White House Report Lauds Immigrants' Positive Effects

NYTimes
By ROBERT PEAR
Published: June 20, 2007

WASHINGTON, June 19 — Hoping to influence Congressional debate, the White House issued a report on Tuesday saying, “Immigration has a positive effect on the American economy as a whole and on the income of native-born American workers.”

The report, prepared by the president’s Council of Economic Advisers, says immigrants enhance the productivity of native-born workers and increase their earnings a significant amount, estimated at $37 billion a year.

In an interview, Edward P. Lazear, a labor economist who is the council chairman, gave the example of a construction site with many immigrants working as roofers.

“They might drive down slightly the wages of roofers in the United States,” Mr. Lazear said. “But as a result of having this valuable supply of labor from abroad, other people on the construction project like carpenters and electricians are more productive. They have better people to work with, more people to work with. The cost of doing the job is lower, and some of that is passed on to consumers in the form of lower prices.”

The study reinforces President Bush’s campaign for a comprehensive immigration bill that calls for more border security, a guest worker program and a “merit-based system” of selecting immigrants that emphasizes education and job skills. The bill, pending in the Senate, would also offer legal status and work permits to most of the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants in the United States.

Many Democrats say the bill could depress the wages of American workers. Senator Byron L. Dorgan, Democrat of North Dakota, said the guest worker program would “put downward pressure” on the wages in construction, manufacturing and other industries.

The White House is entering a debate that has been raging for years.

In one study, George J. Borjas, a professor of economics at Harvard, found that “by increasing the supply of labor between 1980 and 2000 immigration reduced the average annual earnings of native-born men by an estimated $1,700, or about 4 percent.”

“Among natives without a high school education, who roughly correspond to the poorest tenth of the work force,” Professor Borjas said, “the estimated impact was even larger, reducing their wages by 7.4 percent.”

“Over time,” Professor Borjas said in an interview, “the economy adjusts to the presence of immigrants. But in the long run, after all the adjustments, the wages of low-skill workers still go down by 4 percent or 5 percent.”

The White House report is more consistent with the findings of David Card, a professor of economics at the University of California, Berkeley, who said in an interview, “The overall effect of immigration on the average wages of natives is slightly positive.”

In their report, the White House economists said, “The difficulties faced by high school dropouts are a serious policy concern.”

But the economists added, “Immigration is not a central cause of those difficulties, nor is reducing immigration a well-targeted way to help these low-wage natives.”

On another volatile question, the White House said immigrants and their children tended to have “a slightly positive fiscal impact” because, in the long run, they pay more in taxes than they consume in benefits.

The White House study acknowledged that “the positive fiscal impact tends to accrue at the federal level, while net costs tend to be concentrated at the state and local level,” where education and health care are provided.

Immigrants sometimes compete with native-born workers. But the White House said, “Immigrants tend to complement — not substitute for — natives” in the workplace.

Over all, foreign-born workers make up 15.3 percent of the civilian labor force and account for half the growth in the labor force in the last 10 years. They differ in significant ways from native-born workers.

“In contrast to their 15 percent share in the total labor force,” Mr. Lazear said, “foreign-born workers accounted for much higher proportions of workers without high school degrees and of those with Ph.D. degrees, especially for those working in scientific occupations.”

Georgia senators at center of battle

By Stephen Dinan
June 20, 2007
THE WASHINGTON TIMES

The battle for each senator's vote on immigration is at the hand-to-hand combat level now, with business groups that want the bill and grass-roots activists who oppose it fighting it out through phone calls, radio ads and personal visits at offices back home.

Georgia is the newest fight, with the state's U.S. senators considered premier prizes: Sens. Saxby Chambliss and Johnny Isakson, both Republicans who appeared to back the Senate's immigration bill before distancing themselves in the face of voter opposition. But even as they try to increase the gap, the Bush administration and Georgia businesses are trying to rope them back in, telling them the state's economy needs the workers.

"The fundamental message we have been talking about with them for a long time is simply a need for workers," said Wayne Lord, an organizer of Georgia Employers for Immigration Reform and a vice president of government affairs at Pilgrim's Pride Corp., the nation's largest poultry company. "It gets to pretty much basic things when we simply say we need workers to sustain the economic momentum that has been developed in Georgia across a wide range of industries."

With the bill's passage next week in doubt, each vote is critical. Mr. Lord's group began running ads on talk radio yesterday and will begin print ads today urging the two senators to support the bill.

