From: cnd-us@cnd.org (CND-US Editors) Subject: CND-US Update on the Simpson Bill (II), November 30, 1995 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ C h i n a N e w s D i g e s t +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ US Regional Special Issue: Update on the Simpson Bill (II) November 30, 1995 +--------------------------------------------------------------------------+ | CND-US, normally 1 or 2 issues a week, is a supplement to CND-Global and | | has basically no overlap with the CND-G news. CND-US provides in-depth | | information concerning Chinese students/scholars in the United States. | +-------------------------------ISSN 1024-9141-----------------------------+ Table of Contents # of Lines ============================================================================ 1. News Brief (1 Item) .................................................. 11 2. Simpson Moved S.1394 Through the Senate Immigration Subcommittee, Organizations to Present New Approaches & Make New Efforts Against It 78 3. Another Response from Senator Kennedy: Immigration Reform Which Protects Families and U.S. Workers ......... 140 --- --- --- More Info on S.1394 Is Available at URL http://cnd.cnd.org/visa/simpson-bill/ Or at URL http://www.cnd.org/ (Look for Server Announcements on the top page) ============================================================================ CND is a free network news service run by volunteers. To subscribe to/unsub. various CND Services and/or for more information,see trailer of the package. CND-US is published by China News Digest International, Inc. All rights are reserved. Redistribution is hereby permitted provided that it is not for profit and with proper acknowledgement to CND. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1. News Brief (1 Item) .................................................. 11 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- [Financial Times, 7/8 Oct, 95] Skilled Immigrants Needed for High-Tech Work A letter to Congress from Microsoft CEO Bill Gates (cosigned by CEOs of Hewlett Packard, Intel, Sun, and Texas Instruments) says: "The availability of computer and software engineers on a timely basis is critical to our business success. Delays in design, development and production mean a loss of market share that may never be recaptured." The CEOs are worried about immigration laws that would deprive them of skilled labor. Microsoft's labor force is 5-7% foreign-born. An emigration expert at the Carnegie Endowment Fund observes that companies are perfectly capable of moving operations offshore if the talent they need is denied them. [Forwarded by: whuang@hardrock.rad.rpslmc.edu (Weiqing Huang)] ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2. Simpson Moved S.1394 Through the Senate Immigration Subcommittee, Organizations to Present New Approaches & Make New Efforts Against It 78 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1) From: hq@ifcss.org 11/30/95 Subject: HQ NR #7060: Simpson Bill S 1394 Passed in Judiciary Subcommittee Simpson Bill S 1394 Passed in Judiciary Subcommittee Legislation introduced by Simpson (R-Wyo) to significantly reform the legal immigration system and harshly harm business-based employ- ment and immigration was approved by a 5 - 2 vote yesterday by the Senate Judiciary Immigration Subcommittee. The Subcommittee also voted to combine the legislation with Simp- son's bill to reform illegal immigration - S 269, which had been approved ppreviously by this subcommittee. The combined bill will now be sent to the full Judiciary Committee for further action and consideration. During the subcommittee markup, Simpson amended his bill to add- ress valid concerns raised by the business community, especially "high-tech" companies. Simpson removed a provision in the draft legislation that would have required new foreign graduates of U.S. university to complete two years of work outside of the U.S. prior to being allowed to work in the country. In addition, Simpson lowered a fee proposed to be charged to employers wishing to hire foreign workers, taking it down from 25 % to 10 % or $10,000, which- ever is higher, of the first year's salary. The IFCSS Headquarters believes that the national lobbying from high-tech industry and educational community, played important roles in forcing the Simpson's bill to be amended. IFCSS will present new approaches for further lobby effort, and strongly urges our CSS community to be alert, though the bill was amended, and start to fight at the full Committee level. ___ ___ ___ 2) From: Yu Uny Cao 11/30/95 Subject: National Committee on Immigration News Release #NR9534 Simpson moved S. 1394 through the Senate Immigration Subcommittee From: Federation for American Immigration Reform ACCA's Note: Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) is an anti-immigration advocacy group. The following is from their networks. Our campaign still has a long way to go. ACCA/NCOI will keep you posted once we have the summaries ready. Simpson moved S. 1394 through the Senate Immigration Subcommittee intact. Full committee mark-up in the Senate Judiciary committee may not begin until next year. We will keep you posted. The battle for immigration reform continues! The House has completed its committee consideration of H.R. 2202, the Immigration in the National Interest Act, and the Senate Subcommittee on Immigration will take up S.1394, The Immigration Reform Act Nov 29th. S.1934 reduces immigration overall by 30%, and eliminates the family preference categories that have caused chain migration. Senator Alan Simpson (R-WY), the sponsor of the bill, has tough opposition in his own subcommittee from Senator Edward Kennedy (D-MA), the ranking minority member and author of the 1965 "chain migration" amendments. S. 1394 corrects many of the problems created in 1965; but Sen. Kennedy and others will doubtlessly try to prevent real reform by introducing a series of weakening amendments. Simpson must also shore up his base of support within his own party. We must keep up pressure on Senator's Jon Kyl (R-AZ), Arlen Specter (R-PA) and Charles Grassley (R-IA) because in the past they have not been 100 percent supportive of legal reform. It is important to continue using the same tools we used successfully in the House: call, write, fax. Your participation is critical. Senator Diane Feinstein: Phone: (202) 224-3841 Fax: 228-3954. Senator Jon Kyl: Phone: (202) 224-4521 Fax: 228-1239. Senator Charles Grassley: Phone: (202) 224-3744. Fax: 224-6020. Senator Arlen Specter: Phone: (202) 224-4254 Fax: 224-3442. Senator Paul Simon: Phone: (202) 224-2152. Fax: 224-8180. Senator Alan Simpson Phone: (202) 224-3424 Fax: 224-1315. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 3. Another Response from Senator Kennedy: Immigration Reform Which Protects Families and U.S. Workers ......... 