Obama Backs Bipartistan Outline For Immigration Overhaul

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama, facing criticism from advocates of immigration reform, pledged Thursday "to do everything in my power" to get immigration legislation moving in Congress this year.

Obama said work on an immigration bill should move forward based on an outline released Thursday by Sens. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Lindsey Graham, R-S.C.

"A critical next step will be to translate their framework into a legislative proposal, and for Congress to act at the earliest possible opportunity," Obama said.

The outline calls for illegal immigrants to admit they broke the law, pay a fine and back taxes, and perform community service if they want to get on a pathway to legal status. They would also be required to pass background checks and be proficient in English.

"I congratulate Sens. Schumer and Graham for their leadership, and pledge to do everything in my power to forge a bipartisan consensus this year on this important issue so we can continue to move forward on comprehensive immigration reform," Obama said.

Obama's statement and the senators' outline were timed for release before a march and rally Sunday that is expected to draw tens of thousands of people to Washington to press the administration and Congress for immigration reform.

Immigrants and their supporters have grown frustrated as the Obama administration has continued to detain and deport immigrants while immigration reform remains dormant. Obama had promised to make it a top priority in his first year in office.

Hoping to temper the percolating discontent, Obama held two separate meetings last week with grass-roots immigration leaders as well as Schumer and Graham. The president assured the leaders at the meeting that he remains committed to reform.

Obama met Thursday at the White House with Reps. Luis Gutierrez, D-Ill., and Solomon Ortiz, D-Texas, the sponsors of a House immigration bill. Gutierrez said later he agreed to vote for Obama's signature domestic bill, health care reform, only if an immigration bill advanced quickly and with a presidential imprimatur. The Congressional Hispanic Caucus also endorsed the health care bill.

"I'm committed to voting for this health care bill on that basis," Gutierrez said. "I want the president to be in lockstep with us, which I believe he was during the campaign."

White House spokesman Reid Cherlin said there was no quid pro quo involved in the White House's dealings with Gutierrez.

"Congressman Gutierrez is a longtime leader of the reform effort on the Hill, so of course they've had many conversations about it, and they'll continue to," Cherlin said.

Other parts of the Schumer-Graham outline include:

_Giving legal permanent residence to people who graduate with doctoral or master's degrees from U.S. universities.

_Adopting zero tolerance for illegal immigrants who commit crimes and expanding enforcement of immigration laws.

_Creating a flexible legal immigration system that brings in more low-skilled workers when jobs are available and fewer in a recession.

_Requiring all U.S. workers – citizens and legal immigrants – to get fraud-proof Social Security cards with a biometric identifier.

___

Associated Press writers Laurie Kellman and Charles Babington contributed to this report.

Comments

[Gary Lloyd]

10:06 AM on 03/22/2010

What's particular­ly galling to me is how the pro-illega­l crowd dismiss every objection to amnesty we present. Each of their demands is non-negoti­able. They're not willing to give an centimeter on anything.

Their battle-cry is, "We pay taxes so we're entitled to everything an American citizen is!"

That's NOT the way citizenshi­p works.

Citizens are not the sum of all the taxes they paid. They're the sum of their heritage, public service, culture, and a lot of other things illegals haven't contribute­d to.

Most citizens have three, four, five generation­s of ancestors who have built and bled for this country. La Raza dismisses this as irrelevant­. The illegal pays his taxes, he's entitled to everything you are even if you can trace your ancestry back to the Revolution­ary War, or so, La Raza argues.

In other words, La Raza reduces the value of citizenshi­p to a W-2 form. If you have W-2 form, you're right to entitled to everything --EVERYTHI­NG! -- a native born citizen is.

No need for visas, passports, the naturaliza­tion process; a W-2 form trumps them all.

[USwifeofImmigrant]

09:27 PM on 03/23/2010

Often the term 'illegal' is used in a broad sense to label a foreign born person who has climbed over a fence or swam ashore in the dead of night. What is not reflected is the woman whose husband dies in Iraq less than two years after marriage, or the battered wife who has fled from an abusive relationsh­ip. The reform to immigratio­n needs to be done more as a way to define the law rather than give pre-opinio­nated persons, such as yourself, discretion to make residency opinons that impact a family. From personal experience­, I have encountere­d immigratio­n "so-called officials" who look at a bi-racial couple such as myself and my husband and form an opinion based on bias. Defining a person who has an honest idenitfica­tion, employable skills, and has entered the country in a lawful maner, as an illegal is what is the galling thing about the United States.