They are working to counter the backlash the senators heard from Republicans who booed Mr. Chambliss at the party's state convention last month and from grass-roots activists who have flooded the senators' offices with calls.

"They have definitely gotten an earful. We have some very active Georgia members," said Rosemary Jenks, government relations director for NumbersUSA, which is fighting the bill and rallying hundreds of thousands of members across the country to call their senators.

The opponents are expanding their list of targets to include Sen. Trent Lott, Mississippi Republican, who has become a leading supporter of passing a bill. Television ads and a visit by bill opponents to his Mississippi office are among the plans.

But the White House and business groups are countering. Last week, President Bush told Hispanics to lobby for the bill, while the business groups are engaging in a state-by-state effort.

Tamar Jacoby, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute who is pressing for the bill and helping organize business groups, said the local approach is effective, particularly on an issue so closely tied to the local economy.

"It's another thing when somebody in your district who you've known for 20 years, who's created jobs, who's maybe been contributing to your campaign, comes in and says we need to do this," she said.

Mr. Lord said he expects Georgia's senators to continue to work to get a bill they can support.

Mr. Chambliss and Mr. Isakson appeared at the press conference announcing the bill last month along with Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, Massachusetts Democrat, and seven other senators.

Since then, though, they have distanced themselves, including saying last week that Mr. Bush needed to do more to prove he is serious about security. They called for a new emergency-spending bill for border security, but Mr. Bush instead backed putting a funding source into the Senate bill — a move the senators said falls short.

Phil Kent, a Republican activist from Georgia and spokesman for several national groups opposing the bill, said the two senators have heard their voters.

"They'd be making a serious mistake with the electorate in Georgia if they vote for this amnesty bill," he said, adding that a political action committee has vowed to help either a Republican primary challenger or Democratic general election challenger to Republicans who vote for the bill.

Still, the Bush administration is trying to tie the two senators to the bill.

"Senator Isakson was one of the creators and the strategists behind the whole trigger aspect of this bill and he was instrumental, and we wouldn't be this far without him," Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez told reporters last week. "They are both an important part of making this bill what it is, and we have appreciated their leadership."

Tuscon Citizen
Published: 06.20.2007

Feds arrest 81 illegal immigrants in PA raid

The Associated Press

EAST STROUDSBURG, Pa. — Federal agents arrested 81 illegal immigrants during a raid at a manufacturing plant in the Poconos.

All the workers arrested Tuesday at Iridium Industries Inc.'s Artube division have been placed in removal proceedings for eventual deportation, said Ernestine Fobbs, a spokeswoman with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

She declined to say what led to the raid. The company makes plastic tubes for lotions and other consumer products, according to its Web site.

The arrested immigrants are from Mexico, Indonesia, Malaysia and Ecuador and were taken to detention centers for processing, Fobbs said.

Federal agents have carried out several similar raids in recent months as part of a national effort to crack down on illegal hiring.

Last week, federal agents raided a food processing plant in Oregon and detained more than 165 workers on immigration, illegal document and identity theft charges. In December, more than 1,200 immigrant workers were arrested at Swift & Co. meatpacking plants in six states

Mom searching streets of Tijuana for deported son

Tuscon Citizen
Published: 06.20.2007
The Associated Press

The U.S. government challenged claims that a man who authorities are accused of wrongly deporting to Mexico was mentally disabled, citing the man's own mother.

Pedro Guzman, 29, was jailed on a misdemeanor trespassing violation and then deported to Mexico on May 11 after telling immigration and sheriff's officials that he was an illegal immigrant, according to federal officials.

Guzman's relatives sued the Department of Homeland Security and the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department last week in federal court, claiming Guzman was a U.S. citizen and had been wrongfully deported. They demanded that the U.S. government help them find him in the chaotic streets of the border town of Tijuana.

In the lawsuit, filed June 11, the family said Guzman was mentally disabled, and was unable to read or write. But in documents filed Monday, a U.S. State Department official claimed Guzman's mother said he had no mental impediments.

"During the conversation on June 12, Mr. Guzman's mother told a Consular Assistant that
Mr. Guzman is not mentally impaired in any way," Mark Leoni, chief of American Citizen Services in Tijuana, said in court filings Monday.

Guzman's brother, Michael Guzman, said he couldn't comment because he had no knowledge of such a conversation. The mother was not immediately available because she was in Tijuana searching for her son.
Since his deportation, she has wandered Tijuana trying to find him, clutching his picture.
Michael Guzman said his brother appeared normal, had a driver's license and worked in construction, but had severe processing problems.

