Mexican president Fox pressed for starting a large-scale "guest worker" program similar to the "Bracero" plan that existed from 1942 to 1964. Bush said he was open to this proposal. Fox also floated the idea of the U.S. government granting amnesty and legal residence to Mexicans working in the United States who currently have no work permits.

Out of the talks the two governments set up a high level "immigration working group" to pursue these issues, headed on the U.S. side by Secretary of State Colin Powell and Attorney General John Ashcroft, and from Mexico, by Foreign Minister Jorge Castañeda and Interior Minister Santiago Creel.

Fox made his stance on Mexican migrants part of his election campaign last year. His proposals reflect both the interests of the Mexican ruling rich and the outrage of Mexican working people, who in substantial numbers have experienced miserable working conditions in the United States, the repressive force of Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) cops, discrimination and racist violence, and dangerous journeys across the border in search of work. These amount to a national humiliation for the Mexican people.

Last year nearly 400 Mexicans died, often by drowning or dehydration, as they attempted to cross the border illegally. An estimated 300,000 cross every year, and U.S. officials estimate that 5 million workers, more than half of whom are from Mexico, are working in the United States without immigration papers.

Fox has described these workers as heroes, and stood at highway checkpoints along the border for several days in December welcoming Mexicans returning from the United States for Christmas. On February 22 the Mexican government declared an amnesty for foreigners of all nationalities living in the country. The program applies to people resident in Mexico before Jan. 1, 2000, and expires Oct. 1, 2001.

Fox's demand for a guest worker program flows from the Mexican rulers' desire to reduce pressure and social unrest from unemployed and low-paid workers in Mexico. Fox said he is seeking "fair treatment" for Mexican citizens, and that "Mexico seeks men and women who will gain skills and wealth and bring them home to build a new economy."

Fox's top adviser on migrant affairs, Juan Hernández, pointed out, "We need to create 1.3 million new jobs a year just to keep pace with all the new entrants into our labor force. We see a guest worker program as beneficial for both countries." Remittances to Mexico from relatives working in the United States amounts to between $6 billion and $8 billion a year, the third-largest source of foreign revenue after oil and tourism.

During the last few years of relatively low unemployment and a tight labor market, many U.S. employers, seeking to keep a stable workforce and drive down labor costs, have been clamoring for increasing the flow of immigrants to work in factories and fields.  
 
Low pay and no option to stay
Touted as a program to "legalize illegal workers" from Mexico, "guest worker" legislation is being promoted by five U.S. senators. In addition to admitting on a temporary basis up to 150,000 workers a year to ensure a steady flow of workers to temporary jobs on farms, in food processing plants, and hotels, their plan also proposes tightening border security and increased penalties and other repressive measures for hiring undocumented workers.

The current guest worker law allows some 40,000 mostly agricultural workers into the United States each year. The conditions they face gives a glimpse of what the employers are aiming for with an expanded program. In fact, several lawsuits have been filed against giant forestry and sugar companies, charging they do not even pay guest workers the minimum wage. Some 15,000 workers, mostly from Mexico, come to the United States each year to plant trees. Few make more than $300 for a 70 hour workweek. Jamaican sugar cane cutters who come to Florida to harvest cane under the government's "H-2" program, are suing some of the big sugar growers for cheating them out of $51 million in wages.

For workers without documents the situation is even worse. In one recent case, Chinese garment workers in Brooklyn, New York, filed suit against the owners of two sweatshops there for unpaid wages, unpaid overtime, and for pressuring them to work more than 100 hours a week on many occasions.

The bipartisan group of legislators sponsoring the new bill includes Republican senators Phil Gramm from Texas, Pete Domenici from New Jersey, Jim Bunning of Kentucky, Mike Crapo of Idaho, and Democrat Zell Miller of Georgia. They traveled to Mexico to meet with Fox in early January.

Gramm's plan would allow participants to stay no more than one year, and projects that workers would seek employment "primarily but not exclusively in service and agricultural areas." It would replace payroll taxes with "an IRA-like account" ostensibly to finance medical care. These accounts would be considered the guest workers' property. Funds remaining in them at the conclusion of each year's employment agreement would be made available directly to the worker upon his or her return to Mexico.  
 
'A pair of arms'
The guest worker proposals have stimulated an intense debate, and a new examination of the old "bracero" program, which means a pair of working arms in Spanish. The program aided capitalist agricultural outfits, employing 5 million Mexican workers for temporary, cheap labor in the fields of the Southwest and in the factories of the Southeast over a 22-year period.

During the 1940s, 10 percent of the workers' pay was deducted and supposedly put into savings accounts in Mexican banks. These funds, however, "mysteriously disappeared," according to an article in the Dallas Morning News. Few workers ever collected the money owed to them. Lawyers representing these workers, however, plan to file a lawsuit by the end of February seeking recovery of the money, estimated to be between $300 million and $1 billion with accrued interest.

The Bracero program ended in 1964 after reports of abusive treatment of the workers and a series of deadly farm accidents. That program, as is the case with the new proposals, lent itself to employer intimidation of workers standing up for their rights and attempting to unionize. It made Mexican workers easy prey for racists and rightist thugs, who were part of the employers' system of keeping the immigrant workforce in line.

Farmers who employ substantial numbers of laborers, such as the asparagus and lettuce farmers of California's Imperial Valley, are clamoring for more low-paid agricultural workers that a guest worker program would provide. Some 18,000 Mexican workers cross the border every day from Mexicali, a city of more than 1 million, to work in the valley on the lettuce harvest at its height in March, but the large farmers say they need more.

John Welty, executive vice president of the California Tomato Growers, said, "The immigrant workforce has become a critical part of our success during the boom economy."  
 
Opposition to plan
Some immigrant rights organizations, such as the El Paso–based Border Farm Workers Center and the Immigration Law Enforcement Monitoring Project, support amnesty and oppose the guest worker legislation on the grounds that it offers no option for immigrant workers to apply for permanent legal residency. The National Council of La Raza, a Latino rights group, supports amnesty.

In February 2000 the AFL-CIO executive council reversed its previous policy and called for amnesty and for repeal of the law that imposes sanctions on employers who hire undocumented workers. Some business groups, such as the American Hotel and Motel Association, support amnesty.

Over the past year tens of thousands of immigrants rights supporters have held marches, rallies, and vigils calling for amnesty and other demands. These include 20,000 who gathered at an AFL-CIO-sponsored forum in Los Angeles last June; several thousand in New York City, May 1; hundreds in Miami, May 19; 1,000 in Washington in July; and 3,000 in Oakland, California this past January. Most of these actions included union contingents.  
 
Related article:
Defend immigrant workers  
 
 
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