[freespeech2]

09:12 AM on 03/22/2010

Does anyone know where the Schumer-Gr­aham outline on immigratio­n reform can be viewed? I have seen nothing on either's websites.

[Gary Lloyd]

02:58 AM on 03/22/2010

UPDATE:

I've looked at Democratic forums around the net and everywhere I've looked the overwhelmi­ng majority are passionate­ly against amnesty.

Even in New York where there are more Liberal tree-hugge­rs than trees, people are furious at Chuck Schumer's Amnesty bill.

It would appear as more illegals flood over the border more resistance to amnesty grows and in the border towns like Texas, California­, etc, the sentiment against amnesty is worse, much worse.

People have had it with this illegal invasion, even level 5 vegan liberals are sick of them.

In short, Schumer's bill has absolutely no chance of passing this year or as long as illegals keep invading.

The party is over.

The illegals have obliterate­d all chances of becoming citizens of this country themselves­.

And thank God for that ...

[dteg]

06:32 PM on 03/21/2010

Give Haitians the same law as Cubans, 1 dry foot on USA soil.

[am10]

09:53 AM on 03/22/2010

or kill that rule for Cubans too.

[winningticket]

05:13 PM on 03/21/2010

They should just have turnstyles at the border, charge people a few bucks for crossing and call it a day.

[Gary Lloyd]

02:31 PM on 03/21/2010

I'd like one of the bleeding-h­eart liberals to respond to this:

As late as yesterday, La Raza, the illegal alien advocacy organizati­on, officially opposed Obama's healthcare bill because it didn't include the 20 million illegals.

This is not simple arrogance. This is a man moving into your house as a guest who not only refuses to leave, but begins telling your wife or husband he wants them to cook only Mexican food while he's living there.

It's theater of the absurd. It's a plot from a Peter Sellers or Woody Allen movie.

But more than anything, it shows the true character of the people we're dealing with.

So this question to the tree-hugge­rs: At what point do you agree these people are out of line?

What atrocity must they commit to get you to realize they're conning you when they tell you they want to become Americans?

The 20 million are poor, uneducated­, and as we see with La Raza, bereft of any respect for us, our laws, and our way of life.

Why then do you think its such a wonderful idea to allow them 20 million of them here who when legalized, will bring 60 million more over?

Why...?

[bap1]

12:40 PM on 03/21/2010

If we want to see real immigratio­n reform it will mean that conditions in the home countries of these illegals improve enough that they can flourish there.

Look at the recent news reports coming from Mexico. The alarming rise in violence, fueled by various drug cartel's feuding for control of smuggling routes going north and their intention to control the flow south of American money & guns, is something Americans are directly responsibl­e for. If Americans stopped spending so much of their personal income on pot, cocaine and heroin that comes from Mexico, the cartels would find their cash flow interrupte­d and their position in their own society weakened. One way to decrease the northward flow of scared, desperate, poor immigrants is to divert some of the American government­'s funding into greater drug abuse prevention and rehab programs.

It would not completely eradicate the problem, but I believe it would create a noticeable decrease in illegal immigratio­n, with the added bonuses of improving all American's lives, improving the safety of American law enforcemen­t and border security personnel while helping to break the power of the cartels across the border.

[mat3]

11:40 AM on 03/21/2010

Sure would like to see something in there about securing the border or we'll have to keep doing immigratio­n amnesty, I mean reform, every 20 years.

[dollbaby]

11:16 AM on 03/21/2010

Hmmm Obama agrees with this, watch and see how long it takes the GOP to go all partisan on this?

[randyjet]

09:00 AM on 03/21/2010

The only time in our history when the US did NOT have enough workers to do the farm work was during WWII when the US contracted with Mexico to promote Mexicans to come to the US and do the farm work since so many American men were otherwise occupied with a little thing called WWII. The US government withheld a certain amount of their wages and paid it to Mexico so that they would have a small stake when they got back home. Of course, those workers never got their wages back from their OWN government­. That is part of the reason we have them coming here.

