American people what they think about it!

Immigration Reform – The pressure is on!

Posted: 05 Jun 2009 09:17 AM PDT

NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF FORMER BORDER PATROL OFFICERS
Visit our website: http://www.nafbpo.org
Foreign News Report

La Hora (Guatemala City, Guatemala) 6/4/09 – full transl.; a 3 headline article –

- MIGRANTS: Reform could begin to take shape - Expectations due to meeting with Obama - Leaders of undocumented immigrants in the United States keep asking themselves what working plans, what periods of time and requirements will the Guatemalan government , by means of its Chancery, ask for so that the migratory reform will favorable them.

The undocumented person keeps waiting without knowing what tactics and concrete diplomatic strategies will demonstrate the efficiency of the Department of Foreign Relations and its operational arm originated by Conamigua ( Guatemalan National Council for attention to Migrants ). One cruel reality is that the total number of Guatemalan immigrants in the United States could surpass one million 500 thousand between children, adolescents, adults, the elderly; women and men.

The coming days of June 8 and 23rd will be of expectation or possibility for 60 percent of more than that number of undocumented Guatemalans who are waiting to legalize their stay in the United States. HISTORIC OPPORTUNITY Julio Cesar Villatoro, a representative of the Legislative Organism to “Conamigua”, reports that more than 20 American Democrat congressmen and also Republican who are in favor of migratory reform will meet with President Barack Obama in the White House next Monday. He explained that it’s foreseen that the American congressman, Luis Gutierrez, will preside over the work group on immigration and that he will describe to the president about the items analyzed which justify the need to modernize the immigration policy of that country, obsolete in the 21st century.

Then, the Guatemalan deputy added, on Tuesday, June 23rd, deputies of the area congresses, including Guatemala, will meet with congressman Gutierrez and Nydia Velasquez, president of the Caucus which brings Hispanic congressmen together, who will report items dealt with in the oval office with president Obama. The parliamentarian underlined that our countries have gone to fight for a TPS many times, as did president Colom in his first meeting held in Washington with president Bush; to talk about TPS is not a migratory claim, to talk about stopping deportations is not a migratory reform, the integral migratory reform that is wanted is that a legalization be brought about.
CRUDE REALITY Pursued by ferocious dogs, highlighted by satellite with a Global Positioning System (GPS) on land, electronic eyes with heat sensors, police without much human sensibility, a metal barrier and at best the solitude of the desert with cold at night and intense heat during the day, are the trials that the undocumented must deal with to enter the American dream.

The Mexico-U.S. border is armored, when the undocumented ends his trajectory aboard the famous “train of death” which leaves from Tapachula, Chiapas, Mexico, and is free of any accident he finds the famous “border” full of vehicle patrols and mounted police, real and not as in a Hollywood movie. Arizona has become the territory where more undocumented of all nationalities have been concentrated in an inhuman manner with denunciations and charges. On top of that is the unemployment estimated to date at near 14 million of ceased jobs, according to the Sub-Secretary of Foreign relations of Guatemala. Juan Garcia, leader of immigrants in Rhode Island, United States, recently thanked the Guatemalan Chancery for having provided US $15 thousand to help alleviate the hunger of the detainees in Arizona some months ago. But he also warned that the time for massive “lobbying” with congressional members is drawing to a close, while some members of “Conamigua” Assessment Council have limited themselves to having coffee in hotels and have not taken the issue seriously “because a negotiator who speaks English is urgent”, he emphasized.

DIPLOMATIC PROMISE Haroldo Rodas, Guatemalan Chancellor, (Sec. of State) in a recent visit to Guatemala’s Congress, asserts that the Guatemalan president has exchanged correspondence with the American government so that an integral migratory reform may be considered. Rodas said –“What is left is a continuity about what has to be done in Washington with the Central American ambassadors, and, if it is possible, the coordination of all the very powerful leaders who are already in the United States, not only from Guatemala but from El Salvador.”

The Foreign Relations Minister added that afterward a joint meeting of area heads of state with president Obama ought to be brought about “when considered convenient, to be able to push for the proposal to be brought about.”

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