Local Immigrants Eye Bill With Mix of Hope and Suspicion

The sweeping immigration reform plan proposed by the Bush administration and a bipartisan group of senators Thursday has left immigrants across the Washington area scrambling to determine whether the complex compromise agreement would help or hurt them.

The answer varies as much as the circumstances of the estimated 600,000 foreign nationals who call the region home.

Luis, 24, a Guatemalan house painter waiting for work with other illegal immigrants outside a convenience store in Falls Church yesterday, said he was pleased that the plan offered him a path to legalization, but he was suspicious of the fine print.

"I heard it says you have to go back to your country to become legal, but maybe that's just a trick to get people to leave," said Luis, who declined to give his last name.

Annabelle Flores, 48, a U.S. citizen living in Manassas who has waited 15 years to get permanent residency for her sister and three brothers back in the Philippines, was thrilled to learn that the proposal might speed their arrival. But she was dismayed that it would prevent naturalized U.S. citizens from sponsoring their foreign-born siblings and adult children for visas.

"I understand that they need to do that to make room to legalize all the illegal immigrants that are here. . . . But it seems so unfair to people like us who followed all the rules," she said.

Local immigrant advocates offered a similarly mixed verdict -- praising the 380-page agreement as an important starting point for debate, yet vowing to oppose it unless a raft of provisions they consider unfair and impractical are amended.

Of particular concern was the temporary nature of the additional work visas that the plan would extend to as many as 400,000 immigrants per year. Such workers would be required to return to their home countries after two years and remain there for one year before they could come back to the United States.

This would create a large pool of second-class workers who have little legal protection and no stability, said Thomas Snyder, the D.C-based political director for Unite Here, a union that represents hotel, restaurant and garment workers.

"Temporary workers by definition have fewer rights. They cannot assimilate and become part of the workforce," he said. "These are not seasonal jobs, they are temporary workers for permanent jobs. This creates a revolving door of lower-status workers that we just don't need."

Immigrants and their supporters also had qualms about the plan's provisions for legalizing most of the estimated 12 million undocumented immigrants in the United States.

Under the proposal, illegal immigrants who entered the country before January, who pass a criminal background check and pay $3,000 could apply for a four-year "Z-visa," renew it for another four years, then pay an additional $4,000 to apply for legal permanent residency. However, heads of immigrant households would have to return to their home countries to file the permanent residency application from there.