140 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- _From: <*****@******.wright.edu> 11/30/95 Editor: The attached is from Senator Kennedey in response on my email. You might think of posting it so that the public knows how he thinks if it is not too late. Please remove my email address if you post it. From: Senator@kennedy.senate.gov IMMIGRATION REFORM WHICH PROTECTS FAMILIES AND U.S. WORKERS Mr. President, in the coming weeks, the full Senate will be engaged in the important issue of reforming the immigration laws. Our principal goal is to provide the additional authority needed to combat illegal immigration. Initial progress is being made as a result of increases in resources and personnel of the Immigration and Naturalization Service to deal with this ongoing crisis that is so harmful to the country, but much needs to be done. It would be a mistake, however, to allow the nations concerns about illegal immigration to create an unjustified and unwarranted backlash in Congress over legal immigration. Legal immigrants come to America within the limits prescribed in the immigration laws. They join their families, roll up their sleeves, and contribute to U.S. communities. There is every reason to believe that todays new Americans will build an even stronger America for the next generation just as our immigrant predecessors did for us. It is especially important, therefore, that any reforms of the laws governing legal immigration must protect families and U.S. workers. Most Americans agree that U.S. citizens should have the right to bring spouses, children, and other close family members to this country to be with them here if they wish to do so. Yet, there are those who would deny American citizens the privilege to reunite their families in America. Proposals currently before Congress would make it illegal for an American citizen to bring a parent who is under age 65. It would be illegal for Americans to bring in their adult children. And it would be illegal to bring in a brother or sister. In each of these cases, under current law, the U.S. citizen must agree to sponsor their relatives -- to provide for them if they fall on hard times. And we must take additional steps to ensure that U.S. citizens fulfill their sponsorship obligations and be prepared to take legal action against them when they fail to care for their immigrant relatives. Clearly, some reforms may be desirable in the numbers admitted each year. But we should not deny U.S. citizens the privilege of family reunification -- whether it involves their parents, their adult children or their brothers and sisters. In the case of brothers and sisters, large numbers of Americans have already paid millions of dollars in fees to the federal government to have their siblings join them in America. Yet, not only are there those who would eliminate this immigration for the future, they would even deny any possibility of family reunification here for those Americans who have paid hard-earned dollars to the government and waited patiently for their brothers and sisters to come. In addition to protecting families, our laws governing legal immigration must also protect U.S. workers. When immigrants come here at the request of an employer to fill a job vacancy, and not for family reunification, we must make certain that they do not displace a U.S. worker from that job. And we must ensure that employers do not underpay immigrants and undercut the wages of American workers. Our immigration laws have enabled dedicated workers to come here to contribute their skills and ingenuity to American businesses. At times, they have made the difference between the success and failure of an enterprise and have saved American jobs in the process. Nevertheless, in many respects, the laws and procedures governing immigration for employment fail to protect U.S. workers adequately. Although U.S. employers are required to attempt to recruit U.S. workers before turning to immigrants, this process results in the hire of an American worker less than one-half of one-percent of the time. Clearly, the current recruitment requirement does not work and is widely ignored. I am particularly concerned that the laws permitting temporary foreign workers to come to this country have not kept pace with changes in the labor market. U.S. companies are resorting increasingly to temporary hires, rather than permanent employees, and are contracting out functions which they previously performed in-house with permanent staff. The growth of temporary and part-time employees in the labor market means that temporary foreign workers are now in direct competition with this new class of American worker. Lax immigration standards on temporary foreign workers -- so-called nonimmigrants -- have enabled computer consulting firms, health care providers and too many others to turn to temporary foreign workers. As some U.S. companies lay off U.S. workers from their permanent payrolls, they are hiring temporary foreign workers to take their places. This practice cannot be permitted to continue. I join with the Chairman of the Immigration Subcommittee, Senator Simpson, in seeking reforms of this aspect of our immigration laws. Clearly, when employers cannot find a qualified U.S. worker, the immigration laws should fill the gap. But these laws must not be a pretext for hiring cut-rate foreign labor at the expense of U.S. workers. The immigration issue is about our roots as Americans. It is also about how we see our future. We all agree that we must control illegal immigration. But very different considerations apply to legal immigrants. In the process of enacting immigration reform, we must remember and honor the many benefits which legal immigrants have brought to our nation. The reforms we enact must crack down on illegal immigrants, but they must also protect U.S. workers and the right of American citizens to reunite with their families. +--------------------------------------------------------------------------+ | Executive Editor of This Issue: Bo Xiong (Chicago, IL) | | Coordinating Editor of This Issue: TANG Hong (Colorado Springs, CO) | | CND Mailing Lists Maintainers: Liedong Zheng (Singapore) | | Haosheng Zhou (Canada) | | CND Reader Technical Consultant: XU Ming Yang (Australia) | | CND Manager: Bing Wen (Canada) | +--------------------------------------------------------------------------+ | China News Digest (CND) offers the following services: | | (1) Global News (Every Other Day) (2) US Regional News | | (3) Canada Regional News (4) Europe & Pacific Regional News | | (5) HXWZ (Weekly Chinese Magazine) (6) InfoBase | | CND back issues, database and related information are available via: | | ftp://cnd.org [132.249.229.100]; gopher://cnd.org; http://www.cnd.org | | For Readers in Canada: ftp://canada.cnd.org [142.132.1.50] | | To subscribe or get information, mail request to: CND-INFO@CND.ORG | | To contribute news, please send it to: CND-EDITOR@CND.ORG | +--------------------------------------------------------------------------+