SAN JOSE MERCURY-NEWS July 4, 2006
Hearings begin on immigration
The U.S. House of Representatives released the names of witnesses who will testify Wednesday at the first in a series of immigration-reform hearings, and immigrant advocates say the list is what they feared: All are proponents of strict border control as the solution to illegal immigration. Scheduled to testify at the Republican-sponsored event are U.S. Border Patrol agents; California sheriffs who support tougher enforcement; Kris Kobach, an adviser to former U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft; and Andy Ramirez, a representative of the Friends of the Border Patrol -- a California civilian group that patrols the border with Mexico. The hearing will be held at the Imperial Beach border station in San Diego, the country's busiest border crossing station with Mexico. There will be no witnesses proposing guest-worker status or amnesty. Rep. Edward R. Royce (R-Fullerton), chair of the House subcommittee on international terrorism, who is spearheading hearings, could not be reached for comment. When the nationwide hearings were announced last month, House Speaker Dennis Hastert told the New York Times, ``We are going to listen to the American people, and we are going to get a bill that is right.'' The next hearing is scheduled Friday in Laredo, Texas. An Arizona hearing has not been scheduled. The San Diego hearing precedes yet to be scheduled negotiations between the House and Senate on a compromise immigration reform bill. Democrats and immigrant advocates slammed Republican congressional leaders for scheduling the hearings to thwart a compromise bill. ``It's very one-sided,'' said Larisa Casillas, policy director for Services, Immigrant Rights and Education Network, a non-profit, advocacy group based in San Jose. ``Clearly there's an agenda,'' she said. ``There's a desire to talk about border security as the only way to look at reforming immigration policy and the system. It's just disappointing.'' Dueling news conferences and hearings have been scheduled Wednesday by Democratic congressional leaders in Washington and by immigrant advocates in the Bay Area. ``It's an opportunity for the House Republicans to push forward a border enforcement strategy that seems to be completely ineffective,'' said Sheila Chung, executive director of the Bay Area Immigrant Rights Coalition, an umbrella advocacy group based in Oakland.
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