Skip to main content
Normal View

JOINT COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS debate -
Tuesday, 21 Feb 2006

Coalition of Irish Immigration Centers: Presentation.

We now move to No. 3 on our agenda, a meeting with Ms Sheila Gleeson, executive director of the Coalition of Irish Immigration Centers. I welcome Ms Gleeson. She should not feel she is alone, but with friends. We are familiar with the work she does and have visited the USA because we are concerned about the area. We are glad to receive an update from Ms Gleeson while she has the opportunity to come to us. Members will be aware that Ms Gleeson is a leading activist on behalf of the undocumented Irish living in the US. Her visit to Ireland is particularly timely as the Border Protection Antiterrorism and Illegal Immigration Control Act, that is the Sensenbrenner-King Act, is scheduled to be debated along with the McCain-Kennedy Bill by the US Senate shortly. The Senate judiciary committee is due to consider immigration reform in March with the possibility of a full Senate debate some time thereafter. The joint committee has already decided to visit Washington in the near future to add its voice in support of the McCain-Kennedy Bill. It is therefore timely to discuss these issues today.

Ms Sheila Gleeson

I thank the committee for inviting me. I am pleased to be able to do this. It is a critical time in US immigration policy. For members who do not know who I am and what my group does I will give a brief introduction, then discuss the legislation and the activism in the Irish and Irish-American community.

The Coalition of Irish Immigration Centers, CIIC, was founded in 1996 as a loose coalition or umbrella group for all the centres in the US and I am newly hired as its executive director. The CIIC has member organisations in New York, New Jersey, Philadelphia, Massachusetts, Illinois, Maryland, California, Wisconsin, Washington and the District of Columbia. Some of those groups are small and voluntary while others employ staff. The goal of each centre is to provide advice, information and other social service programmes to vulnerable Irish immigrants and to help them to settle when they come to the US.

While it is important to recognise that many Irish immigrants who come to the US to achieve the "American dream" do well, a significant segment does not. The goal of the centres is to be a place to which those immigrants can come. The undocumented immigrants are the most vulnerable who come to the centres because of their fear of accessing a mainstream service. Most undocumented immigrants are not eligible for services and have no safety net. Therefore, when they fall and break a leg on the job they receive no disability payments or help. They go to the Irish centres to receive assistance.

We are often asked how many undocumented Irish there are in the US but we do not know. Since 2001 they are more invisible than ever before and fear is palpable in the community.

Our best guess is approximately 50,000. A series of town hall meetings took place recently, organised by the Irish Lobby for Immigration Reform. At the bigger venues such as New York or Boston 1,000 people showed up and many were undocumented immigrants. It was a huge turn-out in the face of rumours of immigration raids across the US.

The change in attitude toward immigrants in the US has taken place gradually over many years. Much of it has happened since 2001 but the downward slide began long before then. The introduction of severely anti-immigrant legislation in 1996 was the beginning of the difficult times for immigrants.

Undocumented Irish immigrants are living in a constant state of vigilance and fear. They often do not tell friends or employers that they are undocumented. They are afraid that someone who is envious of them will pick up the telephone and turn them in to Immigration, Customs and Enforcement, whose apt acronym is ICE. Many have lived in the US since the mid-1990s when the Donnelly and Morrison visa programmes ended. There have been very few options for people to acquire legal status since that time. We hear from them that they miss their families and friends at home and want to be able to visit, though they do not all want to return. Many have made successful lives in the US or do not want to come back for personal reasons.

I will give a few examples of the experiences of the Irish in the US. Once, three young Irish immigrants were coming home from a day of skiing in Vermont. Their car's rear light was not working. They were stopped by police as they pulled out of a gas station and because they were within 100 miles of the border the police called in border patrol. The three were jailed for weeks and then deported.

A couple of weeks ago two young men in New York crossed a train track, which is illegal. They were arrested and the officer told them that when they came to court to be arraigned he would do his best to ensure that Immigration, Customs and Enforcement were there to meet them. They had to choose whether to do the right thing and show up at the arraignment to pay their fine or just disappear and allow arrest warrants to be issued for them. If ICE attended the arraignment they would be detained and jailed — some jails in New York state are not nice — and then deported, perhaps four to six weeks later.

