The unemployment bill includes a major foreign-worker increase -- Tell your Senators to say NO!

A very interesting post from www.numbersusa.com about the worker increase in the unemployment bill. This follows this post about Diane Black attempting to defund the illegal alien advocate position. This follows this post about Chris Christie giving in-state tuition to illegal immigrants in New Jersey. REMEMBER, “Amnesty” means ANY non-enforcement of existing immigration laws! This follows this comment and this post about how to Report Illegal Immigrants! For more about what you can do click here and you can read two very interesting books HERE.

The unemployment bill includes a major foreign-worker increase -- Tell your Senators to say NO!

Dear NumbersUSA activists, Happy New Year! Only 2 days into this second session of the 113th Congress, we need to ask for your quick attention to help block a major foreign-worker increase amendment in the Senate. Please go to https://www.numbersusa.com/faxes?ID=15659 and send a fax to your two Senators asking them to OPPOSE Sen. Jerry Moran's Amendment (S. Amdt 2612) to S. 1845, the Emergency Unemployment Compensation Extension Act (DETAILS BELOW). While NumbersUSA takes no position on the overall legislation or the extension of unemployment benefits, we do oppose major increases in foreign workers, particularly at a time when more than 20 million citizens and legal immigrants are struggling to find full-time work. One can't help but note the irony in Sen. Moran's attempt to permanently increase the number of foreign workers via legislation intended to help unemployed U.S. workers. Your quick response is particularly needed as this amendment is the first immigration-related piece of legislation in play this year and defeating it will send an important message that Americans oppose increases in immigration, whether or not they are comprehensive increases or piecemeal increases. The fate of the Moran Amendment is surely being monitored by the well-funded advocates of higher immigration such as Mark Zuckerberg's FWD.us and others who have just this week essentially said they are no longer pushing for a comprehensive immigration bill and instead focusing on pushing any and every piecemeal increase they can. While this particular action is in the Senate, you can be sure that the House Leadership is watching closely as they are preparing to set their legislative priorities for the year. Send a Fax Yesterday the Senate voted to proceed to the debate over the extension of unemployment benefits (S. 1845). Today, Sen. Jerry Moran (R-Kan.) has introduced an amendment to the unemployment extension bill. His amendment would add language that would grant an additional 125,000 permanent foreign workers visas each year.  Fax your Senator or click https://www.numbersusa.com/faxes?ID=15659 These permanent visas would be allocated as such: 50,000 to foreign graduates in STEM fields and 75,000 to "immigrant entrepreneurs." While there is some support for increasing the share of qualified STEM-type visas, there is nothing temporary or qualified about the Moran Amendment and it contains no worker protections. THANK YOU for all you have done and continue to do in the name of sensible immigration policies. Anne manetas

4 Senators Propose Easing Visa Limits for Highly Skilled While Americans Still Unemployed

A very interesting post from www.Alipac.US about a proposed immigration increase during a time of high unemployment. This follows this post about illegal immigration in the "conservative" state of Texas. This follows this post about Marco Rubio's DREAM Act. This follows this post about the Black Caucus hurting Black Americans with their immigration stand. This follows this post about how to Report Illegal Immigrants! For more that you can do to get involved click HERE and you can read a very interesting book HERE!

4 Senators Propose Easing Visa Limits for Highly Skilled While Americans Still Unemployed

A bipartisan group of four senators proposed on Tuesday easing visa limits for highly skilled immigrants and foreign students, a move that challenges Congressional leaders on their fixed positions on the issue of immigration during an election year.



Two Democrats, Senators Mark Warner of Virginia and Chris Coons of Delaware, and two Republicans, Senators Marco Rubio of Florida and Jerry Moran of Kansas, introduced the legislation, which is a break for both parties. Democrats have traditionally held highly skilled worker visas as a bargaining chip for measures on lower-skilled immigrants that are far less politically popular. Many Republicans have opposed any expansion of visas.



May 22, 2012, 1:00 pm

ByJONATHAN WEISMAN NY Times



But the senators, appearing at a news conference on Tuesday, said the struggling economy necessitated steps that move past those positions. Mr. Rubio is trying to gather support for his version of legislation that would offer legal status to young illegal immigrants brought to the country as children, but he said he would not try to link his version of the Dream Act to the new high-skilled worker proposal. That has to pass on its own merits, he said.



Senators Coons and Warner agreed, even as they reiterated their support for comprehensive immigration legislation.

“We’ve got to grow jobs,” Mr. Warner said.



“We can’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good,” Mr. Coons said.



The new legislation would create a new type of visa for as many as 50,000 foreign students graduating from American universities with master’s degrees or doctorates in science, technology, engineering or mathematics. Visa recipients would have to show they stayed in science and technology fields for five consecutive years before they could get permanent resident status. The proposal would also create 75,000 new visas for immigrant entrepreneurs in the science and technology field.



The legislation would also eliminate numerical limitations on employment-based visas that use per-country quotas. And it would make tax changes that favor start-ups, including making permanent President Obama 100 percent exemption on capital gains taxes for investments in small start-ups.

“It’s new businesses that create jobs,” said Robert Litan, vice president for research and policy at the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, not necessarily small businesses.



The lawmakers are trying to build off the success they had with the Jobs Act, which focused on easing capital to small businesses. Joining them at the news conference was Steve Case, a co-founder of America Online and one of the JOBS Act’s biggest champions.



“This economy was built on risk-taking entrepreneurs,” Mr. Case said. “It’s important that we double down.”



For decades, immigration measures have been far more controversial than straight business bills. Democrats and immigration advocates have held back visas for highly skilled workers and temporary agriculture worker programs to martial support among business groups, reasoning that once they passed, Republican allies would have secured their priorities and any effort to get a pathway to citizenship for illegal immigrants would lose the few Republican allies it has.



Immigration opponents have said high-skilled visa expansions take good-paying jobs from Americans and work as a disincentive for students who should be striving for those jobs.



Those factors make the new push for four relatively new senators an uphill climb.



“As the new guys, we didn’t get the memo that in an election year, we’re supposed to take the year off,” Mr. Warner said. “Clearly, China is not taking the year off.”