eom

...eom.

...I'll make this a twofer.

Done.

eom

Yes, that bill included a guest worker provision that would have established an exploited class in this country, whose deportabilty at the whim of their employer would distort the labor market.

These statements do not contradict each other.

...but I think both could be true.

But I'm going to take his explanation in the order he offered. Is it about American jobs or was it about 'exploitation?'

The latter looks to have been adopted after that statement, though, perhaps to gain sympathy from Latinos objecting to his vote.

Of course its about both.

They bring in slaves essentially who are taking jobs Americans could do, & American workers would work at a rate that will allow profit for the employer, just not obscene profits compared to hiring slaves.

*In some cases, probably more than we know, they really are slaves.

Ie, Four accused of aiding slave-labor ring on Ohio egg farms
http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/local/2015/07/02/Four-indicted-in-egg-farm-labor-ring.html

http://www.buzzfeed.com/adriancarrasquillo/latino-group-defends-sanders-against-clinton-attacks-over-im#.xfoZ6D3pdG

Latino Group Defends Sanders Against Clinton Attacks Over Immigration Vote

The Latino group LULAC — which Bernie Sanders always cites when explaining his vote against a 2007 immigration bill — is annoyed with the Clinton campaign for making Sanders’ vote an issue. “The Clintons, when they were in office, weren’t exactly friends to immigrants.”

...but I would imagine that he'd agree with both rationales.

Many, many Latinos, though, view(ed) opposition to that bill as a betrayal of their interests.

The 'Clintons' weren't in office, Bill was. But the Clintons have a long history working with the Latino community from their college years registering Hispanics to vote in Texas.

...but that has jackshit to do with this post.

How are facts about her record not relevant?

This is really stupid Bigtree.

Sanders has a thing about the guest worker program and he highlights the economic argument, American jobs, much more than he worries out loud about worker exploitation.

I don't have the same relationship, the same reverence for this politician that others here do. He operates like a typical pol and I regard his political statements and acts from the perspective of what I defend, not from a position that put his votes and statements in the best light possible. I don't know why that's so hard to understand. My views aren't obligated to any politician.

I think his 2007 vote was WRONG. I think his reasons were self-serving to his pet concern about guest workers and his 'jobs' argument. Moreover, outside of this campaign (where I function the most), I don't give a damn about his reasons. A vote with republicans on that bill was a betrayal to me.

You can call that 'stupid,' all you want, but I don't care about any of these politicians more than I care about the issues I advocate for and represent. You defend Sanders, I'll promote those who believe this bill he voted against was vital and necessary, despite whatever objections he had at the time; despite whatever story he comes up with in this election for why he voted the same as republicans on the 2007 bill.

He was on the wrong side of history, and I think his vote was a good example of how his pet economic issues take precedence over what I consider more important issues and concerns, despite his later adoption of that Latino group's position. I don't like his politics on this issue. I don't trust his politics on this issue. Not everyone is going to agree with how this politician operates. He'd better get used to that, and his supporters better start understanding that people who differ or dissent from their view aren't 'stupid,' at all, they just disagree.

by suggesting that he lied about his reasons for opposing the 2007 bill is stupid.

Because in fact that is what you wanted him to do against his principles of wanting to not put people in those conditions, and the side effect was that many Americans have also lost jobs as a result of them being replaced by slave labor such as H-1B and H-2B. And supporting those positions is what will LOSE Hillary Clinton with many of the independents and more rational Republicans more concerned about losing their jobs and not just about some of them being xenophobically motivated to hate immigrants. Bernie will get many of those votes from those who are more rationally opposed to those programs that Hillary will lose.

Do you really thinking growing guest worker programs and screwing people the way these people were screwed is a good thing?



http://www.thenation.com/article/these-workers-came-overseas-help-rebuild-after-hurricane-katrina-and-were-treated-prison/

...the leading Latino advocacy groups supporting the bill (with some exceptions) were for slave labor.

Did you think at all before you wrote that?