A young undocumented woman was being stalked by a stranger on a train, a random individual who probably had mental health issues. This lasted for six months but she was terrified to go to the police for fear they would ask her about her status and deport her. Only when she sought help at one of the Irish centres could we pursue the matter for her.

A young man from the west of Ireland fell off a roof in Boston. His co-workers called 911, the emergency services, who all attend in the event of an emergency. The police arrived on the scene first and an officer proceeded to interrogate the young man as he lay on the ground badly injured. They also interrogated his co-workers about their legal status. The contractor was on his way to the site, having heard about the accident, when he was called by the police officer, to whom the men had given his number. The contractor heard the man in the background screaming as he was being questioned. The young man had a fractured skull, a torn spleen and fractured ribs, and was even questioned about his legal status while in hospital. These stories instil terror in everybody.

Legislatively, the Senate majority leader Bill Frist has indicated that he will bring a Bill, not yet written, to the Senate floor by 27 March. Prior to that, perhaps on 2 or 3 March, the Senate judiciary committee will consider an immigration reform Bill. The starting point for the judiciary committee discussion is Senator Specter's chairman's mark, which is an amalgam of reform legislation authored by Senators Cornyn and Kyl, McCain and Kennedy, and Senator Hagel. Many national advocacy groups, including the Irish lobby for immigration reform, ILIR, favour the McCain-Kennedy proposal as the most comprehensive approach to reform and are urging Senator Specter to move his chairman's mark closer to the McCain-Kennedy Bill.

Although it passed the House in December 2005, the Bill, H.R. 4437 or, as it is more commonly known, the Sensenbrenner Bill, which would make unlawful presence a felony and make criminals out of countless Americans who have contact with undocumented immigrants, is not yet law. It will, however, represent one end of the bargaining table at conference committee. The Sensenbrenner Bill is the House Bill but in conference, committee members of both the House and the Senate put forward Bills, which eventually leads to a final product. Sensenbrenner's Bill is so punitive, however, that the Senate needs to produce a comprehensive Bill of its own to balance it at conference committee.

Whether it is good or bad news, this is an election year in the US, with elections due to take place in November. The potential exists for influencing legislators if we can mobilise. We hear that constituent mail and calls to Senators' offices are at the moment overwhelmingly anti-immigrant. People would have to live there to appreciate how negative the discussion is and how punitive the mood. Talk radio shows, even mainstream programmes on CNN, are full of language like "illegal aliens", "criminal aliens" and "swarms of aliens coming over the borders". More positively, the Irish community is beginning to mobilise and have some impact.

The Coalition of Irish Immigration Centers, CIIC, the Irish Apostolate USA and the Irish centres have been working to educate and mobilise the Irish community to make it aware of what it can achieve. The formation of the Irish Lobby for Immigration Reform, ILIR, in December by Niall O'Dowd, the editor of the Irish Voice, has really helped to gel all the different groups together and provide a unified profile for the Irish lobby. The lobby group has, in little more than two months, been extremely successful in bringing in big hitters such as Grant Lally, a republican strategist, while Charles Schumer addressed a meeting in Queens, New York, last week. Bruce Morrison, the author of the Morrison visa programme, also attended some meetings.

I attended the meeting in Boston, where I live, and was pleased to see it present an uplifting picture of hope, because a sense of hopelessness is palpable in all immigrant communities. There seems to be no way of overcoming all the negatives.

The ILIR has held a series of town hall-style meetings which have been hugely successful. We expected 300 or 400 people for our first meeting in Rory Dolan's but 500 packed into the venue and an estimated 400 to 500 were left outside. At the Boston meeting 1,015 people signed in — there may have been a couple of hundred more there — and the Philadelphia meeting on 3 February was attended by more than 300 people, in spite of strong rumours that week that Immigration, Customs and Enforcement would be apprehending undocumented immigrants at building sites, to the extent that many businesses told employees not to come to work. In Queens last week another 900 people turned out, and these were people who could not make it to the first meeting in Yonkers. It is a huge turnout and mobilisation in the Irish community, which we have not seen before. Groups such as Irish immigration centres, some of the older Irish-American groups, the Irish cultural centres, the Irish American Unity Conference and the Ancient Order of Hibernians in America have all come out on this issue. We are aiming for a lobby day on 8 March in Washington DC, which will be sponsored by the Irish Lobby for Immigration Reform.

