President Bush again endorses guest worker program
President Bush again endorses guest worker program
The agricultural community was encouraged by President Bush's push for immigration reform the last week in November, as he once again endorsed the concept of a guest worker program.
In a swing through Texas and the Southwest, President Bush called for increased measures to secure the borders including the end to the "catch-and-release" program, which he said would be replaced with a "catch-and-deport" effort. But while he wants the United States to close its border to illegal immigrants, during a Nov. 28 speech in El Paso, TX, the president said, "We're also a compassionate nation. We've got to treat people with respect and dignity. ... We need to have a rational, temporary worker plan that is not amnesty. Amnesty would be a mistake. Granting amnesty to the people who have come to our country illegally would invite others to come to our country illegally. On the other hand, a temporary worker program would take pressure off our border. When you match willing worker with willing employer on a job Americans won't do, with a tamper-proof card that says, 'I'm here legally on a temporary basis,' it means our border patrol agents won't have to chase people coming here illegally to work - they'll be able to chase criminals and drug traffickers and crooks."
Though Mr. Bush's words about amnesty left the industry a bit queasy, Tom Nassif, president and chief executive officer of Irvine, CA-based Western Growers Association, said that a follow-up conference call with White House staff Nov. 29 revealed that the president's remarks did not rule out the potential eligibility of the illegal workforce already in the United States.
"We were happy to see the president stand up and say that a guest worker program has to be part of the solution," said Mr. Nassif. "But like all legislation, the devil will be in the details."
Mr. Nassif said that the follow-up conference call with the White House was even more reassuring, but the president's ideas will still have to move through Congress, where they will be subject to much debate.
While the WGA executive believes that there is an immigration and labor shortage crisis in the United States, and action is needed immediately, he is also realistic to know that passage of legislation will take time. "Something needs to get done quickly, and we would hope that a comprehensive immigration reform package would be passed within six months," he said.
While that would be extremely quick for legislation, Mr. Nassif said that it is not quick enough to solve the immediate labor shortage that is starting to spread throughout California and the West.
This past summer, raisin producers in the San Joaquin Valley said that they did not have enough workers to harvest their crops. Apple growers in Washington have experienced the same problem this fall, and now citrus growers in the Navel-producing regions of California are having difficulty filling their harvesting crews.
"We have been getting calls from citrus growers," Mr. Nassif said, "and we know there is going to be a problem during the winter harvest [in the Arizona and California desert regions]. Western Growers has asked the department of labor for some type of expedited H2A program this winter that would allow day laborers to cross the border each day and work the fields in the area surrounding Yuma [AZ] and Imperial County in California.
"That is going to be very expensive for the growers, but if the only alternative is to not harvest their crops, they will chose the H2A program," Mr. Nassif added.
Western Growers has had a series of meetings over the last few weeks with growers and government officials to gauge the interest in H2A as well as the government's willingness to launch some type of expedited program. He said that the growers are interested and the government has shown some indications that it will work with the industry, albeit not quite in the expedited fashion originally proposed.
Meanwhile, the immigration reform issue continues to heat up. Even as President Bush was touting a guest worker program as a necessary part of immigration reform, the House of Representatives seemed poised to pass some border- tightening measures that do not address the worker situation.
The National Council of Agricultural Employers -- the umbrella group that hammered out the AgJOBS compromise between employer and labor groups -- has issued a call for action against the measures being considered by the House. In an NCAE Action Alert dated Nov. 22, the group opined that the House would soon pass an ill-conceived, enforcement-only approach to immigration reform. The NCAE Alert summarized the issue as follows:
"Republican members of the House that have been largely responsible for the recent barrage of enforcement-only immigration bills are responding to a small but vocal minority of individuals who actually believe that the United States can seal itself off from the rest of the world. It has not worked before, and it is not working now. In the past few years, the number of agents along the border has tripled, the budget of the border patrol has quintupled, and still our illegal immigrant population has skyrocketed to over 10 million with half a million more coming every year. Enforcement-only measures and employer sanctions have not worked, they are not working, and they will not magically begin to work in the future. We must have balanced, comprehensive immigration reform that acknowledges both the need to secure our borders and provide American businesses access to a legal workforce."
