"The Senate immigration bill would require that foreign construction laborers here under the guest-worker program be paid well above the minimum wage, even as American workers at the same work site could earn less.
The bill "would guarantee wages to some foreign workers that could be higher than those paid to American workers at the same work site," says a policy paper released this week by the Senate's Republican Policy Committee. "This is unfair to U.S. workers, inappropriate, and unnecessary."
The 11-page, harshly critical analysis of the Senate immigration bill on this one point reveals how torn Senate Republicans are over the larger issue of immigration.
Though the bill was supported by Majority Leader Bill Frist of Tennessee and Majority Whip Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, it was opposed by the rest of the Senate Republican leadership and a majority of Republicans in the chamber. And despite the support of Mr. Frist and Mr. McConnell, this week's policy paper critical of the wage guarantees for foreign workers marks the official stance of the Republican Policy Committee, which formulates and implements the policies of the caucus.
Across the Capitol, House Republicans are no more charitable about the Senate's immigration bill. They announced yesterday seven new House hearings for later this month into how bad they think the Senate bill is. One such hearing is titled: "Do the Reid-Kennedy bill's amnesty provisions repeat the mistakes of the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986?" "
No doubt this version of the bill is god-awful - thank McCain (and remember he wants to be your President). What would this mean?
"The Davis Bacon Act of 1931 (DBA) requires that the local prevailing wage be paid to all workers employed in federally contracted construction or projects done for the District of Columbia. Those wages -- up to four or five times higher in some fields than the federal minimum wage of $5.15 per hour -- are set by the Department of Labor.
The Senate's immigration bill would require that the higher wages be paid to foreign temporary workers in all construction occupations, even if the project isn't federally funded and doesn't otherwise fall under DBA.
"In other words, foreign workers employed in a construction job for which a DBA wage rate has been determined could be guaranteed wages higher than those paid to American workers doing the same job on the same private construction project for the same employer," the policy paper reports.
The DBA wage rate for an air conditioning mechanic in Alexandria or Montgomery County, for instance, is $30.27 an hour. That mechanic also is guaranteed paid holidays for New Year's Day, Martin Luther King's birthday, Memorial Day Independence Day, Labor Day, Veterans Day, Thanksgiving Day, the day after Thanksgiving and Christmas Day">
Ok, at this point we know that there is NO WAY in hell any substantive immigration reform is going to get done in this election year. But then the entire debate isn't going to be solved in a way which is going to be acceptable to all. The first step of securing the borders is worthless is it's not going to be "north and south". We can't cry for shoring up the southern border while allowing a porous and wide open border with Canada. That in itself if part of the problem. For more of my position on this subject review here.
But this kind of language in the bill is ludicrous and in the words of Rumsfeld, "Not helpful". Senator Harry Reid is definately not being helpful as well. H/t Michelle Malkin.
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