This will help us to put our viewpoint out there. We receive much help from some of the national groups and other immigrant groups who are on the same page as us. Without getting into too many details, what we are looking for is comprehensive legislation. Any legislation focused solely on strengthening enforcement and enhancing border security, and which does not provide for the reasons people risk their lives to sneak into the country, will not function correctly. Such people sneak in because there is work in the US.

There are an estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants living in the US. Most are playing a vital role in the economy, yet what we term as "report to deport" legislation, where a person would report for a three year work visa before having to return home, is being discussed. That type of legislation will not work. American industries have come to rely heavily on unauthorised workers, who provide a vital service.

To reiterate the timeline, the mark-up, when the Senate judiciary committee meets to consider the legislation, should take place in early March. Senator Bill Frist has stated he expects to bring his Bill to the floor on 27 March. If the judiciary committee does not have a Bill, Senator Frist has indicated he may move his own legislation. If he moved legislation it would likely be an enforcement-only Bill, which would not consider the comprehensive issues, the guest worker programme or any type of permanent residency programme.

The Irish Government, the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Deputy Ahern, and members of this joint committee have stepped up to the plate on this issue. I am entirely sincere in stating we appreciate it. It has been a positive change. The visit to the United States last year had an impact on the legislators. I had an occasion to be in Washington DC carrying out advocacy and lobbying work before the holidays, and almost every office — particularly the Republican offices — were impressed with what had been heard from committee members. This was mentioned to us by people in the offices who were familiar with the committee's visit.

We appreciate the committee's work in this regard. People know what the joint committee is doing. This help and support has been mentioned at the ILIR meetings. People who are undocumented appreciate knowing that many official groups in Ireland are supportive of them. It is important to keep the goal of comprehensive legislation in mind. At the moment it looks like it could be a difficult battle. We are mobilising, organising and getting people to Washington DC. We are making calls and sending e-mails. I hope the joint committee will be able to keep up its efforts to support our work, as it is very important.

I thank Ms Gleeson for her written submission. From what has been stated with regard to timing, in early March the Senate judiciary committee will meet to consider the Bill. That would be a very important phase. Senator Frist is likely to introduce an immigration Bill from approximately 27 March. The time in between is clearly important. We are planning to go to the US, so would it be important to be there before that date, or possibly even much earlier in March?

Ms Gleeson

I was discussing this with Senator Mooney. That is what it looks like. What comes from the judiciary committee is potentially what the Senate will take up on 27 March, if it is finished. The question is whether it will be finished, and we do not know the answer. It is somewhat fluid so I cannot give a definite answer. That is the current state of affairs. I checked last night in anticipation of this question being asked, and those are the dates we are working with. That may change if the judiciary committee is close to bringing out a Bill. It is possible that Senator Frist will delay it. I do not know for sure the answer to that question.

A good time for the joint committee to travel to the US would be when the legislation is taken up in the Senate. At this stage that looks like being towards the end of March. We hope the judiciary committee will produce legislation that is positive and comprehensive, as that would be ideal. If it does not and Senator Frist produces a bill, it may deal mainly with enforcement and border security.

It may be one sided.

Ms Gleeson

It would be more in line with the Sensenbrenner bill.

Have we anything to offer in exchange? What might American legislators want from this State or would there be quid pro quo? Is it possible the US might seek reciprocity with regard to visas, or Americans coming here to work?

Ms Gleeson

That is a good question. One strength, from an Irish emigrant point of view, is that we are offering young, highly educated workers who go there with some qualifications. Even those who do not have a third level education bring skills that are badly needed in the US. There is a skill set that is an important piece of the economy. In the Boston area, numerous studies have considered the need for immigrant workers there. This would range from people with business and high-tech degrees or who work in banking down to the construction workers or people who work with the elderly or in hospitality. There are many good people with good qualifications.