I can then RESPOND in the same fashion if you think that kind of character assassination is acceptable!

Bernie explained that he doesn't like slave labor and couldn't seeing putting that kind or program in place just to make some people richer. Why can't you accept that and understand that we all need to work harder against the forces of corruption to give us a CLEAN immigration bill that we can all unite behind, instead of trying to demonize those who are trying to work against the very big problems of slave labor that he was principled in voting against.

Some Latin groups like LULAC understood his position and stood with him against these bills and you certainly don't want to make them in to being anti-immigration.

You can't ask many of those who are being exploited as slaves "treated as prisoners as that article notes" or many of the rest of us including people like me in the tech sector being out of work constantly with only periodic contract jobs while these exploitive programs are permitted to exist just because they are bundled with an immigration reform bill.

I did think before I wrote that. Evidently, those who accuse Bernie of being against immigration didn't think too hard of who they were throwing under the bus when they were STARTING that kind of battle!

...I'm not subscribing to any of the nonsense you attributed to what I wrote.

He has noted that BOTH the quotes about guest worker programs being exploitive that he's said recently AND them hurting availability of American jobs and their wages were adversely affected. Why can't BOTH of these be true! Just because he was quoted one reason at one time and another a different time doesn't have them invalidate each other.

I've criticized H-1B programs for both reasons many times here, and have said that is what distinguishes Bernie's opposition to them versus what Trump and Cruz try to use as a reason (on their party purely losing American jobs to them). Just because the corporate media and the corporate campaign of Hillary is trying to frame it as only a damn the foreign worker, protect American jobs meme, doesn't mean that Bernie and that those who have his concerns have to share that FAULTY framing of his campaign!

I've given you an article documenting how the H-2B program was so abused that the workers had to take their H-2B sponsors to court to correct many of the problems of abuse they had experienced following their work rebuilding after hurricane Katrina. So you and others concerned about immigrants rights want to side with those H-2b sponsors abusing those who they brought in for cheap labor?

And it isn't just H-2B workers that are abused. H-1B workers are abused too as documented by this report where the Indian worker talks about his "body shop" experiences with anonymity.

http://www.nbcbayarea.com/investigations/Silicon-Valleys-Body-Shop-Secret-280567322.html

I've personally seen just next door to me when I lived in the Bay Area how body shop employees were abused in the way they were all thrown in to tight living spaces in a small apartment across the hall from me about the time I moved out of that place, and were later kicked out because their sponsor wanted that apartment just for himself.

Many people see this kind of thing happening all around them every day, and are frankly tired of it. Yes, we definitely need to get immigration reform, but we need to be firm in not asking one group of people to sacrifice their rights to help others, when arguably those making decisions don't have the rights of either party at heart in the way our current pay to play government works.

You constantly try to imply that Bernie doesn't want to do immigration reform because of his votes, and we've CONSTANTLY shown that he's had a reason for doing so, and it is NOT because he's against immigration reform.

Personally, I think Hillary has more to explain on her quotes that she DOES support H-1B guest worker programs as she does here (OVER EIGHT YEARS AGO!!) which was the last time she tried to be straight with the American people on where she stood on this program.

If her surrogates are going to try and make a big deal about Bernie's vote against the immigration bill that he's explained at least TWICE in debates/town halls during this campaign, then I think the American people are owed an explanation from her why she thinks that these guest worker programs are important to support and where she stands on these programs today. Why can't you all who are concerned about immigrants' rights be as demanding of an explanation from her on her votes for guest worker programs while she was a senator (and more detail of where she stands on TPP and other trade deals that go hand and hand with these programs)?

Would she rather have a system where people are pushed in to these programs rather than facilitating a path to real immigration that I would argue is being held up while the PTB push people in to these sort of programs, or push the justice system in to not prosecuting those employing undocumented workers for being illegal employers. Until we change the system from where it is now, there won't be any incentive to provide a real path to citizenship that so many people want (and should get too!).

I believe both Boxer and Sanders were comfortable voting no, signaling what they disliked, as protest votes because there was no possibility of passing.