In a swing through Texas and the Southwest, President Bush called for increased measures to secure the borders including the end to the "catch-and-release" program, which he said would be replaced with a "catch-and-deport" effort. But while he wants the United States to close its border to illegal immigrants, during a Nov. 28 speech in El Paso, TX, the president said, "We're also a compassionate nation. We've got to treat people with respect and dignity. ... We need to have a rational, temporary worker plan that is not amnesty. Amnesty would be a mistake. Granting amnesty to the people who have come to our country illegally would invite others to come to our country illegally. On the other hand, a temporary worker program would take pressure off our border. When you match willing worker with willing employer on a job Americans won't do, with a tamper-proof card that says, 'I'm here legally on a temporary basis,' it means our border patrol agents won't have to chase people coming here illegally to work - they'll be able to chase criminals and drug traffickers and crooks."
Though Mr. Bush's words about amnesty left the industry a bit queasy, Tom Nassif, president and chief executive officer of Irvine, CA-based Western Growers Association, said that a follow-up conference call with White House staff Nov. 29 revealed that the president's remarks did not rule out the potential eligibility of the illegal workforce already in the United States.
"We were happy to see the president stand up and say that a guest worker program has to be part of the solution," said Mr. Nassif. "But like all legislation, the devil will be in the details."
Mr. Nassif said that the follow-up conference call with the White House was even more reassuring, but the president's ideas will still have to move through Congress, where they will be subject to much debate.
While the WGA executive believes that there is an immigration and labor shortage crisis in the United States, and action is needed immediately, he is also realistic to know that passage of legislation will take time. "Something needs to get done quickly, and we would hope that a comprehensive immigration reform package would be passed within six months," he said.
While that would be extremely quick for legislation, Mr. Nassif said that it is not quick enough to solve the immediate labor shortage that is starting to spread throughout California and the West.
This past summer, raisin producers in the San Joaquin Valley said that they did not have enough workers to harvest their crops. Apple growers in Washington have experienced the same problem this fall, and now citrus growers in the Navel-producing regions of California are having difficulty filling their harvesting crews.
"We have been getting calls from citrus growers," Mr. Nassif said, "and we know there is going to be a problem during the winter harvest [in the Arizona and California desert regions]. Western Growers has asked the department of labor for some type of expedited H2A program this winter that would allow day laborers to cross the border each day and work the fields in the area surrounding Yuma [AZ] and Imperial County in California.
"That is going to be very expensive for the growers, but if the only alternative is to not harvest their crops, they will chose the H2A program," Mr. Nassif added.
Western Growers has had a series of meetings over the last few weeks with growers and government officials to gauge the interest in H2A as well as the government's willingness to launch some type of expedited program. He said that the growers are interested and the government has shown some indications that it will work with the industry, albeit not quite in the expedited fashion originally proposed.
Meanwhile, the immigration reform issue continues to heat up. Even as President Bush was touting a guest worker program as a necessary part of immigration reform, the House of Representatives seemed poised to pass some border- tightening measures that do not address the worker situation.
The National Council of Agricultural Employers -- the umbrella group that hammered out the AgJOBS compromise between employer and labor groups -- has issued a call for action against the measures being considered by the House. In an NCAE Action Alert dated Nov. 22, the group opined that the House would soon pass an ill-conceived, enforcement-only approach to immigration reform. The NCAE Alert summarized the issue as follows:
"Republican members of the House that have been largely responsible for the recent barrage of enforcement-only immigration bills are responding to a small but vocal minority of individuals who actually believe that the United States can seal itself off from the rest of the world. It has not worked before, and it is not working now. In the past few years, the number of agents along the border has tripled, the budget of the border patrol has quintupled, and still our illegal immigrant population has skyrocketed to over 10 million with half a million more coming every year. Enforcement-only measures and employer sanctions have not worked, they are not working, and they will not magically begin to work in the future. We must have balanced, comprehensive immigration reform that acknowledges both the need to secure our borders and provide American businesses access to a legal workforce."