I am not sure about the issue brought up by the Chairman. I have not heard of much demand for people wishing to come to Ireland. The immigration policy here is reasonably flexible and generous. We received calls at many of the centres from Americans who want to move here, and there appears to be some availability of visas for these people.

I have found it the other way in practice. I do not want to elaborate too much, but there could be something in the issue. Looking at the two sides has brought it to my mind.

The American ambassador has gone to universities encouraging people to go for summer breaks working in the United States, as this has fallen off a lot. A certain fear has been created, and the US does not wish to get into a position where it is no longer seen as a destination for people who have scientific and technical skills. There has always been a great relationship between Ireland and the US, and people have gone there and returned. People are wary at the moment, however. There was a case some weeks ago where a learned man was invited over by a university in Pennsylvania, and he was thrown into prison.

Ms Gleeson

That is correct. It was the University of Pennsylvania.

Nobody wishes that and we are not into that practice. Apparently this person's documentation had been put in order by the university but there was a technical issue, although there was nothing untoward with the application or the person. It was sorted out quickly, but people might not see the country as a place they would like to go in the aftermath of such an incident. Nobody wishes to end up in chains wearing an orange jumpsuit.

That is anathema to us in Ireland.

While we have had a good working relationship and good exchanges there is a danger that they would be adversely affected by the climate and an over-reaction to the events of 11 September 2001. We appreciate what happened on that date. We were there after it and saw the impact on the people which was phenomenal. Ireland was probably the only country that closed down entirely for a day. All the businesses closed down a day's production. That was money. However, we still ended up fairly high in the ranks of production at the end of the year. Nevertheless we took that measure. That is evidence of the closeness of the two countries and it is important not to damage that element.

I welcome Ms Gleeson. I was a member of the group that travelled to the US in May. That visit was a dose of reality for me because having raised the issue here and having requested that we meet the ambassador formally here in public, we eventually met him in private. He painted a rosy picture at the time that the President of the United States was giving the matter his top priority. He had mentioned in the State of the Union address in 2005 that things would be moving. I came back from the visit to the US with a different impression. I would not say there was an air of hopelessness but there was certainly a dose of reality. Having spoken with the groups in New York and Philadelphia and some of the legislators and their representatives in Capitol Hill we became aware of the major difficulties that the 50,000 Irish illegal emigrants are part of an overall group of approximately 11 million illegal emigrants in the United States. It would be difficult to differentiate between the 50,000 Irish and the overall group of 11 million emigrants.

One of the legislators said the McCain-Kennedy Bill was DOA — I did not know what DOA stood for — but I was told it means "dead on arrival". That was the bleak scenario with which I came back from the United States. I read the President's State of the Union address in January in which there was a passing reference to immigration laws. What he is saying is that the US will beef up enforcement. There was little sign of any hope of an enlightened approach to this issue or that the invisible Irish would be given an opportunity to declare themselves and apply for a permanent visa which would allow them to work. The attitude appears to be that one must go home and then apply. Is that a pessimistic or a realistic view of the position?

Having said that, I support and applaud the efforts being made to mobilise the Irish-Americans who need recognition and appreciation for what they have done for US society. I applaud the Ms Gleeson and her colleagues on what they are doing. There is a massive hill to climb. We seek the delegation's advice on who to deal with the legislators there. The Taoiseach will make his play to President Bush on the eve of St. Patrick's Day delegation and the Minister of State, Deputy Ahern, will make his case.

The Chairman has raised the issue of the possibility of a bilateral agreement with the United States and Ireland on the issue of workers, on both sides of the Atlantic. Does the delegation consider there is a realistic chance of an effective bilateral agreement which would give some space to the Irish in the US and put them in a different category from the 11 million who are seeking recognition?

I was on a private visit to southern California in January and was horrified at the anti-immigrant atmosphere there. Local television stations had news bulletins of meetings being broken up and disrupted. These were local support organisations and advice centres for immigrants whose activities were being disrupted by people who saw the immigrants as taking the scarce jobs available. Is the semi-stagnation in the US part of the factor that is raising the anti-immigrant atmosphere, as much as the security implications post-11 September 2001? Is there merit in the Chairman's suggestion of a bilateral approach with the US authorities?