"To the point that he's retarded? No, he's not like that," said Guzman. "But he doesn't remember things, he can't record things well in his mind."

A spokesman for American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California, which filed the case on behalf of the family, said the government assertion didn't make sense.

"Why would someone in the process of being released on house arrest agree to voluntary deportation unless he was confused about what he was signing?" said ACLU spokesman Michael Soller.

In a court filing dated June 13 but released Monday, a U.S. Immigration and Customs officer asserted the family said Pedro Guzman had been to Ensenada, Mexico, for several weekend trips and had no problems. Michael Guzman said the family had visited Mexico, but not since Pedro Guzman was 10 or 11 years old.

"But again, he doesn't remember anything, so he wouldn't know what to do," said Michael Guzman.

ACLU Suit Alleges Deportees Were Drugged

By Sonya Geis
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, June 20, 2007; Page A04

LOS ANGELES, June 19 -- Two immigrants were held down and forcibly injected with sedatives by immigration officials who were attempting to deport them, the American Civil Liberties Union charged in a lawsuit filed Tuesday.

The class-action complaint targets the Department of Homeland Security, Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Division of Immigration Health Services, an agency of the U.S. Public Health Service that contracts with ICE to provide medical services. The division is already facing lawsuits charging that it provides inadequate medical care to detained immigrants.

Dozens of immigrants from countries as diverse as Cameroon, Iraq and Peru arrive at Washington's Union Station to tell Congress their personal stories in hopes of winning passage of a controversial immigration bill. (By Katherine Frey -- The Washington Post)

Both plaintiffs in Tuesday's lawsuit claim they declined sedatives that were offered to them when immigration officials sought to deport them, but they were injected with a powerful antipsychotic anyway.

According to the lawsuit, Raymond Soeoth, a 38-year-old Indonesian national, was in a Los Angeles area immigrant detention center in December 2004 when the authorities told him he was about to be deported. Soeoth asked to call his wife and make arrangements in Indonesia but was denied, said his attorney, Ahilan Arulanantham.

A note in Soeoth's medical records states that Soeoth said, "I'm not ready to go," and told officers he would not board an airplane. Another note indicates that Soeoth may have been a suicide risk, which his lawyer says is untrue.

Immigration agents injected him with the sedative, antipsychotic drug Haldol, according to his medical records. Soeoth's deportation was canceled by airline security because they had not been notified by immigration authorities, records show.

The other plaintiff, Senegalese immigrant Amadou Diouf, 31, was put on a commercial flight at Los Angeles International Airport in handcuffs, his medical records show. Diouf protested that he should not be deported, then asked a flight attendant in French to speak to the captain. Medical escorts wrestled him to the floor of the airplane and injected him, the lawsuit states.

The captain asked them to leave, and Diouf was sent back to detention. Both men are now free while their immigration cases are on appeal, their attorney said.

Virginia Kice, a spokeswoman for ICE, said decisions about immigrants' medical care are made by the U.S. Public Health Service, which "does not involuntarily pre-medicate or sedate a detainee solely to facilitate removal efforts, unless authorized by a judge's removal order."

She added: "When ICE is carrying out the removal order of an immigration judge, our officers are responsible for the safety of the alien and members of public who come into contact with the alien on a commercial flight."

Posted Jun 20, 2:24 PM Hide Post

Immigration Bill Critics to See Votes

By JULIE HIRSCHFELD DAVIS
The Associated Press
Tuesday, June 19, 2007; 7:43 PM

WASHINGTON -- Sixteen of the two dozen amendments the Senate will consider attaching to a revived immigration bill come from senators who helped derail the legislation earlier this month.

A list of the proposed changes obtained by The Associated Press illustrates how key Republicans and Democrats plotting to revive the measure before the Fourth of July recess are trying to placate critics by holding votes to address their top concerns.

The proposals range from bids to make it more difficult for illegal immigrants to gain legal status to attempts to give family members of U.S. citizens more opportunities to immigrate.

The bipartisan coalition that crafted the deal is keeping the still-tentative list under tight wraps as they scramble to fine-tune it with an eye toward attracting the widest possible swath of converts to the bill. The measure, which would grant as many as 12 million illegal immigrants lawful status while tightening border security, stalled on June 7 when just 45 senators voted to end debate and move to a final vote _ well short of the 60 whose backing was needed.