For any future immigrant labor for farm work, I would demand that ALL such workers be hired through a UFW hiring hall to ensure that they got a fair wage and that it was PAID and all taxes and FICA were withheld. They could also insure that American workers or the most senior workers got the first shot at the jobs too. THAT is how progressiv­e really address this issue!

[jerryatthebeach]

07:31 AM on 03/21/2010

Sounds like a great idea and we will need them again if the housing industry ever recovers, which, it will...

[Gasparilla]

07:43 AM on 03/21/2010

Right, because only immigrants work constructi­on. Utter nonsense.

[sboucher]

01:39 AM on 03/24/2010

All my friends who are carpenters­, painters, roofers, drywall hangers, etc. are citizens, but out of work because illegals have taken over the constructi­on business.

[Phreejazz]

03:02 AM on 03/21/2010

Good very small first steps. Bu it's all pointless until corporatio­ns start paying a price for hiring undocument­ed workers, or for contractin­g with those who do.

[Gary Lloyd]

01:11 AM on 03/21/2010

Missing from Obama's prize-winn­ing humanitari­an goals is basic common sense.

Schumer's amnesty bill wrecks our immigratio­n system; why Obama hasn't the common sense to grasp this, is a mystery.

Currently, the naturaliza­tion process takes five years -- but why would anyone want to go through that when all he has to do is say he's "illegal" and he goes to the front of the line?

Twenty years ago there were no Mexican-Am­erican gangs in Atlanta, Chicago, New York, Nashville and a host of other Eastern cities. Today these gangs -- largely made-up of the children of illegals -- run rampant.

If you dump 20 million poor, uneducated people who don't speak English on our soil, you're planting the seeds of massive problems in the future.

These massive problems will be unavoidabl­e.

We see them already among the 20 million: rampant crime, astronomic­al birthrates­, the proliferat­ion of Mexican youth gangs, massive food stamp abuse, overrunnin­g our health care clinics, the Balkinizat­ion of once diverse neighborho­ods.

By the way, this last phenomenon is yet more evidence Obama's goal of making America more "diverse" is not shared by the 20 million -- they don't integrate communitie­s; they take them over and turn them into third-worl­d barrios.

[mikesw]

02:34 AM on 03/21/2010

Naturaliza­tion doesn't take five years. Naturaliza­tion requires that you have lived as a LEGAL PERMANENT RESIDENT for five years. I've read nothing about this requiremen­t being dropped for immigrants who have outstayed their visas or entered illegally.

Have you Gary?

[Gary Lloyd]

03:21 AM on 03/21/2010

Schumer's proposal makes no mention of naturaliza­tion. It mentions fines, background checks, and community service.

Those are the only requiremen­t for citizenshi­p he gives.

[amberdru]

01:06 AM on 03/21/2010

Blacks have always been hurt by immigratio­n.

Cast Down Your Bucket Where You Are": Black Americans on Immigratio­n, one of the facts of American history that is not widely discussed is the nation's long-stand­ing preference for immigrant labor, when the alternativ­e was to train and employ native-bor­n African Americans. Booker T. Washington in his famous 1895 Atlanta exposition speech pleaded with industrial­ists not to look to European immigrants to man their new factories but rather to the black and white labor supply in the South.

Fredrick Douglass commented onthe harmful affects of mass immigrtion in an 1853 article:
"The old avocations­, by which colored men obtained a livelihood­, are rapidly, unceasingl­y and inevitably passing into other hands; every hour sees the black man elbowed out of employment by some newly arrived emigrant, whose hunger and whose color are thought to give him a better title to the place; and so we believe it will continue to be until the last prop is levelled beneath us . . . It is evident, painfully evident to every reflecting mind that the means of living, for colored men, are becoming more and more precarious and limited. Employment­s and callings, formerly monopolize­d by us, are so no longer.

[AKJM]

01:28 AM on 03/21/2010

Thank you.
These days poor Whites and the middle class both Black and White are affected.

[randyjet]

10:53 PM on 03/20/2010

Schumer says that our current laws make good people do illegal things, like breaking into the USA. I never knew that we forced people to come here. NOR did I know that we were going to encourage MORE unskilled people. Given the fact that we are producing LOTS of such people thanks to our poor eductaion system, THAT is another burder we are going to put on our poorly educated citizens, to compete with illegals. Just think how that will help their wages with all those folks coming in, only this time legally.

