Immigration bill said to go far in repairing inadequate system

Published: 2004-05-05

WASHINGTON (CNS) -- House and Senate Democrats introduced a bill May 4 that the chairman of the U.S. bishops' Committee on Migration said would go far to repair an inadequate immigration system. The Safe, Orderly Legal Visas and Enforcement, or SOLVE, Act was introduced by Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., and Reps. Bob Menendez, D-N.J., and Luis Gutierrez, D-Ill. It would allow people who have entered the country illegally to apply for legal residency if they have been here for more than five years and held jobs. It also would break through backlogs in applications for family reunification visas and create two programs for workers in low-skilled, temporary jobs. In a statement the same day, Coadjutor Bishop Thomas G. Wenski of Orlando, Fla., offered his support for the bill as chairman of the migration committee. The bill reforms "crucial areas of our immigration system in a way that protects the rights of U.S. and foreign workers; promotes family unity; and grants migrant workers and their families in the United States the opportunity to become permanent residents, and if they so choose, U.S. citizens," Bishop Wenski said.

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