Immigrants Are Too Wary to Even Learn About Obama's Immigration Plan

(Bloomberg) -- Daniel Jimenez’s job at the United Farm Workers Foundation is to promote the biggest reprieve for undocumented immigrants in a generation to as many as possible. On a recent day, after waiting an hour past the appointed 6 p.m. start, he began speaking to eight tomato-pickers and pistachio-tree planters and a dozen empty chairs.

Jimenez had traveled to Hanford, California, to publicize President Barack Obama’s executive action easing immigration rules. While the order is designed to protect as many as 5 million people from deportation, it pays for no efforts to publicize its benefits. People were wary even before a judge put it on hold.

Sympathetic groups soldier on, trying to rally enough applicants to make the measure politically impossible for a future president to undo.

“It could take months; we really don’t know,” Jimenez, 23, told the Hanford audience in Spanish. “Meanwhile, just be prepared.”

Obama announced the plan in November as a response to Congress’s unwillingness to update a policy that both parties agree is flawed. Recipients would enter the formal economy with work permits and Social Security numbers, creating a legal workforce for businesses, greater security for themselves and revenue for government coffers.

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http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-04-01/wary-immigrants-scarce-as-activists-pave-way-for-obama-s-order