I remember when the bill was debated and when there was a vote. I remember how hard right wing talk radio fought that vote. I remember that they stressed that voting for cloture was the same as voting for the bill. In hind sight a sign of how they would deal with every bill worked on by a Democratic Senate. As this was in the wake of more than 41 Senators voting against Alito on the vote after cloture passed with fewer than 41 against it, I was stunned by the difference between the parties.

Protests votes are often cast by Senators, but they become difficult to defend without explanation. In fact, the famous "I voted for it before I voted against it" was an ax ample of this. Though Kerry explained he voted for paying for the supplemental war bill by rolling back upcoming tax cuts to the wealthy then voted against the bill adding it to the debt, he first had to counter attacks that he voted against funding troops at war, then he had to explain his own unfortunate shorthand"


The 2003 vote was on a bill that was going to pass nearly unanimously. Here the vote was on an already domed piece of legislation. Just as arguing that Kerry would ever defend troops, arguing that Sanders would not have cast a vote for anything that would have made the situation better if he could have been the 60th vote, is not believable.

Sees which way the wind is blowing and adjusts his sails.

Anyone surprised?

Here are four pdf links to the congressional record in June 2007 when they were debating this:
https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CREC-2007-06-25/pdf/CREC-2007-06-25-pt1-PgS8337.pdf#page=2
https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CREC-2007-06-07/pdf/CREC-2007-06-07-pt1-PgS7271-6.pdf#page=11
https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CREC-2007-06-07/pdf/CREC-2007-06-07-pt1-PgS7271-6.pdf#page=13
https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CREC-2007-06-07/pdf/CREC-2007-06-07-pt1-PgS7271-6.pdf#page=14

Bernie said a lot on the floor of the Senate. String search for Sanders in those documents to read it all. It's in a few places - at least two major speeches. Once again, Bernie is telling the truth. Hillary is not. Here are some excerpts:

As I think we all know, this is a long and complicated bill. An important part of this bill deals with illegal immigration --how do we make sure we stop the flow of illegal immigrants into this country; how do we finally begin to deal with employers who are knowingly hiring illegal immigrants; what do we do with 12 million people who are in this country who, in my view, we are not going to simply, in the middle of the night, throw out of this country. These are difficult and important issues.

On those issues I am in general agreement with the thrust of this legislation. But, Mr. President, I wish to tell you there are areas in this bill where I have strong disagreement, and one is the issue of legal immigration , what we are doing in terms of bringing people into this country who, in my view, will end up lowering wages for American workers right now.

Here's one part where it gets "good". Who can name the corporation Hillary sat on the board of directors for? I'll let Bernie name them and why:

The argument there is Americans don't want to do the work. They say: We can't find American workers to do the work. That is a crock, in many instances. It is not true. One of the groups that has come to Congress to tell us how much they are concerned about the need to find workers because they can't find Americans to do the jobs is our old friends at Wal-Mart.

As many Americans know, Wal-Mart pays low wages. They often hire people for 30 hours a week rather than 40 hours a week, and they provide minimal health care benefits. Yet Wal-Mart has come in and said: Well, we can't find the workers. Bring us in more low-wage workers.

Well, guess what. Two years ago, when Wal-Mart announced the opening of a new store in Oakland, CA, guess how many people showed up for that job in Oakland, CA, at a Wal-Mart. Eleven thousand people showed up--11,000 people showed up in Oakland--filled out applications for a job when only 400 jobs were available. Eleven thousand people for 400 jobs.

Wal-Mart says they need more low-wage workers coming in from around the world because they can't find workers. Well, that was a couple of years ago. So you might say: Well, that doesn't happen today. In January of 2006, when Wal-Mart announced the opening of a store in Evergreen Park, just outside of Chicago, in your home State, Mr. President, 24,500 people applied for 2,325 jobs. Yet Wal-Mart and their friends are coming in here saying we can't find Americans who want to work.