The package of changes was described by three congressional aides close to the talks, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the list is confidential and subject to change.

Under the plan, Sen. Kit Bond, R-Mo., would get a vote on his plan to bar illegal immigrants from getting green cards. Democratic Sen. Jim Webb of Virginia would see consideration of his amendment to limit legalization to certain unlawful immigrants who have been in the U.S. four years or more.

Both voted "no" during the test-vote that blocked the bill's progress.

Also making the list is an amendment by Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., that would bar illegal immigrants from collecting Social Security benefits for work done while they were in the U.S. unlawfully.

Sen. Barbara Boxer of California, one of only 11 Democrats who voted against expediting final action on the bill, would get a vote on her amendment to reduce the number of temporary workers admitted to the U.S. based on how many guest laborers overstayed their visas.

Democrats already succeeded in revising the bill to lower the cap from as many as 600,000 per year to 200,000.

There's no guarantee that such proposals would pass _ nor have any of their sponsors said publicly that they would back advancing the bill if they had a chance to air their amendments. But Senate leaders in both parties believe the list will produce the 60 votes needed to reopen debate on the measure and get it to a final vote.

One senior aide close to the discussions predicted that as many as 24 Republicans would back moving ahead with the bill under the scenario envisioned _ compared with just seven GOP senators who did so previously.

Immigration Bill Critics to See Votes
Also in the package, as currently drafted, are:

_An amendment by Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas, to mandate that all illegal immigrants return home within two years to gain lawful status. The bill only requires those seeking green cards to do so.

_A proposal by Sen. Robert Menendez, D-N.J., to increase the number of points under a new merit-based green card allocation system that could be awarded for being related to a U.S. citizen or green card holder.

_An amendment by Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., to condition any legal status for unlawful immigrants on the measure's border security and workplace enforcement measures. The bill would instead allow such immigrants to get probationary legal status while those so-called "triggers" were being met.

_A proposal by Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., to increase penalties on employers who repeatedly hire illegal immigrants.

_An amendment by Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, to replace the employment verification system with a less-burdensome alternative.

_An amendment by Montana's Democratic Sens. Max Baucus and Jon Tester, who opposed moving to a final vote on the bill, to remove requirements that workers present "REAL ID" driver's license to prospective employers.

_An amendment by Sen. Norm Coleman, R-Minn., to let law enforcement agencies share information about people's immigration status.

_An amendment by Sen. Bernard Sanders of Vermont, the sole Independent to oppose the June 7 test vote, to bar companies that have had mass layoffs from hiring foreign high-tech workers.

When the bill would hit the Senate floor was in doubt amid a troublesome debate on energy legislation that threatened to push the immigration bill into next week.

Democrats have begun an elaborate series of procedural maneuvers to allow a test-vote as early as Thursday night on a new version of the measure that includes a $4.4 billion "Immigration Security Account" designed to address the concerns of wavering Republicans.

Meanwhile, GOP hard-liners urged President Bush, an enthusiastic backer of the bipartisan Senate measure, to enforce immigration laws, including those providing for expedited deportation for certain illegal immigrants.

"It's time to be resolute. It's time to show some backbone. It's time to stop amnesty," said Rep. Peter T. King of New York, the senior Republican on the Homeland Security Committee. "What we want to do is to stop the Senate amnesty bill in its tracks now."

On the other side of the Capitol, Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., a leading critic of the bipartisan bill, made the same plea in a letter to Bush.

"We're working hard to make sure we get a good bill or none," Sessions said.

Posted Jun 20, 2:38 PM

31 illegal immigrants arrested Contractor hired them for Fossil work; neither firm tied to wrongdoing

12:00 AM CDT on Friday, June 15, 2007
By JIM GETZ and ISABEL MORALES / The Dallas Morning News

Federal agents arrested 31 women – all illegal immigrants – Thursday, after a routine customs inspection of a Fossil Inc. warehouse in far northeast Dallas, officials said.

Tim Counts, a spokesman for the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement branch of the Department of Homeland Security, said a contractor identified as Simos Insourcing Solutions had hired the 31 to do warehouse work for Fossil, the Richardson-based manufacturer of wrist-watches.

ICE had been working with Customs and Border Protection to conduct a joint inspection of the warehouse on Sanden Drive near the Garland border, when questioning revealed that many of the workers were in the United States illegally, Mr. Counts said.

The 10 agents present when the inspection began about 9 a.m. mushroomed to 35 once they learned the workers' status.

