The immigration bill is headed back to the Senate floor today. It is unclear whether there will be enough votes–60 are needed–to allow the bill to proceed. And, even some of the Senators who say that they will vote to allow the bill to proceed–i.e., they will vote to cut off any filibuster–are saying that a vote to allow the bill to move doesn’t guarantee support for final passage. What a mess…
   Today, Steve Greenhouse of The New York Times has a piece looking at the divide within labor on the bill.
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The threat that labor poses to the bill has gone largely unrecognized in part because three prominent unions — the service employees, the farm workers, and the hotel, restaurant and apparel workers — have backed the legislation. But that support, advocates say, has been outweighed by opposition from the AFL-CIO and virtually all other unions, including auto workers, Teamsters, food and commercial workers, and construction unions.
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  And…
Supporters of the bill say that the A.F.L.-C.I.O., in opposing the legislation, is focused on protecting the gains that its mostly middle-class members have made in pay and benefits over the decades. To the labor federation, the big worry is that the bill’s guest worker provision will pull down wages, take away jobs from Americans and exploit immigrants.
The three unions that favor the bill also dislike the guest worker program but are willing to support the bill to pursue a larger goal: a path to legalization for the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants in this country. The three unions, which represent many janitors, farm laborers and hotel housekeepers, have high percentages of members who are immigrants. They also recognize that it will be far easier to unionize immigrants — perhaps the most fertile ground for labor’s growth — when illegal immigrants are given legal status.
   What do you think?