Let us be clear. Wal-Mart does not provide good wages, does not provide good benefits, does not provide good health care,

How do you like them apples? In 2007, "Wal-Mart" had been lobbying to bring in cheap labor and their ex-board of director is all for it. And it's screwing up the immigration bill that Sanders would have otherwise voted for but they won't drop it. Could this have something to do with it?

Disclosures to the Federal Election Committee reveal how lobbyists for Wal-Mart, Chevron, Facebook and Goldman Sachs have been acting as fundraising captains for Clinton

See how that works?

Hillary was there for the vote. She heard where Bernie stood, that he supported much of the legislation and why he couldn't vote for it - for what Walmart was up to. So what does Hillary do in this campaign? Turns it around, deceptively spinning it that Bernie was against Latinos - while she had sold out American workers for her Walmart bundling. And it's no joke because this garbage is all over Nevada taking votes from Bernie.

I do not know how you Clinton supporters sleep at night. This is not a nice, ethical woman. She's deceitful, ruthless and doesn't care who gets thrown under the bus.

In essence, this bill didn't die because of people hating Latinos. It died because folks wouldn't go along with the corporate greed - it was too much and too obvious.

Bernie goes on later in his speech

Many of the largest corporations in this country are supporting this legislation. And you know why? It is not because they are staying up late at night worrying about some Mexican kid in Detroit or Chicago and what will be the future of that kid. They are not worrying about that. What they want to see is a continued influx into this country of cheap labor. They are not content with outsourcing millions of good-paying jobs. They are not content with fighting against working people who want to form unions. They are not content with their opposition, successful until recently, of keeping the minimum wage at $5.15 an hour for 10 years. That is not good enough. Now they are saying: Gee, we can't move Wal-Mart from America to China, we can't move hotels to China, we can't move restaurants to China, so what is the best way to continue keeping wages low for those workers?
....
Reclaiming my time, Mr. President, the Senator makes an important point, and that is we have all been educated that economics is about supply and demand. If you don't get the workers you want, you raise wages and you raise benefits. You don't simply open the door and bring in other workers at low wages.

I sure don't have a problem with those words. They were right in 2007 and they're still true today.

The next day, Bernie rises to propose an amendment. He hasn't given up on the bill. He's trying to solve the problem so he can vote for it.

In a moment, I want to talk about an amendment I will be offering with Senator Grassley to the immigration reform bill. That is amendment No. 1332. I should mention this amendment has been endorsed by the AFL-CIO. It was endorsed by the Programmers Guild and by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers.
...
This bill also carves out a path to citizenship which, frankly, is the right thing to do. But also what this bill does not do is analyze effectively the impact of various aspects of this legislation--the guest worker program, H-1B program--on the lives of American workers. The basic premise under which this bill operates in those areas is a false one. ...
...
What I fear the most is if we keep going in the direction in which we are moving now economically, what we are going to see is our children are going to have a lower standard of living than we do. In fact, according to a recent joint study by the Pew Charitable Trust and Brookings Institute, men in their thirties earned on average 12 percent less in 2004 than their fathers did in 1974, after adjusting for inflation. Incredibly, men today are earning less than their fathers did despite a huge explosion in technology and worker productivity.
...
During the debate over NAFTA and permanent normal trade relations with China--which I participated in as a Member of the House of Representatives--we were told by all the corporate interests who pushed that legislation on the Congress not to worry about the blue-collar jobs we would lose. I remember it distinctly. They said: Well, yes, it is true. If we open up our markets, yes, it is true we are going to lose a lot of these factory jobs. They are going to go to China, Mexico, whatever. But don't worry because if your kid does well in school, becomes computer proficient, your kid is going to have a great job out there at good wages. That is the future of America. Don't worry about the blue-color jobs. You have all these white-color information technology jobs.

