Posted on 02/03/2010 8:09:28 AM PST by AuntB
Zogby Poll: DC Lobbyists Often Out of Step with Constituencies
WASHINGTON (February 3, 2010) - A new Zogby poll of senior executives, business owners, and members of union households finds that each of these groups thinks the best way to deal with illegal immigrants in the country is to enforce the law and cause them to return home.
This is in stark contrast to lobbyists for large companies, such as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which argue for legalization. The findings of the survey are consistent with surveys done by the National Federation of Independent Business, which represents small enterprises, showing strong opposition to legalization. Among unions, the leadership strongly supports legalizing illegal immigrants, but this survey shows enforcement — not legalization — is by far the option favored by union members and their families.
This survey of likely voters uses neutral language and includes 7,046 members of union households, 2,490 executives (e.g., CEOs, CFOs, VPs or department heads), and 9,990 small business owners.
Among the findings:
When asked to choose between enforcement that would cause illegal immigrants in the country to go home or offering them a pathway to citizenship with conditions, most members of the business community and unions chose enforcement.
* Executives (e.g. CEOs, CFOs, VPs etc.): 59 percent support enforcement to encourage illegals to go home; 30 percent support conditional legalization. * Small Business Owners: 67 percent support enforcement; 22 percent support conditional legalization. * Union Households: 58 percent support enforcement; 28 percent support conditional legalization.
One of the most interesting findings of the survey is that members of the business community think there are plenty of Americans available to fill unskilled jobs.
* Executives: 16 percent said legal immigration should be increased to fill unskilled jobs; 61 percent said there are plenty of Americans available to do unskilled jobs, employers just need to pay more. * Small Business Owners: 13 percent said increase immigration; 65 percent said plenty of Americans are available. * Union Households: 10 percent said increase immigration; 72 percent said plenty of Americans are available.
Most members of the business community and union households do not feel that illegal immigration is caused by limits on legal immigration, as many of their lobbyists argue; instead, members feel it is due to a lack of enforcement.
* Executives: Just 13 percent said illegal immigration is caused by not letting in enough legal immigrants; 75 percent said inadequate enforcement. * Small Business Owners: 10 percent said not enough legal immigration; 79 percent said inadequate enforcement. * Union Households: 13 percent said not enough legal immigration; 74 percent said inadequate enforcement efforts.
In contrast to many businesses group and union leaders, most executives and union members think immigration is too high.
* Executives: 63 percent said it is too high; 5 percent said too low; 16 percent said just right. * Small Business Owners: 70 percent said it is too high; 4 percent said too low; 13 percent said just right. * Union Households: 63 percent said immigration is too high; 5 percent said too low; 14 percent said just right.
Discussion: The large divide between union members and their leadership on the immigration issue is not really surprising. Union members and their families want higher wages and better working conditions that would likely come from lower levels of immigration. While union leaders also want improved conditions for workers, they see legalized immigrants as potential new members, giving them a different point of view. The divide between some business lobbying groups and their members of the business community on immigration is perhaps more surprising.
The largest business association representing big companies is the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. The Chamber supports 'earned legal status leading to legal permanent residency' for illegal immigrants. But when given the options of a conditional legalization or enforcement and illegal immigrants going home, executives and small business owners choose enforcement over legalization two and three to one. As for future levels of immigration the Chamber has made clear that, 'We face a larger and larger shortage' of low-skilled workers. The Chamber's president argues that more immigrant workers are needed, 'to fill jobs Americans don't want.' While the idea of improving wages and working conditions to attract American workers does not seem to have occurred to the Chamber, small business owners and executives consider this the best option. Four to one, executives said if employers can't find enough workers they should pay more rather than increase immigration levels. For small business owners it was five to one.
The survey reported here might be surprising to some, but the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) states clearly on its website that, based on its survey of members, 79 percent 'believe undocumented workers should return to their country and seek admis¬sion legally.' Their website goes on to state that 'NFIB will not support legislation that contains amnesty for undocumented workers.' Although the Zogby poll discussed here never uses the word 'amnesty,' when asked about conditional legalization, versus enforcement, small business owners and executives are clear - immigration laws should be enforced and illegal immigrants should go home.
Methodology: Zogby International was commissioned by the Center for Immigration Studies to conduct an online survey of 42,026 adults. A sampling of Zogby International's online panel, which is representative of the adult population of the United States, was invited to participate. For small business owners, Zogby asked respondents if they owned a small business. Executives are those who indicated they were either a C-level executive, managing partner, managing director, or served on the board of directors. Persons in union households are either a member of a union themselves or live with someone who is a union member. The survey was conducted by Zogby from November 13 to 30, 2009. The margin of error for all likely voters is +/- 0.5 percent. The margin of error for executives is 2 percent, for small business owners 1 percent, and for those in union households 1.2 percent.
The survey is available online at http://www.cis.org/Business-Union-Poll.
Are you listening, GOP wanna be candidates???
“”* Executives: Just 13 percent said illegal immigration is caused by not letting in enough legal immigrants; 75 percent said inadequate enforcement. * Small Business Owners: 10 percent said not enough legal immigration; 79 percent said inadequate enforcement. * Union Households: 13 percent said not enough legal immigration; 74 percent said inadequate enforcement efforts””
In the meantime, Obama/DHS is cutting enforcement $$$.
Delays prompt White House to propose deep cut in secure border initiative
By Jill R. Aitoro 02/01/10
President Obama proposed slashing by more than a quarter the fiscal 2011 budget for the Homeland Security Department’s massive border security project, which relies on high-tech equipment to look for illegal immigrants, because of long development delays.