I thank Ms Gleeson for a comprehensive outline of the realities facing the Irish in America. Can she elaborate a little on police activity? I appreciate the stories she has given are anecdotal but are they part of a wider hostile police attitude? I am surprised because we have always had the view that New York's finest was made up of the Irish but are now harassing emigrants. Some of the stories, particularly the one about the building site, is horrific. What is the state of play at the Catholic lobby? The visit of Deputy Allen coincided with the weekend of the Irish Lobby for Immigration Reform meeting that took place in Washington at which the conference of American bishops launched an immigration reform movement which they were supposed to spread out across the country to lobby. What is the state of that lobby in the context of Ms Gleeson's remarks about mobilising the Irish community?

In her written report Ms Gleeson made the point that the amount of mail Senators are receiving is overwhelmingly hostile to immigration reform. I presume as a result of the Niall O'Dowd initiative that is now being counterbalanced by an Irish letter-writing campaign. How effective is it and has it advanced? Has the Irish Government any role to play? The Department of Foreign Affairs provided €30,000 to the Irish Lobby for Immigration Reform before Christmas for administrative purposes to get it going. Could this support be extended to other lobby groups?

It is a rather innovative proposal that Irish taxpayers' money be given to Irish citizens in the US to help them effect change to the laws of another country. While I welcome it, and do not wish to get tied up in jargon, it has possible implications. If Americans were to start lobbying American-Irish groups here to effect change to Irish law what would the reaction be? Having already done this, does Ms Gleeson think the Government should extend the support to other groups and, if so, would it be helpful? I am thinking in terms of trying to focus Senators in the next month or six weeks on the issue of the Irish dimension because as is unstated, all of us who are involved in this issue will know that most American legislators do not see this as an Irish problem. They see it as a Mexican-Central American-South American problem, of which we are but an infinitesimal part, which is probably the single biggest obstacle to changing the attitudes and introducing meaningful reform along the lines outlined.

With the other members I welcome and offer my support to Ms Gleeson and the Coalition of Irish Immigration Centers. Being out of status or illegal has not protected young Irish people against the Irish themselves. I have read about a few cases involving people who were lost, without status and without information on how to resolve problems that have had tragic results. I found out more information about it and I thought that was appalling. The organisation's case studies are important because they reveal the vulnerability of people on a day to day basis. That has changed and we began to get news of the centres, not just about the major contingent events but also the new forms of relationship including, for example, the change in the administration of driving licences in New York and elsewhere.

I make two points about that. We hear that if 11 million people left the United States economy at the one time, it would have a considerable economic impact in terms of employment. What we have, therefore, is an acceptance of people within the economy but a perception of the same people as a threat to citizenship and the way of life of people who simply do not want to accept or allow for difference. I will not delay the committee on this point because Ms Gleeson knows a great deal about that. It is not new.

I first went to the United States as a student at the end of 1966, nearly 40 years ago, and at that stage people were afraid the Mexicans would walk over the border and there would not be any place left for anyone else. Twenty years later, in the 1980s, the fear was that people would walk from Nicaragua up through Honduras bringing the Mexicans with them and that in no time the place would be swamped, which is a terrible word that is used here also.

The reality is that in conditions of massive economic uncertainty, people's labour is being used but their presence is not acknowledged. We are stuck, therefore, with the whole legislative route. My question is simple. I know it is difficult to choose the right date between the first and last week in March. This committee should be flexible on the timing of the visit to have the maximum effect. Ms Gleeson mentioned the calls being made to the offices of various people who will be decision makers. Some are a lost cause, frankly, and Ms Gleeson and I know that, but others are marginal and are capable of being turned to some extent. The visit of the committee should be strategically planned and I am sure we would appreciate advice not just on the timing of the visit but its strategic effect.

Another point it is important to make, because others may have a different view, is that the total prostration of the Irish Government in terms of every other issue on foreign policy will have no effect. We should help the lobby and these centres and make a strategic visit. A strong case can be made from a human aspect, which it is in terms of family connections and so on, but also economically. I wish Ms Gleeson well with it.

I welcome Sheila Gleeson. I take up the point the Chairman raised about reciprocal or quid pro quo arrangements. I raised that issue with the ambassador in terms of a number of people from America who were finding it difficult to get work permits here.