"This was a routine inspection," said John Chakwin, special agent in charge of the Dallas ICE office. "Now it's an investigation."

Mr. Chakwin said "all those detained were hired by the temporary company and not Fossil."

Mike Kovar, chief financial officer for Fossil, said his company has terminated its business relationship with the other company, which he called a "national temporary staffing agency."

He said no Fossil employees were detained or questioned.

Mr. Counts said ICE would question Fossil and Simos. Fossil is a $1.2 billion company with more than 7,000 employees nationwide and 1,337 in the Dallas-Fort Worth area.

"Thirty-one people was certainly a significant number to find in one warehouse, so we'll continue our investigation," Mr. Counts said.

But, he said, "I want to stress at this point we certainly have no evidence of wrongdoing by Fossil or by the contracting employer."

Simos representatives couldn't be reached for comment Thursday.

In the last two years, law enforcement actions targeting worksites have increased.

Nationally, arrests of illegal immigrants on criminal charges increased about 300 percent to 718 arrests in the last fiscal year, which ended Sept. 30.



Family members

At the warehouse Thursday, dozens of family members gathered outside, trying to learn the whereabouts of their relatives.

Yolanda Cálix said she is desperate. Her three grandchildren have been left without their mother, Kristela, 23, one of the workers held. Ms. Cálix said she received a phone call about 11 a.m. Thursday from her daughter, who "could barely speak because she was crying so hard."

"She told me immigration was there, she was scared and to please pick up the children from the babysitter," said Ms. Cálix, a native of Honduras who has been in the U.S. since 1997 on a permit that affords her temporary protective status.

"I don't know what to tell the kids when they ask me what happened to Mommy," she said. "This is hard. How can they do this to good people who are really not hurting anyone?"

Kristela's three children – ages 7, 3 and 1 – are all U.S. citizens, born after she arrived in the U.S. Her job at the plant was to put prices on the watches and pack them into boxes.


Employees separated

One man, who identified himself only as Rodriguez, said his wife, originally from Mexico, also called him in the morning to tell him that immigration was at the plant.

Agents brought in dogs and separated the employees hired by Fossil from those hired by Simos Insourcing Solutions, he said.

He said he feared something would happen after seeing a similar raid at vegetable packing plant on the news.

"We know we're taking a risk working for these companies," said Mr. Rodriguez, who left his daughters – ages 6 and 1 – with a sister-in-law. "We know we're breaking their laws. But they should give us a chance. They shouldn't separate the families."

Mr. Rodriguez said he would probably wait to find out when his wife might be deported and reunite the family in Mexico.

"It's not worth the hassle to be here, if we have to live in hiding," Mr. Rodriguez said.

The workers – 20 from Mexico, seven from Honduras, three from El Salvador and one from Nicaragua – will be held in jails in North Texas counties until deportation hearings can be held.

Mr. Counts said the warehouse was in a foreign trade zone, where goods are stored tax-free while awaiting distribution. Agents were initially looking for such things as copyright violations, counterfeit goods and quota violations as part of a routine inspection.

Staff writer Dianne Solís contributed to this report.

Unions Differ on Immigration Legislation

By JESSE J. HOLLAND
The Associated Press
Thursday, June 21, 2007; 3:37 AM

WASHINGTON -- The revival of the Senate's immigration legislation also resurrected a rare split inside organized labor.

The AFL-CIO formally came out against the bill Wednesday, reflecting the distaste among manufacturing unions and others whose members have been displaced by overseas competition and would have to compete with an influx of cheaper workers who don't have labor rights.

Embracing the bill are a couple of unions that cater to workers in the fast-growing service sector of the economy and also split from the AFL-CIO in 2005. They've seen their membership rosters swell with immigrants taking jobs in hotels and restaurants and as janitors.

The Senate legislation would legalize some 12 million unlawful immigrants and create a new temporary guest worker program wanted by employers in virtually all sectors of the economy. That's where the unions' interests diverge.

Earlier this month, the AFL-CIO and its allies succeeded in getting the Senate to limit the temporary worker program to only five years. The bill's proponents vowed to try and make it permanent again in later negotiations with the House if the bill makes it that far.

That victory, however, didn't placate labor leaders still opposed to the bill.

"This bill is far from the kind of comprehensive immigration reform that would improve the status quo for either U.S.-born or immigrant workers or their families and, in fact, it is likely to make matters much worse," said AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Richard L. Trumka.

