Guest worker program for agriculture sought

Unemployment is soaring. Yet advocates and Congressional leaders want a guest worker program that would legalize tens of thousands of undocumented agriculture workers.

Proponents say they want a legal work force to pick the nation’s tomatoes, peppers and lettuce. Opponents call it amnesty for illegal workers at a time Americans are losing their jobs.

“If you can’t use legal workers and pay American wages and provide American working conditions, then you shouldn’t be in America,” said Roy Beck, executive director of NumbersUSA, a Washington, D.C.-based group that advocates for reduced immigration. “America shouldn’t have peasant jobs.”http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/sfl-guestworker-program-b040609sbapr06,0,634671.story

By Luis F. Perez — South Florida Sun-Sentinel