And extensions to the 90 days.

One person was an expert on Japanese food, a sushi chef, who was very qualified and had particular skills but that did not go down well with our Department. I gave him details on what to do. It is an issue, and many members are aware of it, that we continue to talk about and hope Irish emigrants will get their documents sorted, yet we have not done enough for immigrants here. I have given some examples to the ambassador.

I have some practical questions for Ms Gleeson. If there is success in resolving the position of the undocumented Irish immigrants in the United States, what will happen then? I have heard various reports about that. Will Irish people be able to make application there? Do they have to come home, as other people reported? Are we simply talking about Irish immigrants because in the past people here could apply for Donnelly and Morrison visas and there were different lotteries and so on? Perhaps I am jumping too far ahead but people would like to know if we are just talking about Irish immigrants?

In regard to this committee being flexible or making a strategic visit, that is important and we should keep open the possibility. We should not simply decide on the end of March. Perhaps Ms Gleeson could give us more information on the resolution of the undocumented Irish.

Ms Gleeson might like to reply now. Most of the points have been covered.

Ms Gleeson

Deputy Allen asked whether ours was a pessimistic view. It is difficult to know. One of the things the Irish lobby for immigration reform has done effectively is take a more positive stance on some aspects of this issue. If we were to look too much at reality we would all sit back and say we cannot do anything about it. That lobby has begun to turn around the issue and say there is some hope if we do something. It will be difficult to win the battle if we believe there is no hope.

There are many reasons it makes sense to produce comprehensive immigration legislation, not least being that if the 11 million workers decided to take a trip home, the economy would collapse. Numerous economic studies have been done across the country that show the contributions of all immigrants. They put more into the economy. The majority of immigrants pay taxes. They are already paying into the system but are not eligible to take anything out of it. People go to the United States to work. They are not eligible for benefit. People say they only go there for the benefits. I assure the committee they do not go to America for the welfare benefits. That is not a reason to go there because they do not get benefits. There is a strong economic case to be made if people look at it logically and in a pragmatic way but we have not seen that yet.

There is some hope that the situation will turn around because if it does not it will be very difficult. Some Bills have been produced, including what is known in the advocacy community as the report to deport Bills whereby people must provide their names and then return to their home country to get a visa. That is totally impractical. Many of the foreign embassies could not deal with the volume. It would be expensive. Also, the fines and penalties people would pay would go directly to the US Immigration Service to pay for some of the work it is doing. They will make quite a deal of money out of this and that will be injected, hopefully, into improving the existing sluggish and bureaucratic service. In terms of whether it is a pessimistic view, I hope not. I am feeling more hopeful now but it is an uphill battle which is the reason it is so critical for this committee to do what it can. If we plug it in everywhere we can, so to speak, I hope we can make a difference.

We are small in numbers but have a voice that we need to raise much louder. It has given me hope to go to the ILIR meeting and see all the young undocumented immigrants. There is a buzz about this. Everybody is going to Washington DC. Contractors are shutting down their businesses for a day or two days in order that their workers can go. Everybody is rowing in behind this proposal.We saw people who had organised the fight for Donnelly and Morrison visas at the Boston meeting. There is great movement on this issue and that gives me some hope. I propose that we should do what we can.

On the question of a bilateral agreement, we should consider that. I am not sure such an agreement would be considered, at least not before this discussion is held but it is something to consider. An economic benefit would be gained from that and we can consider the possibility of trying to secure some work visas. Even in some of the more negative Bills there appears to be some allowance that we at least need skilled workers but other workers are also needed. Many industries have collapsed in the Boston area. The SEIU, the service workers union, indicates that there is a huge undocumented population there and it has been active on this issue. One of its leaders is a gentleman from Dublin.

Many different groups are focused on this issue. In recent weeks, an association of the hotel workers, the horse breeders association, Intel and agricultural workers have come out in favour of comprehensive immigration reform. There are many groups that can bring some weight to bear on this issue.