Several unions see a real threat to American workers under the Senate bill because temporary foreign workers would for the first time be able to hold non-seasonal jobs.

Ana Avendano, an AFL-CIO attorney and director of its immigrant worker program, said that would give employers like Wal-Mart and owners of meatpacking and poultry plants a lower-wage source of year-round workers that could be exploited.

On the other side are unions like the Service Employees International Union and UNITE HERE, an amalgamation of formerly separate unions representing hotel, restaurant, laundry and textile workers.

SEIU is now the fastest growing union in the country with more than 1.8 million members and says it represents more immigrants than any other union. UNITE HERE also has a large number of immigrants in its membership. Both see a recruiting target in those 12 million now-illegal immigrants.

They also are in favor of keeping temporary foreign worker programs, which are popular with immigrants, as long as the government ensures the workers aren't abused. A House plan that would allow temporary foreign workers to apply for a three-year visa which can be renewed for another three years is their preferred method.

Under a properly run temporary worker program, only about half of the foreigners coming to the United States under those conditions would want to stay permanently, SEIU Executive Vice President Eliseo Medina said.

"They would want to do it like my father used to do it. He used to come and work for a period of time and then go home," Medina said. "I think what you will wind up with a lot of people being truly temporary workers, because that's what they want to be."

Each side is using its influence in the Democrat-controlled Congress to push for a resolution in its favor.

Unions spent more than $66 million in the midterm election cycle, most of that money going to Democratic candidates. That makes them a player in the debate in the Senate and the House, although the differing opinions may blunt their impact.

Medina isn't surprised that all the unions aren't on the same page. "There's differences among labor just as there's differences among business" on the legislation, he said.

The Senate bill died earlier this month but was resurrected after pressure from President Bush, who has made it a top domestic priority. The bill is widely regarded as the last and best chance for Congress to take action on immigration _ possibly for years to come.

"It's time to create legal and fair channels for immigrants to come here to work in the future," Medina said. "And it's time to replace this cycle of border deaths and worker exploitation with a controlled system that works for America."

But there is disagreement even among the unions that broke away from the AFL-CIO to form the new coalition Change to Win.

SEIU is for a temporary foreign worker plan, while the Teamsters and the Laborers' International Union of North America _ also Change to Win members _ are not.

"LIUNA will not support the creation of a new guest worker program without serious reforms," president Terence M. O'Sullivan said, "most fundamentally a realistic path to citizenship that encourages immigrants to put down roots and stay to pursue the American dream."


On the Net:

SEIU member Luz Diaz talks about immigration: http://www.youtube.com/watch?vpahHd5Zu-UA

AFL-CIO information on immigration: http://aflcio.org/issues/civilrights/immigration

© 2007 The Associated Press
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Opponents vow to try to block immigration bill

By Donna Smith
Reuters
Thursday, June 21, 2007; 4:12 PM

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A group of Republican senators opposed to a sweeping immigration overhaul that would legalize millions of unlawful immigrants said on Thursday they were determined to torpedo the bill when the Senate resumes debate next week.

"The process has been rigged from the beginning, which we think gives us justification to use every measure possible to slow this thing down and stop it," said Sen. Jim DeMint, a South Carolina Republican, at a news conference.

DeMint and other Republican opponents argue the bill amounts to amnesty for millions of law-breakers with no guarantee that tough border security and workplace enforcement measures would go into effect. They argue the legalization program will only encourage more illegal immigration.

The immigration overhaul, put together during months of negotiations among a small group Republicans, Democrats and the White House, would be a major legislative victory for President George W. Bush in his second term. Democrats have pressed him to bring more of his Republican allies in Congress on board after the bill stalled in the face of stiff opposition.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Nevada Democrat, decried Republican efforts to slow the legislation and said he was hopeful it would pass this time around.

A determined minority can often derail legislation in the closely divided 100-member Senate where it takes 60 votes to advance any controversial bill. But it was unclear if opponents of the immigration bill would be able to maneuver around a rarely used tactic, called a clay pigeon, Reid plans to use to push the bill to passage.

The parliamentary ploy effectively allows Senate leaders to pick amendments for consideration and shut out the opposition.

Democrats are also divided over the immigration bill. Labor unions oppose the temporary worker program saying it would create an underclass of cheap laborers. Bush, backed by his Republican party's pro-business wing, favors the temporary worker program to fill jobs they say Americans cannot or will not perform.

