Reid will Push for Amnesty Debate this Fall

In a new Los Angeles Times report, a spokesman for Senator Harry Reid said the Majority Leader is planning to bring the immigration debate to the Senate this fall. The time frame contradicts White House sources who say the administration prefers to wait until 2011.

The L.A. Times report also outlines the new strategy Amnesty advocates are using in the face of rising unemployment numbers. A new alliance is forming between open-borders groups and organized labor that will push for an illegal-alien Amnesty and changes in foreign-worker visa programs that could decrease overall numbers. Under the plan, an independent council would regulate the number of foreign-worker visas issued each year based on the country’s employment needs. This would be anathema to the interests of business groups which constantly push for more cheap, foreign labor. During the 2007 Amnesty fight open-borders groups, business groups, and some labor unions teamed up to push a “comprehensive immigration reform” bill that included an expanded foreign-worker program. This caused the AFL-CIO to oppose the bill because they favor lower foreign-worker visa numbers. The new Amnesty alliance hopes to bring the AFL-CIO on board for this round.

“Last time the coalition was not quite as solid as we would have hoped,” said Ali Noorani, director of the National Immigration Forum, in the L.A. Times article.

Last week, President Obama met with the Congressional Hispanic Caucus where he told members that he would issue a public statement supporting comprehensive immigration reform. Pres. Obama did say he supported reform during his California trip last week as well.

Supporters of the new proposal are planning an $18 million media blitz and grass-roots campaign. The independent commission that would examine visa needs based on labor and industry data was first proposed by former President Carter’s Labor Secretary Ray Marshall.

For more on this story, see the Los Angeles Times. And see NumbersUSA Vice President Jim Robb’s blog on this development.