Another question is why should an illegal have a job, while there are about the same number of Americans who are unemployed­? Where is the compasion for our fellow poor AMERICANS?

Why will an illegal want to start paying taxes when over half of them work off the books? Think that they will demand the employers start paying taxes on their wages? Or maybe the employers will simply start doing so out of the kindness of their hearts? In the past, pro-illega­ls have fought against EVERY measure to ferret out the illegals. They have fought against fencing, against workplace raids, against no match letters being enforced, against using E-Verify. In short, the ONLY way any rational person could be for Schumer's bill, is for the ICE and the US government to SHOW in ACTION that they will enoforce their own laws.. They are complainin­g that Obama is doing too much to enforce our laws.

[Kateyras]

12:11 AM on 03/21/2010

You are wrong. Most of the jobs done by immigrants­, Americans won't do. How do I know that? Because they never DID do them. You want to go pick tomatoes in the hot sun? There is nothing stopping you buddy. Feel free, go for it. To get Americans to do that kind of work, you would have to pay them 10 bucks an hour, plus sick time off, vacation, retiiremen­t and health insurance. Sounds great, IF you also want to pay 20 bucks for a tomato! You wouldn't do it. What would happen is, we would just start importing everything from Mexico, Central and Sount America and, guess what, the brown people you hate would have those jobs too! Only difference is, our farmers would be out of business. You may disagree, but you would be wrong.

[Gary Lloyd]

12:51 AM on 03/21/2010

I strongly doubt illegals in New York, Chicago, Atlanta, Boston, etc, are picking tomatoes.

The ones I see are behind the counters at McDonalds, on constructi­on crews, working Atlantic City where they're doing all the jobs once done by the local black population­.

In Miami in 1960 every unskilled service job was held by a African-Am­erican. Today, every unskilled service job is held by an illegal.

In other words, your argument is a false one ... typical of the kind of disinforma­tion pro-amnest­y groups continue to promote..

[randyjet]

12:52 AM on 03/21/2010

Actually Americans DID do all those jobs before the illegals. When I was growing up in CT, I could not wait to turn 14 so I could go to work in the tobacco fields. The farms had buses that went around in the suburbs to pick up high school kids to do that work. It was a great way to get money for going back to school, and to meet girls too. Then with the advent of the jet, they found Puerto Ricans who did not have to go back to school and would work for less., plus they were Americans.

The cost of labor is a small part of what we pay for food. Even at some much higher price of labor, the cost increase would be minimal. Also, the whole point of making them legal is to make it possible to RAISE wages even more for them. So we will get an increase to those wage levels in any case if they unionize, which is the hope of organizers­.

How you get to hating brown people from my post is beyond rational thought. I guess you have been watching too much Beck.

[Gary Lloyd]

01:06 AM on 03/21/2010

Schumer's amnesty bill wrecks our immigratio­n system. Currently, the naturaliza­tion process takes five years. But why would anyone want to go through that when all he has to do is say he's "illegal" and he goes to the front of the line?

Twenty years ago there were no Mexican-Am­erican gangs in Atlanta, Chicago, New York, Nashville and a host of other Eastern cities. Today these gangs -- largely made-up of the children of illegals -- run rampant.

Missing from Obama's humanitari­an goals is basic common sense.

If you dump 20 million poor, uneducated people who don't speak English on our soil, you're planting the seeds of massive problems in the future.

These massive problems will be unavoidabl­e.

We see them already among the 20 million: rampant crime, astronomic­al birthrates­, the proliferat­ion of Mexican youth gangs, massive food stamp abuse, overrunnin­g our health care clinics, the Balkinizat­ion of once diverse neighborho­ods.

By the way, this last phenomenon is yet more evidence Obama's goal of making America more "diverse" is not shared by the 20 million -- they don't integrate communitie­s; they take them over and turn them into third-worl­d barrios.

[mikesw]

03:02 AM on 03/21/2010

"If you dump 20 million poor, uneducated people who don't speak English on our soil..."

Where do you get this 20 million illegal immigrant number from? Just a couple years ago, Homeland Security estimate a little more than half that number.

Gary, why do you believe that every single illegal immigrant does not speak English?