The White House asked for $574.2 million for the Secure Border Initiative, a cut of 28 percent from the $800 million fiscal 2010 budget. SBI includes security fencing that would eventually run along the southern and
northwestern borders of the United States, and a network of sensors, cameras and control towers to monitor the areas.
“The deployment rollout schedule is taking longer than anticipated, [which is why] the secretary announced a review of the program,” said a DHS official during a press briefing about the budget.
DHS confirmed in January that Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano would reassess SBI in the wake of extensive delays. “[She] indicated she’d take a look at the status of the project and where it was going to go, and
this reduction reflects that [review],” the official said.
Fiscal 2011 funding will pay for the full deployment of the first phase of SBI, but will not cover additional developments in other areas that originally were included in the 2011 budget, the official said.
The administration also asked Congress to withhold $75 million until House and Senate appropriations committees approve a spending plan that Napolitano will have prepare within 90 days of the budget’s enactment.[snip]
http://www.nextgov.com/nextgov/ng_20100201_8105.php?oref=rss?zone=NGtoday
Illegal immigration is bankrupting America and hurting American workers.
Easy democrat votes...that’s what this amnesty push is all about.
Obama adviser: Amnesty to ensure ‘progressive’ rule
‘Imagine 8 million new voters who care about our issues?’
Granting citizenship to millions of illegal immigrants would expand the “progressive” electorate and help ensure a “progressive” governing coalition for the long term, declared a recent adviser to President Obama whose union group is among the most frequent visitors to the White House.
“We reform the immigration laws, it puts 12 million people on the path to citizenship and eventually voters,” stated Eliseo Medina, international executive vice-president of Service Employees
International Union, or SEIU.
Medina was speaking at a June 2009 Washington conference for the liberal America’s Future Now!
Medina said that during the presidential election in November 2008, Latinos and immigrants “voted overwhelmingly for progressive candidates. Barack Obama got two out of every three voters that showed up.”
“Can you imagine if we have, even the same ratio, two out of three? Can you imagine 8 million new voters who care about our issues and will be voting? We will be creating a governing coalition for the long term, not just for an election cycle.”
See video of Medina’s remarks:
http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=123955
Sift through the reports coming out of Davos and it appears that all industrialized nations are starting to back away from open borders and free trade. (double-digit unemployment and an incresingly restive populace will do that to you, eh?)
8 million??
With chain migration, make that 20-25 million. Goodbye USA!!
Every group of ‘citizens’ polled favors enforcement over a ‘path to citizenship’/Amnesty, including a poll of progressives.
Wake up GOP!
http://www.freerepublic.com/tag/immigrationpoll/index?tab=articles
Thanks. We all knew this but nice to see Democrats admitting it(that Illegals will be a permanent progressive voting base.)
Makes me think of Bush and McCain. I remember Bush sent out poor Tony Snow to claim that the illegals would vote ‘Republican’ on Rush’s radio show!
Hispanics still support O overwhelmingly even with 15 % unemployment rate for them.
Get a look at this one!~
Feds: Jaxport security guard was illegal alien
FEb. 3, 2010
The Jacksonville port security guard had all the trappings of police work.
Deputy’s badge. Handcuffs. Police lights on the grille of his Crown Vic. A loaded pistol inside.
But the badge was stolen. The gun was illegal. And according to federal agents, so was Aldenor Abrantes Filho.
Filho, 31, was arrested Tuesday morning at the port’s Blount Island terminal by Jacksonville police and U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers on a charge of possession of a firearm by an illegal alien. They said he was a Brazilian alien who lied to get his job at the port and his Florida driver’s license.
Hours later he appeared in court in shackles, still wearing his gray U.S. Security Associates uniform, as a prosecutor explained the allegations against him. The Jacksonville Port Authority contracts with U.S. Security Associates for guards.
“The complaint contains evidence of multiple crimes, but you’re just charged with one,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Dale Campion said. He told Filho he faces up to 10 years in prison and deportation if convicted.
Filho told U.S. Magistrate Thomas Morris he wanted to hire his own lawyer and planned to call his pastor for help. Morris scheduled a status hearing on that issue this afternoon. He ordered Filho held without bail until then, and Campion told the judge he will seek to hold Filho without bail for the case’s duration.
According to the complaint filed by Customs and Border Protection, Filho began working at Blount Island last month and was noticed by a Jacksonville police officer during a routine check of people entering the terminal. He had a Florida driver’s license, and his application said he was born in Georgia, but subsequent checks showed he was a Brazilian native who entered the United States on a six-month visitor’s visa in 2003 and never left, the complaint says.
A petition for more permanent immigrant status was denied in 2007, the complaint says.
When police and federal agents confronted him Tuesday, they got his consent to search his car because “it appeared to be a police vehicle,” the complaint says. In addition to the grille-mounted lights, his white Ford Crown Victoria had flexible handcuffs hanging from the rearview mirror and a laptop computer in the center console.
Inside were a loaded Taurus .22-caliber semiautomatic pistol and two St. Johns County Sheriff’s Office badges, one belonging to a deputy and the other indicating it was a captain’s. The St. Johns Sheriff’s Office informed officers the deputy badge number matched a badge reported stolen, the complaint says.
Wake Up America!
“Easy democrat votes...that’s what this amnesty push is all about.”
We tried to warn the ‘bots who supported a recent GOP dimwit that this is what would happen. Thank God there are no 3rd terms anymore.
Don’t feel sorry for Snow. He believed that crap just like Bush did. He had a long history of spouting the open borders manure just like his boss.
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