Chicago, IL
In just the last few weeks, leaders at all levels of government have heard the voices of immigrants and their allies in labor, religious, civil rights and community groups, demanding an opportunity for undocumented workers to move out of the shadows and continue their contributions in their workplaces and communities without fear and with the rights and protections of any other U.S. worker. Many states and localities have embraced immigrant workers and their families, establishing day labor centers to ensure a decent wage for hard work, facilitating easier access to driver's licenses, and investing in the future by helping more immigrant children attend college. And most recently, both the White House and Congress appear poised to push serious changes in immigration law that will affect us all, regardless of immigration status.
The AFL-CIO welcomes these developments. Though globalization is often viewed as a one-way street to move capital around the world, it can pave the road to reunification of families and to opportunities to improve living standards through hard work. The United States bears dramatic testament to this phenomenon: according to the 2000 census, there are more foreign-born people in the United States now, in all categories of immigration, than ever before.
As a workers' movement built by immigrants, we believe the nation should embrace immigrants for the diversity and values they bring, rather than fear them as threats to values or jobs. Hopefully, the debates in town halls, Congress and the media will culminate in prompt and fair changes that benefit us all, and that reflect our values as a people.
More than a year ago, in February 2000, the AFL-CIO Executive Council firmly and squarely set out our view that immigrants have played and continue to play an extremely important role in the workplace and society; and that they are entitled to full and fair workplace protections. We believe that the principles we laid out in our statement on immigration should form national immigration policy. Specifically:
- undocumented workers and their families should be provided permanent legal status through a new legalization program;
- employer sanctions and the I-9 system should be replaced with a system that targets and criminalizes business behavior that exploits workers for commercial gain;
- immigrant workers should have full workplace rights, including the right to organize and protections for whistleblowers;
- labor and business together should design mechanisms to meet legitimate needs for new workers without compromising the rights and opportunities of workers already here; and
- guestworker programs should be reformed but not expanded.
The foundation of any discussion on immigration must begin with a broad legalization program that makes no distinction based on country of origin and that allows undocumented workers and their families who have been working hard, paying taxes and contributing to their communities the opportunity to adjust to permanent legal resident status. The Congressional Hispanic Caucus is blazing the trail that the country must follow to address the inequities in our current immigration system.
The AFL-CIO and its affiliated unions will work vigilantly with our coalition partners representing the immigrant, ethnic, faith, and civil rights communities to ensure that comprehensive legislation providing for legalization and the enforcement of workplace rights for all workers is introduced in Congress and ultimately signed into law.
Along with legalization, reform of the immigration system must also include repeal of the current system of workplace immigration enforcement with its emphasis on the I-9 system. The current system does not work: not only does it not deter the hiring of undocumented workers, it actually protects employers who violate labor law as a matter of business practice. Instead of punishing workers, the I-9 enforcement system should be replaced with one that further criminalizes smuggling and production of fraudulent documents for commercial gain, creates stiff penalties for employers who exploit immigrant status to interfere with workers' exercise of employment and labor rights, and gives protected status to those immigrant workers who courageously come forward to protest violations of their workplace rights. The workplace is stronger, fairer and safer for all when the rights of every worker are equally protected and enforced by law.
We should recognize that one of the reasons for undocumented immigration is that our current legal immigration system for family members and for workers is in shamefully bad shape. Whether addressing the family reunification backlogs or processing the applications of those seeking to adjust their status, the INS should be appropriated adequate amounts of funding specifically dedicated to benefits and services. The promise of legalization is only real when the agency administering the program has properly trained staff, reasonable regulations promulgated in accordance with the letter and spirit of the law, and the funding necessary to process applications in a fair and efficient manner.
Beginning the debate on immigration reform by fashioning it around creation of an extensive new guestworker program for low-skill jobs, as some have proposed, is a wrong-headed approach. The upshot of every guestworker program in the United States to-date has been to further depress wages for all workers, foreign and U.S.-born, to cause greater exploitation, and to reduce overall employment opportunities. Oftentimes, the agricultural guestworker program continues even as its abuses are chronicled. In the future for other industries, it is unacceptable to tie immigrant workers to an employer, industry or region with the nebulous promise of some form of legalization after a period of many years. It is equally unacceptable that guestworkers be used to deny opportunities to U.S. workers and drive wages down. Guestworker programs must be reformed first before we discuss their use as a tool for legalization.
Along with U.S. workers, immigrant workers perform valuable jobs. Too often, employers have attempted to divide workers by race, ethnicity and immigration status, playing one group against the other to undermine solidarity and preclude workers from achieving progress together. History has proven that mistreatment of one group in a workplace will ultimately lead to the mistreatment of all workers. We have much to learn from each other. We must be mindful of and learn from the history of oppression that many U.S. workers have faced, in particular the long struggle of African-American workers. All workers must understand the difference that unions make for workers, whether it is a living wage, better benefits or a safer work environment.
Like our nation, our workplaces are becoming more diverse. Our nation, our workplaces, and our movement will be better and stronger by including those previously excluded. Together, as union brothers and sisters, we will embrace, celebrate and respect our diversity, and will aggressively pursue policies and laws that ensure the fair treatment for all workers and their families.