Legal status for undocumented farmworkers fails

The Senate turned back a proposal yesterday to offer legal status to hundreds of thousands of undocumented farmworkers, but advocates vowed to press on despite what they called a temporary setback in their efforts to reform the nation's immigration laws. "We will be back," declared Sen. Larry Craig, R-Idaho, taking satisfaction in the 53 votes the measure received. While that represented a majority of the 100-member Senate, it fell short of the 60 votes the proposal needed to stay alive as an amendment to an emergency funding bill for U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. For the time being, victory belonged to those who fought the proposal, which was sponsored by Craig and Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass. It would have offered legal status to most of the nation's undocumented farmworkers, who are estimated to account for between 50 percent and 75 percent of the nation's agricultural work force of approximately 2 million workers. California's Democratic senators took opposite sides. Sen. Dianne Feinstein opposed the "Agjobs" bill, calling it a magnet for more illegal immigration. Sen. Barbara Boxer supported it. Workers who qualified for the program would have been eligible for green cards if they performed 360 days of farm work within six years of the program's enactment. The highly coveted visas provide the right to live permanently in the United States and eventually to apply for citizenship. [more]