Blog Post

Immigration Reform Bill Delayed Again

Posted January 31, 2010 by Patrick Young, Esq.

The Huffington Post has a compelling article on when immigration reform will finally be introduced. According to the article by journalist Jeffrey Kaye:
“The timeline originally was to have a bill by February,” said Sonia Ramirez, legislative representative for the AFL-CIO. “Now I think they’re shooting at having a detailed outline of the direction they’d like to go in the bill by the end of February.” Once the outline is agreed on, she explained, lawyers will draft the text.
The day after President Obama’a tepid endorsement of immigration reform in the State of the Union Address, Schumer was asked when reform would be introduced. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid interposed: “Chuck, let’s not get into any deadlines. You get into trouble by setting deadlines. It is something we’re committed to do. And we’ll do it as soon as we can.”
According to the Huffington Post, one of the major stumbling blocks is a disagreement between organized labor and business over employement-based immigration provisions of the bill:
The AFL-CIO’s Ramirez indicated that she and other labor leaders are trying to reach a compromise with business representatives on a complicated section of the bill that would set guidelines to regulate the use of migrant workers on either a temporary or permanent basis. Labor organizations have supported a plan for a new Presidential commission to help establish criteria and calculate labor needs. Business groups have said that they would not accept a commission that could be politicized and not suitably responsive to “market forces.” This issue may seem esoteric, but as legislative efforts to enact immigration reform move haltingly along, the ability of labor and business to agree on the fundamentals of migrant worker programs could make the difference between a viable bill and yet another failed effort to fix the broken system. The recently-introduced House immigration bill advocated most forcefully by Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-Ill.) and championed by many reform advocates is widely seen as basically dead on arrival because of criticisms from the right that it is too migrant friendly.
Labor’s Ramirez suggested that the commission proposal would not be a deal breaker. “In terms of creating a system—let’s put the word ‘commission’ aside—that contemplates economic need and makes decisions on visas based on demonstrated need, that’s attractive to us both [business and labor]. So I think there is lots of agreement on how to move forward.” Ramirez said that labor would want to insist that migrant workers involved in “future flows” be assured worker protections and rights. Labor is also pushing to make sure that recruiters who bring in foreign workers are better regulated. But she made it clear that the commission idea was more of a subject for negotiation than a key demand. “It’s about crafting a system,” she said, “not calling it a ‘commission.’”

Patrick Leahy, who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee, which has jurisdiction over immigration issues, has indicated that he may favor a piecemeal approach tto reform as time begins to run out on passage of a comprehensive bill. Most analysts believe that a comprehensive immigration reform bill must be introduced within the next sixty days to have any chance of passage this year.