Well, guess what is happening. From January of 2001 to January of 2006, we have lost 644,000 information sector jobs. Alan Blinder, the former Vice Chairman of the Federal Reserve, has told us between 30 and 40 million jobs in this country are in danger of being shipped overseas.
---
What upsets me is how our young people feel about this situation. These are kids who go to school—sometimes they borrow a lot of money to go to college—they work hard, and what
they are looking forward to, whether through a BA or a BS or an MA or a Ph.D., is a good, secure, challenging, meaningful job with a decent income. What they are seeing is companies saying: We do not want you. We want somebody from abroad who will work at lower wages than you. I think that must be very discouraging for so many of our young people.

Madam President, the amendment I am offering today, along with Senator GRASSLEY, is a pretty simple amendment. What it would do is it would prohibit companies that have announced mass layoffs from receiving new visas of any kind, unless these companies could prove that overall employment at their companies would not be reduced by these layoffs. In other words, we are calling their bluff, and we are saying: You can’t lay off large numbers of American workers and then tell us you desperately need workers, professionals from abroad. Those companies which are truly experiencing labor shortages would not be impacted by this amendment and could continue to receive increases in foreign workers, but companies that are reducing their U.S. workforce by laying off thousands of Americans would be prevented from importing workers from abroad. The bottom line is, the companies that are laying off thousands of Americans shouldn’t be allowed to import workers from overseas. Let us stand up for the American people. Let us stand up for American workers. Let us support
this amendment.

Here's his amendment. They ignored it - didn't even vote on it:
https://www.congress.gov/amendment/110th-congress/senate-amendment/1332/actions

Someone else made this comment:

Three weeks before we had the final vote and Senator Reid pulled it down, after the debate continued a couple of weeks ago, a Rasmussen poll showed support for the bill in the high 20s. Then fell to 23 percent, and the last poll showed only 20 percent of Americans supported this bill. Only 20 percent of the American people said we should pass this bill.

In spite of all that, the bill fell just a few votes short.

I see crap like this and start to wonder about Trump if Hillary wins. If Hillary wins Nevada tonight, it will be in significant part because the people of Nevada got hammered with this deception to steal votes. Sanders made himself crystal clear what they were up to in 2007. It is beyond debate.

http://www.c-span.org/video/?198489-1/senate-session

Second day here:
http://www.c-span.org/video/?198532-1/senate-session&start=11246

Thank you, bookmarking for when this gets recycled.

Bookmarked.
Excellent post, thanks.

If so, what has led you to believe this?

...the 'you're calling Bernie a racist' line.

What a sham.

...what I really did want to know is if you actually ascribe these racist motives to Sanders. I get why you think this is an alert attempt. It's not, but I get it. What I was actually trying to do was get you to the point of admitting (as any thinking person would) that Bernie Sanders doesn't display ANY characteristics of a racist. So don't answer, I get that, but please don't think that you're spinning a believable narrative. People know better.

people live like this...... by the way they pay their bosses for the honor to do so......

Some people say a man is made outta' mud
A poor man's made outta' muscle and blood
Muscle and blood and skin and bones
A mind that's a-weak and a back that's strong

You load sixteen tons, what do you get?
Another day older and deeper in debt
Saint Peter don't you call me 'cause I can't go
I owe my soul to the company store

I was born one mornin' when the sun didn't shine
I picked up my shovel and I walked to the mine
I loaded sixteen tons of number 9 coal
And the store boss said "Well, a-bless my soul"

You load sixteen tons, what do you get?
Another day older and deeper in debt
Saint Peter, don't you call me 'cause I can't go
I owe my soul to the company store

I was born one mornin', it was drizzlin' rain
Fightin' and trouble are my middle name
I was raised in the canebrake by an ol' mama lion
Cain't no-a high-toned woman make me walk the line

You load sixteen tons, what do you get?
Another day older and deeper in debt
Saint Peter, don't you call me 'cause I can't go
I owe my soul to the company store

If you see me comin', better step aside
A lotta men didn't, a lotta men died
One fist of iron, the other of steel
If the right one don't a-get you, then the left one will

You load sixteen tons, what do you get?
Another day older and deeper in debt
Saint Peter, don't you call me 'cause I can't go
I owe my soul to the company store.