No April Fools’ joke. At Talking Points Memo today is a great story about odd allies—and the friendship between undocumented activist extraordinaire Jose Antonio Vargas and founder of the Tea Party Patriots Mark Meckler. Vargas is the gay Pulitzer Prize-winning immigrant who first outed himself to the New York...
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This weekend, the AFL-CIO and the US Chamber of Commerce agreed to a guest worker visa program, a major breakthrough in one of the biggest hurdles to immigration reform legislation. The agreement means that the “all major policy issues” have been resolved in the run-up to legislation. As...
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Over the weekend, officials at the US Chamber of Commerce and AFL-CIO announced that they had reached an agreement on a guest-worker program in immigration reform, one of the key holdups in the process to legislation. Though some members of the Senate Gang of 8 were quick to note...
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“A Historic Breakthrough,” Says Frank Sharry It is reported that a deal has been reached between the gang of eight senators and the AFL-CIO and the Chamber of Commerce on the creation of a new worker program. The following is a statement from Frank Sharry, Executive Director of America’s...
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Big news this afternoon with reports that a deal has been reached between the gang of eight senators and the AFL-CIO and the Chamber of Commerce on the creation of a new worker program. And, Ana Avendaño, Director of immigration and community action at the AFL-CIO, tweeted: We have a deal...
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Update: Young has issued a full apology: “I apologize for the insensitive term I used during an interview in Ketchikan, Alaska. There was no malice in my heart or intent to offend; it was a poor choice of words. That word, and the negative attitudes that come with it, should...
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In the latest blow to GOP minority outreach, the big news of the day involves Rep. Don Young (R-AL), who referred to immigrants as “wetbacks” while speaking on a local radio station yesterday: “My father had a ranch; we used to have 50-60 wetbacks to pick tomatoes,” Young, an...
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It’s Easter Recess for Congressmembers, who are back at home holding town halls, meeting with constituents–and being served petitions with tens of thousands of local signers all demanding immigration reform. A coalition of immigrant-rights groups, in conjunction with local organizations, have collected more than 40,000 petitions from immigration reform...
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A range of developments underscores the momentum behind immigration reform, while highlighting the newfound support for reform from both traditional and non-traditional backers. Even the spate of stories last week that asked if business and labor disputes would help scuttle the overall reform effort were overblown, as the talks...
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Yesterday on Univision, Maria Elena Salinas interviewed Republican Rosario Marin, a former US Treasurer, about her thoughts on prospective immigration reform. Marin was fairly pessimistic, expressing concerns that Obama is using immigration as a political issue rather than really being serious about pushing it through (a favorite argument of...
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