Obama to hold bi-partisan meeting on immigration reform

Obama to hold bi-partisan meeting on immigration reform
In April, the Obama White House made huge news when it signaled that it would pursue immigration reform this year.

Mizanur Rahman
Houston Chronicle
Immigration Chronicles

It appears today the administration is taking its first step to that goal.

According to America's Voice, the Obama Administration announced that it plans to hold a bi-partisan meeting with members of Congress on June 8 to discuss moving forward on comprehensive immigration reform this year.

So we'll start taking bets now on the odds of CIR passing this year.

The nonpartisan Reform Institute held a forum in Capitol Hill today to talk about its position that immigration reform is critical to long-term economic growth.

Former U.S. Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez and demographer Dowell Myers of the University of Southern California attended the forum. According to a Reform Institute statement:

"The United States has long benefited from having the most talented, hardest working labor force; fixing our broken immigration system so that the best and the brightest from around the globe will continue to bring their energy and entrepreneurial spirit to the U.S. will be critical to maintaining our competitive edge as well as our ability to be the land of opportunity and prosperity," stated Secretary Gutierrez.

"The two greatest demographic forces that will shape America's future are the aging of the baby boomers and the settlement and advancement of immigrants; where they intersect must be a key focus for policymakers," according to Dr. Myers.

Not everyone is buying the argument that immigration reform would help the U.S. economy. Here's an excerpt from a report by the Federation for American Immigration Reform:

The arguments put forward by amnesty advocates -- such as the Immigration Policy Center -- offer no new research, but rather regurgitate research that lumps together legal and illegal immigrant workers in order to give the false impression that illegal immigration is a benefit to the country and would be even more so if they gained legal status through an amnesty. This ignores findings that demonstrate the very different characteristics of illegal alien workers compared to legal permanent residents.

Experience with the 1986 amnesty demonstrates the falseness of the assertion that adoption of an amnesty would transform lowskilled, low-educational-attainment, illegal aliens into skilled, educated workers who would be making high wages and paying higher taxes.

Research in fact documents that the result would be the opposite. Adoption of an amnesty would perpetuate competition for low wage jobs, harm to the nation's
most vulnerable workers, extend reliance on social welfare programs by poor Americans, and increase the number of persons eligible for social assistance.Moreover, granting amnesty to illegal aliens would send the
message around the globe that the United States no longer believes in the rule of law and is not willing to punish those who violate it.