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Coalition to press for immigration reform

07/01/2005

As the summer heats up, so does the immigration debate all across the nation, and in the Washington Metropolitan area, immigrant, business, and religious leaders are joining forces to push for a comprehensive immigration reform that would fix what everyone agrees is a broken system. On Monday, community leaders from across the region officially launched the National Capital Immigrant Coalition to combine business, labor, community, and faith voices to pass comprehensive immigration reform.

“Sen. John McCain, an Arizona Republican, and Sen. Ted Kennedy, a Democrat from Massachusetts, joined forces on a comprehensive immigration bill to overhaul immigration. It is time for the President to step forward and do his part to repair our broken immigration system and benefit the entire nation,” said Jaime Contreras, Secretary-Treasurer of the Service Employees International Union Local 82.

The Coalition aims to push for the Secure America and Orderly Immigration Act of 2005 (S. 1033/H.R. 2330), known also as the McCain-Kennedy Bill, which, they say, satisfies security and fairness concerns and advocates are demanding that the President line up in support.

Senate Judiciary Committee hearings on the Kennedy/McCain immigration reform bill could take place as early as this month.

“It is possible to have an immigration system that respects the rights of all, protects individuals fleeing persecution, makes us all more secure, and acknowledges the economic, social, and cultural contributions of immigrants,” said Reverend Simone Bautista.

This Coalition is forming at a time in which there has been a backlash against illegal immigration and a strong anti-immigrant measures put forward in Congress, such as the Real ID act, that was strongly opposed by most immigrant advocacy and civil rights groups, and passed attached to the appropriations bill for Iraq and Afghanistan.

This is happening in part as a reaction to the sheer numbers of new undocumented aliens. According to a new study by the Pew Hispanic Center, since 2000, 1.4 million Mexicans have come to the U.S., and fully 85% of them have entered without authorization.

The leaders of the Coalition say that in the shadows of the capital, undocumented workers toil daily to feed downtown workers, watch the children of working families, and construct the bridges and roads that move the region. They chastise President Bush for being silent on the issue of immigration, although he has committed last fall to repair the system.

According to the Coalition's leaders, the bipartisan McCain/Kennedy legislation introduced in May is filling in the gap, and could result in reforming the immigration system to ensure a more secure America, and recognize the economic contributions of hard working immigrant families.

“The business community understands the importance of providing a way to earn legal status for the millions of undocumented workers already in the United States.

These workers take part in the hard duty of building our schools, roads, hospitals, hotels, offices, courts, and houses and therefore, as announced by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, immigration reform remains a top priority for the business community,” said Hector Torres, Vice President of Sales and Marketing at the Capital Hotels.

Democrat and Republican parties are both in a very difficult position when it comes to immigration, and have deep internal divisions regarding how to maneuver the issue.

While the Republicans would love to cater to the never satiated appetite for low-wage labor on the business community with the guest worker program the Administration has proposed, but they want to be seen as tough on the borders, and have been lukewarm towards the McCain/Kennedy bill who would offer a legalization option to undocumented aliens already in US.

“Legalization is an effective instrument of national security,” said Eugenio Arene, Executive Director of the Council of Latino Agencies, also a member of the Coalition. “The current immigration system does not provide an effective mechanism to engage between 8 to 10 million undocumented immigrants to participate in the collective task of protecting our communities,” said Arene.

A recent poll, conducted by Fox News, of 900 registered voters showed that 79% of them were in favor of stationing the army at the border to prevent illegal crossings. Another poll by NBC/Wall Street Journal also found that 58% of the 1,005 adults surveyed disapproved of Bush's guest worker program, while only 38% favored it.