Friday, May 18, 2007

Senators Strike Immigration Deal

The "Deal" Offers:
  • New renewable four-year Z visa to be created for illegal immigrants allowing employment. After renewal, worker may be eligible for green card
  • Temporary worker program to allow 400,000 workers three renewable two-year visas but require them to go home before they can return each time. Their time in the US would earn points towards permanent status
  • Stiffer penalties
  • Tighter border security
  • Merit-based system to gauge skills of future immigrants

1 comment:

AG said...

It's Fascinating.
Capital and labor can be freely moved across borders, but not bodies. Davis' Magical Urbanism discusses the development of twin cities along the US-Mexico border in which on US soil are the executive offices and on the (exploited) other side are their maquiladoras. Anti-flag put it well
"The line is drawn
In the sand
On one side your a slave
The other a free man.."

Now this (perfectly proletarianized?) labor force has been legally appropriated and coded into breaks and flows..."Their time [working??] in the US would earn points towards permanent status"...a new stage in (capitalist)liberalism and democracy: slave-worker now, citizen later?