A survey of illegal immigrants from Latin American countries released on Thursday showed the vast majority of them would seek legal residency if the legislation passes.

The poll of 1,600 illegal immigrants conducted by New America Media, an association of ethnic news media, found about 83 percent would apply for the new "Z" visa that would allow them to work legally in the United States and eventually apply for permanent resident status.

But about 27 percent of those said that they would probably not apply if they were required to return to their home country to pick up the visa, the survey said.

June 20, 2007, 10:05PM
Houston Chronicle

McCain urges free trade with Latin America

By BRIAN SKOLOFF
Associated Press

PALM BEACH, FLA. — America should open its borders to free trade throughout Latin America and work harder toward establishing democracy in Cuba, Republican presidential candidate John McCain said Wednesday.

"Latin America today is increasingly vital to the fortunes of the United States," McCain said during a speech to the Florida Association of Broadcasters. "It is in the United States' national interest that the Cuban people live in freedom."

McCain called Cuba "a national security threat" under the rule of Fidel Castro and said he would pursue diplomatic efforts toward democracy there, but not the use of military force.

"I don't think we can move militarily against a country just because they have a government we don't like," he said.

"As president," McCain added, "I will not passively await the long overdue demise of the Castro dictatorship ... The Cuban people have waited long enough."

McCain said he would increase funding for the U.S. government's anti-Castro radio and TV stations and press for the release of all political prisoners and internationally monitored elections. He would keep the trade embargo in place.

Asked why not open trade with Cuba to help its people, McCain joked, "I don't know what we'd trade besides 1950s vintage cars."

McCain said Venezuela President Hugo Chavez has breathed "new oxygen" into Castro's regime, and that the U.S. government must do more to quell dictatorships throughout Latin America. Chavez's government has helped spur economic growth in Cuba by selling the island oil at favorable prices.

The Arizona senator said anti-Americanism is on the rise in Latin America as the U.S. focuses on other places around the world, allowing "dangerous forces" to work unfettered in the region.

June 20, 2007, 10:14PM
Lott feeling backlash over radio salvo on immigration bill

By JONATHAN WEISMAN and SHAILAGH MURRAY
Washington Post

It was a casual shot across the bow, a comment last week from Senate Minority Whip Trent Lott: Advocates of an immigration overhaul would have to "deal" with talk-radio hosts who he said don't know what is in the legislation but want to kill it nonetheless.

The return fire to that passing comment has been withering, as some of the nation's most prominent conservative talkers turn on a man they once defended adamantly.

Michael Savage, who hosts The Savage Nation, accused Lott of dispatching Nazi storm troopers against his critics. A National Review blogger tagged the senator "Vacant Lott." Conservative talker Hugh Hewitt warned that Lott, R-Miss., would only "further motivate the base because to the reality of a bad bill and past insults is now added a genuine note of dislike" for those conservatives.

"When I hear a United States senator say that what I do for a living is a 'problem' that the government has to 'deal with,' you can interpret it any number of ways," Rush Limbaugh said on the air. "He's either saying, 'Well, we're going to have to come up with our own ways to overcome them' or 'We're going to just have to wipe them out.' "

"When they're with you, it's great," Lott said this week. "When they're not, it's not good."

Democrats have long borne such tongue-whippings. But now conservative Republicans are feeling the lash as well.

"I've had my phones jammed for three weeks. Yesterday I had three people answering them continuously all day," Lott said. "To think that you're going to intimidate a senator or any senator into voting one way or the other by gorging your phones with phone calls — most of whom don't even know where Gulfport, Miss., is — is not an effective tactic. But it's their right to do that."

But to some of the hosts, such as Hewitt, it's not about intimidation. It's about pride. Lott's comments were not just inflammatory, Hewitt said, they were insulting.

To The Washington Post, Lott had said, "I'm sure senators on both sides of the aisle are being pounded by these talk-radio people who don't even know what's in the bill." To the New York Times, he had offered: "Talk radio is running America. We have to deal with that problem."

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., one of the immigration bill's chief architects, suggested on Sunday that opponents of the deal border on being racist.

"We've been down this road before — 'no Catholics,' 'no Jews,' 'Irish need not apply,' " Graham said on ABC's "This Week."

Those quotes suggest that Republicans favorably disposed to the immigration bill are more interested in calling its opponents names than debating the bill's merits, said Hewitt, who declared he has read the entire immigration bill.

"They are not giving sophisticated answers to sophisticated, penetrating criticisms," Hewitt said. "They're attempting to silence the debate."

