Amnesty setback in Senate leaves mestizo population in a quandry. “Who’s going to do the beds at the hotels? Who’s going to pick the oranges? Who’s going to wash the dishes?”
By MAURA POSSLEY
MANATEE –Hopes were high within the local Latino community when the U.S. Senate took up its controversial immigration reform proposal this week.
But as the bill suffered a possibly fatal defeat Thursday, stunned supporters were left wondering when – or how – the topic would resurface. It appears unlikely lawmakers will tackle immigration again before the 2008 presidential election.
“Are we going to continue to pretend there is nothing happening here?” said Luz Corcuera, chair of Manatee County’s Latino Community Network. “If the president has spoken and we have sent our phone calls and letters to our representatives, where do we go from here?”
Corcuera and other supporters saw President Bush’s strong support of the bill as a sign that passing reform was imminent. The bill would have brought a sweeping overhaul to national immigration policy.
“He said we need to come from a place of compassion, and this is not a compassionate response,” Corcuera said.
Local growers in Manatee County have specifically called for a guestworker program.
“We still have serious labor issues that we need to deal with long-term,” said Bob Spencer, a vice president of West Coast Tomato in Palmetto. “I just hope that we can somehow figure out some way to provide a guestworker program that allows people to come here and work in jobs that do not have enough domestic workers.
“The bill that was in play was definitely perceived to be a blanket amnesty bill,” he said, “and there was just no way that was going to work because the people were just not going to go for it.”