Thread: New study says immigration bill adds 1.6 million guest workers; Sessions says "We don

New study says immigration bill adds 1.6 million guest workers; Sessions says "We don't have that many jobs."


By Challen Stephens
on June 05, 2013




U.S. Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Mobile (Associated Press)
"We don't have that many jobs" - Sen. Jeff Sessions

Alabama politicians this morning welcomed a new study warning that the current immigration legislation would add 1.6 million more guest workers to the U.S. economy in the first year, and more than 600,000 over current levels each following year.

“Will this be a larger number than we can assimilate?” said U.S. Sen. Jeff Sessions on a conference call with reporters and politicians this morning. “I’m really worried about the direction we’re going.”


U.S. Rep. Mo Brooks, R-Huntsville (The Huntsville Times file photo)

U.S. Rep. Mo Brooks, R-Huntsville, said the increase would suppress wages and increase unemployment. “Simple economics. You increase the supply of anything, it tends to push down the price,” he said of high-skilled foreign labor.

Today’s conference call -- including also Rep. Lou Barletta, R-Penn., and Rep. Lamar Smith, R-Texas -- served to introduce a new study by the nonpartisan Center for Immigration Studies. The Center reports that the current Gang of Eight bill working through the Senate would raise the number of temporary foreign workers across nine visa categories by a total of 1.6 million in the first year.

That is predicted to taper off in subsequent years, as the study finds the bill would add about 600,000 more workers per year after an initial influx. According to the study, that increase would nearly double the 700,000 foreign workers admitted in 2012.

The majority of that initial wave would be V-1 visas, providing work authorization for people who have family in the United States and are waiting to immigrate. That accounts for 950,000 of the initial 1.6 million. Those people would seek green cards and eventual citizenship.

The next largest category would be highly skilled workers, as well as their dependents. That’s an annual increase of 105,000 H-1B visas, a program designed to admit highly skilled, educated foreign workers in a variety of fields from doctors to software designers to data analysts.

Sessions this morning said the influx of well educated guest workers would hurt American workers. “They take work from college graduates or a young kid who needs to get started in the workplace,” said Sessions.

Most H-1B workers are based out of a handful of states, including California, New Jersey and Michigan. The Department of Labor certified just 167 H-1B workers in Alabama this year. New Jersey alone was certified for 29,000.
The study finds that “escalator” amendments from Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, could raise the caps further, leading to 170,000 more H-1B workers each year as the bill slowly takes effect.

“That’s more than doubling admissions under the controversial H-1B program,” said Jessica Vaughn with the Center for Immigration Studies, adding the current H-1B cap sits at 65,000 admitted per year with an additional 20,000 for specific science and math fields.

But the study also points to H-4 visas, which under the current bill would allow the spouses of H-1B workers to look for work. The study estimates that will translate to another 220,000 foreign workers in the first year of the legislation and about 50,000 more guest workers each year thereafter.

Vaughn also pointed to new E visas allowing entry to foreign workers with which the United States has free trade agreements. She estimates 155,000 more workers each year through that avenue. “Basically, H-1B by another name”,” she said.


Carlos Ramos, of Alexander City, Ala. adjusts the head of the Senator Jeff Sessions puppet during an immigration reform protest in downtown Huntsville on Monday, May 20, 2013. (Eric Schultz / eschultz@al.com) Disrespectful and demanding MORE, as usual JMO

The Center describes itself as an independent, nonpartisan "think tank devoted exclusively to research and policy analysis of the economic, social, demographic, fiscal, and other impacts of immigration on the United States."
Although, the Southern Poverty Law Center in 2009 argued the Center has "always been part of a broad-based and well-planned effort to attack immigration in all forms."

Sessions said the Senators sponsoring the current immigration reform were unable to provide projections on guest worker increases, and that he welcomed the Center's analysis.

Congress can’t justify the increase in foreign labor right now, he said. “We don’t have that many jobs,” Sessions said.

Unemployment currently stands at 7.5 percent nationally, and 6.9 percent in Alabama.

Brooks pointed out that national unemployment is higher for African American workers, sitting at about 13 percent. “Now is not the time to hurt American workers because of policies that legitimize illegal immigrants on one hand,” he said, “and bring in vast amounts of legal immigrants.”

http://blog.al.com/wire/2013/06/new_study_says_immigration_bil.html

Senators, Congressmen Comment On New Report Showing Gang Of Eight Plan Adds Four Times More Guest Workers Than 2007 Bill

Wednesday, June 5, 2013

WASHINGTON—U.S. Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL), a senior member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, joined with Sen. David Vitter (R-LA), Rep. Mo Brooks (R-AL), and Rep. Lou Barletta (R-PA) in issuing the following statements today regarding the new Center for Immigration Studies report on the adverse impact that the Gang of Eight’s guest worker provisions would have on American workers, in addition to the 30 million individuals who would receive legal status under the plan:

Sen. Sessions: “This report from CIS is a bombshell. To my surprise, and no doubt the surprise of many, the Gang of Eight immigration bill doubles the annual number of guest workers from today’s levels—a much larger increase than any of us had imagined. It adds four times more guest workers than the rejected proposal from 2007. Yet today’s employment situation is far worse than when Congress considered the 2007 proposal. This large increase in guest workers guarantees that Americans’ wages will remain stagnant and that the unemployed will remain unemployed. This legislation surges the number of low-wage workers at the expense of the poor and middle class.