But the conservative response to Lott may be symptomatic of a broader disenchantment with the Republican Party, said Michael Harrison, editor and publisher of Talkers magazine, which chronicles talk radio.

The immigration debate is a bellwether, he said, but conservative criticism is brewing on issues from education to spending to Iraq. Last week the magazine granted its annual Freedom of Speech Award to Savage for his criticism of President Bush, the first time Harrison can remember honoring a talk show host for speaking out against someone of his own political persuasion.

Republican politicians "assumed they owned conservative talk radio," Harrison said. "But support of conservatives by talk radio was only being borrowed as long as conservatives felt that Republicans served the conservative movement."

Republicans backing the immigration bill were mindful this week of Lott's experience — and contrite. Asked about the radio response, Sen. Mel Martinez, R-Fla., joked, "I ain't saying a thing" before adding: "When we want to be on talk radio, we find a way to get on, because we like their views and we like their audience. So when we don't like their message, we ought to be willing to take the pain."

But to the bill's opponents, it's not about grinning and bearing it, as Martinez is doing. It's about accepting the judgment of the GOP's base.

"Talk radio was sort of the watchdog on this," said Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala. "Who else was watching out? Who else was reading the bill?"

"A decent respect for our constituents means when they have very serious problems with an important piece of legislation, perhaps we should back off," he said.

Jun 21, 9:52 PM EDT
Tuscon Citizen

High-tech fence on Ariz. border delayed, Congress seeks answersHigh-tech fence on Ariz. border delayed, Congress seeks answers

By DAN CATERINICCHIA
AP Business Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Technical issues are delaying the completion of a multibillion-dollar high-tech fence intended to reduce illegal entry along the nation's southern border, the government said Thursday.

Some lawmakers are questioning why Boeing Co., the lead contractor, and staff at the Department of Homeland Security waited until a day after a hearing earlier this month to update Congress on the delay.

The first phase of the project involves building nine towers that are dotted along 28 miles of the Arizona-Mexico border, and bracket the Sasabe port of entry.

Boeing, the world's largest aerospace company, in September won a three-year, $67 million contract to install the fence, the initial step in a multibillion-dollar plan to reduce illegal entry along 6,000 miles of U.S. borders with Canada and Mexico.

The 98-foot tall towers each hold an array of high-tech radar, sensor devices and potent cameras intended to detect intruders and provide specific information, including their location, to agents on the ground to intercept.

At the hearing on June 7, no problems or delays on so-called Project 28 were mentioned. But the next day DHS officials notified congressional staff of a one-week lag due to radar problems, according to a letter questioning how and when Congress was informed.

The letter was sent Tuesday to DHS Secretary Michael Chertoff by House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., and Rep. Loretta Sanchez, D-Calif., chair of subcommittee that held the hearing.

"It is unacceptable that the department chose to disclose this information via telephone to committee staff, rather than providing a thorough assessment of the project's status directly to committee members at the hearing," the letter says.

DHS spokesman Russ Knocke said Boeing did not tell the department about the radar issues, which were identified on the day of the subcommittee hearing, until June 8 when the information was promptly passed to the committee.

"It was coincidental. Nonetheless, it's still not acceptable," Knocke said Thursday, adding that Chertoff will respond to the letter soon.

DHS officials called House committee staff Friday to inform them that Project 28 would be further delayed. In addition to the radar issue, Boeing also is working through technical glitches hampering complete camera coverage from all nine towers back to the common operating video terminals used by Customs and Border Protection agents, Knocke said.

Boeing set the original deadlines and has not provided a new target date for completion, Knocke said, adding only that "we are moving with an absolute sense of urgency."

Construction on the nine towers has been completed, Knocke said.

"It's not considered to be a terribly problematic glitch, but nevertheless it is a glitch and has to be fixed," Knocke said. "We're not going to give Border Patrol agents something that is not fully ready, and so we are putting a lot of pressure on the contractor to get this done and as quickly as possible."

"We continue to work toward the resolution of a few remaining technical matters on the border," said Boeing spokesman Eric M***acone, who referred questions about the delay to Customs and Borders Protection.

A CPB spokesman said no hard date had been set for completion. He added that even after the system is working properly, border agents will need to be trained to use it.

The House last week passed a $37.4 billion DHS funding bill that provides $1 billion for the project, but President Bush has said he will veto the overall measure since it exceeds the administration's request by $2.1 billion.