CQ NEWS
Jan. 30, 2013 – 6:06 p.m.
Guest Worker Issue Poses Hurdle in Immigration Effort
By David Harrison, CQ Roll Call
Longtime observers of the immigration debate are waiting to see whether a bipartisan group of eight senators can produce a workable plan to allow low-skilled workers into the country to take hard-to-fill jobs.
While much of the public discussion around the senators’ four-page immigration framework has centered on securing the border and granting citizenship to 11 million undocumented people, the so-called “future flow” question could prove to be even more delicate and controversial.
That question was one of the points of contention that sank the 2007 immigration overhaul effort. Many of the 2007 players are back, hoping lawmakers will have better luck this time.
“Future flow has been one of the shoals upon which the good ship immigration reform has floundered,” Sen.
Low-skilled workers now have few options to enter the country legally. Only 5,000 permanent residency visas are set aside for low-skilled workers each year. Temporary visa programs for both agricultural and non-agricultural guest workers, the “H” visa category, have been criticized both by labor groups for restricting workers’ rights and by employers for being unwieldy.
As a result, many low-skilled immigrant workers coming to the country do so illegally. A recent Pew Research Center report on undocumented immigrants found they are more likely to have less education and hold lower-skilled jobs.
“There’s never been any public understanding of this need,” said Tamar Jacoby, president of ImmigrationWorks USA, which lobbies for immigration changes from a business perspective. “Legalization is not the heart of it. Legalization is cleaning up the mistakes of the past. We’re going to make exactly the same mistakes if we don’t fix the system going forward.”
So far, lawmakers have preferred to talk about high-skilled workers rather than lower-skilled immigrants. The document released Jan. 28 contained only broad outlines of the senators’ thoughts on workers who come to this country to work as dishwashers, landscapers and home health aides. An immigration fact sheet released by the White House on Tuesday was also short on details on temporary guest-worker programs.
Asked about a guest-worker program, White House press secretary Jay Carney said only that the administration wants “to make sure it protects workers, including immigrant workers, and that it is actually based on data-driven workforce demands, rather than political whim.”
A Senate Democratic aide working on the issue said senators are waiting to see the outcome of talks between the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the AFL-CIO centered on future worker programs. Chamber President Thomas Donohue and AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka have met several times, and staff members from the two organizations are working to iron out an acceptable plan. Andrea Zuniga DiBitetto, an AFL-CIO lobbyist, said both sides hope to reach an agreement within the next few weeks, in time for the bill to be introduced by March.
Still, the Jan. 28 unveiling offers some hints that senators have absorbed the lessons of 2007.
The 2007 bill would have created a temporary guest-worker program that did not offer lower-skilled immigrants the opportunity of eventually becoming legal permanent residents. Those in the program would have been able to work in the country for two years, and then would have been required to leave for one year before applying to renew their visas. The bill also created a separate visa program for low-skilled workers already in the United States that could eventually grant them a green card.
At the time, the AFL-CIO and several Democratic lawmakers said the proposed guest-worker language would deprive temporary workers of their rights and make it difficult, if not impossible, for them to stay in the country permanently. Labor was also worried that employers would reject local workers in favor of cheaper immigrant labor. Republicans, on the other hand, had concerns about border security and about legalizing the status of millions of people who had moved to the country illegally.
Guest Worker Issue Poses Hurdle in Immigration Effort
The Jan. 28 immigration framework, on the other hand, explicitly said the senators would make it possible for employers to hire temporary, lower-skilled immigrants when they cannot find Americans to do the work. It also said the envisioned legislation would “permit workers who have succeeded in the workplace and contributed to their communities over many years to earn green cards.”
It remains to be seen how workers brought to the country on a temporary basis would be able to become permanent residents.
The outline also suggested that the number of low-skilled non-agricultural workers allowed into the country would change based on labor market conditions. More workers would be allowed in economic expansions when jobs are plentiful but the flow would be staunched during downturns.
The 2007 bill also envisioned having the number of temporary visas fluctuate with the economy, but the Senate got bogged down over the details, in particular over the question of where the initial number of visas should be capped.
That history suggests the specifics of such an arrangement will have to be carefully negotiated. Would there be a commission to determine how many workers are needed, as labor is advocating for? Or would the number of new visas be automatically triggered by unemployment rates or requests from employers?
“That’s the subject of very intense discussions,” said
“There are certain levels of our economy where you can’t find native-born workers after you advertise a competitive wage,” Graham said. “There will be a process to find out what you need each year.”