These guest workers do not enter as permanent immigrants but as workers brought to the country temporarily. Employers can often hire them at lower wages without fear the worker will change jobs or seek a promotion or ask for more pay. The guest worker program is separate from the bill’s proposed tripling of the number of people given legal permanent residency over the next 10 years. These large increases will be a hammer blow to working Americans—both immigrant and native-born.

I have a simple question for my fellow Senators: how can we justify adding four times more guest workers than were proposed in 2007 at a time when so many more Americans are out of work?”


Sen. Vitter: “We must be able to both secure our borders and enforce current immigration laws before we even begin to talk about enacting any type of expanded guest worker program. How do we expect to improve our unemployment statistics, by adding millions of temporary workers to our labor force? We must make securing our borders and stopping the flow of illegal immigrants into our country our principal focus.”


Rep. Brooks: “I want to thank the Center for Immigration Studies for conducting this important study that identifies the dangerous consequences of the Senate’s “Gang of 8” amnesty bill. America is far and away the most generous nation in the world as regards to immigration, accepting from 600,000 to more than a million immigrants per year for citizenship. However, the Senate’s amnesty bill would, by creating a large, artificial increase in illegal alien labor, suppress wages and further increase unemployment. As the Center for Immigration Studies’ analysis shows, this amnesty bill would double the flow of annual guest workers into the U.S. Now is the worst possible time to cripple the American worker with polices that legitimize illegal aliens or bring in vast new numbers of lawful immigrants, both of which are consequences of this amnesty bill. We need a policy that takes into account our economy in order to limit any adverse effects on employment. I suspect that as more examination of the Senate’s amnesty bill is undertaken, more and more serious flaws of this nature will be exposed.”


Rep. Barletta: “Our immigration laws were created for two purposes: to protect our national security and to protect American jobs. The Senate Gang of Eight proposal does neither.

It seems that yet again the American people are being sold a bill of goods. In 1986 we were told that if we granted amnesty to 1.5 million illegal immigrants, the problem would be solved and we would secure the borders. In fact, the borders remained wide open and the number of illegal immigrants swelled to more than three million. Now, the Gang of Eight is trying to tell us that they will fix the situation again, but we now find out that the threat to American jobs is greater than they have predicted. Illegal immigration is a problem on many fronts. It is clearly a national security issue, as the 1993 and 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center proved – never mind the problems with the system involved in the Boston Marathon attacks. It is also a threat to the livelihoods of legal immigrants and residents who obey our laws and would soon have to compete for scarce employment and resources. Finally, it is a fiscal liability that a recent study predicted would be a drain of $6.3 trillion on our taxpayers, even after tax receipts from legalized citizens were realized.

This plan does nothing to protect our national security, it does not help legal residents compete for jobs, and it is fiscally irresponsible. So exactly why would we do this?

This is a plan that needs to be defeated.”


BACKGROUND:
Compared to 2007, 4.6 million more Americans are out of work, 19.8 million more Americans are on food stamps, unemployment among teenagers is 54 percent higher (15.7 percent in 2007 vs. 24.1 percent in April 2013) and African-American teenage unemployment is 38 percent higher (29.4 percent in 2007 vs. 40.5 percent in April 2013). Meanwhile, labor force participation is at its lowest rate in more than three decades. Median household income is 8.9 percent lower than in 1999 and 8.1 percent lower than in 2007, according to the latest Census data.

A report from Northeastern University’s Center for Labor Market Studies titled “Over a Million Immigrants Land U.S. Jobs in 2008-2010” found that unskilled immigrants were taking jobs in the construction sector, a sector many young Americans seek to enter. A recent National Bureau of Economic Research report found that 40 percent of the decline in employment rates for low-skilled black men has been due to immigration in recent decades. Research by Harvard professors Borjas and Katz have found that immigration reduced the earnings of certain native born workers by up to 8 percent.

[NOTE: To view the full report from the Center for Immigration Studies, please click here.]

http://www.sessions.senate.gov/publi...on_id&Issue_id

Sessions will lead off debate on the Senate floor tomorrow on the Senate immigration bill. Sen. Reid has filed cloture to move the bill.

05/31/2013

Sessions warns immigration proposal will depress wages ‘for maybe 20 years-plus’



BY JEFF POOR

At a stop during his Alabama economic development tour at the Energex Tube facility in Thomasville on Thursday, Sen. Jeff Sessions had some strong words about the current immigration battle being waged on Capitol Hill for Ashley Knight of Mobile-CBS affiliate WKRG 5. (video above)

“I’m telling you — I’ve looked at it, I’ve studied it,” he said. “It will not work. It does not strengthen enforcement in any effective way.”

The economic effects of the proposal according to Alabama’s junior senator would include a negative impact on wage rates for two decades.

“It’s going to make it, at a time of high unemployment, flat wages for maybe 20 years-plus,” he said. “We need our wages to start going up.”

Sessions pleaded for compassion and for ending “illegality.” But he said previous efforts to curb illegal immigration, including a previous legislation promising a border fence, have failed to do accomplish meaningful results at the expense of the taxpayer.

“American people are being ripped off,” he added. “They’re being told time and time again we’re doing things that are going to stop the illegality and it’s not so. The government has failed to follow through and this bill will continue that.”

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