On the issue of police activity, random cops are being over zealous in enforcing immigration law. There were some moves last year and there has also been a provision included in the Sensenbrenner Bill that would mandate local police to enforce immigration law but the Bill has not been passed yet and that is not yet the law. An attempt was made last year through the CLEAR Actto have the legislation passed but it was rejected by the House and the Senate. It is not in place yet but it is one aspect being examined. The danger of it is that people will not report crimes, harassment or any kind of injustice they have experienced. There has been employer exploitation.

I worked at the Irish Immigration Centre until last year. I dealt with a young woman who was raped and would not report it to the police. That type of crime goes unreported. She was afraid that if a rape test was carried out the police would be called in, she would have to testify and they would deport her. She had a child and, therefore, she would not do that. We want to prevent that happening; we want people to actively co-operate with police. We see random cases. We met some police officers in the Boston area and heard that most of them are not interested in that aspect, but then there is the member of the force who is interested in enforcing the law, and there is very little one can do about that. One contractor I met did not know whether to make a complaint about an incident in a small town just outside of Boston, a liberal town where one would not normally expect to find this happen there. Nevertheless, one policeman there was apparently quite zealous about this issue.

There has been a turnaround in the mail, which is good news. When the ILIR held the meetings, mail boxes, e-mails, etc., were filled up. Some of the young people involved in this issue actively follow it up. They hear positive information and that is important. The Irish voice is an important one for them to hear. It is important for them to be able to say "I am Irish. I am working here, contributing to the economy and I want you to pass comprehensive immigration reform legislation". Matters are turning around in that regard and I hope that will continue.

There was even great mobilisation around the debate on the Sensenbrenner Bill before the holidays. People who had never made calls called in because it was so negative, punitive and would have criminalised almost everybody concerned. I listened to some of the debate on C-SPAN and one of the legislators pointed out that his staff could be potential criminals in the event of their getting a call from a undocumented constituent, in that, failure to disclose that would be considered a felony. That was interesting but the Bill was passed in any event.

I urge the committee to be as flexible in the date as possible because it is not set in stone. I talked to Mr. Joe Hackett at the embassy before I came hereand that was the best advice he could give. We intend to work with the embassy and the ILIR and to be strategic about who the committee members can talk to and visit and where the most impact can be made. The Republican Senators are probably some of the ones who are on the edge and they would be the ones to target. We will work on that.

I wish to deal with the importance of comprehensive reform. I did not want to go into too much detail but the 1996 IIRIR legislation — I can never remember what the letters stand for — was clever immigration legislation, the provisions of which extended in many directions, as if it had many tentacles. That has made matters difficult. Major provisions of it affect young Irish immigrants. If one overstays a visitor visa by more than 180 days, one is subject to a three-year or ten-year bar from entry to the United States. Furthermore, many arrest issues were criminalised for immigration purposes, of which I can give members examples.

The authorities made almost every offence an aggravated felony for immigration purposes, even though it might be considered a minor altercation. If one kicked somebody, that would be classed as a felony because it would constitute assault with a deadly weapon — one's foot is considered to be a deadly weapon. Shop-lifting is considered a crime of moral turpitude. We dealt with a case involving a young girl whose family moved to the US when she was 13. When the girl was a teenager she went a little off the rails and was caught stealing a blouse. She comes from a good family, went to college, had a great job and wanted to apply for citizenship, which is when this issue arose, yet for that crime she committed she was probably deportable. She committed the crime when she was 17, only three years after she arrived in the United States. It is considered a crime of moral turpitude for which the offender can be deported. If the girl was to apply for citizenship, she would be deported. When anybody applies for a new green card, the authorities consider all these issues and applicants are being deported for such offences. Many minor offences are now considered felonies and that has made the position difficult.

I heard an advocate say that the introduction of a comprehensive Bill would provide for the mother of all waivers. It would waive many of these issues such that people would be able to benefit from whatever legislation emerges. It is important to ensure the provision of waivers from the three-year and ten-year bar from entry to the US. Many members of the Irish community have travelled to and fro between Ireland and the US and are subject to bar in terms of entry to the US. Even though they do not know that yet, it would arise if they were apply for something. It is, therefore, important to adopt a comprehensive approach in anything we do.

At some level an agreement might not work unless all these issues, of which there are many, are considered. The adjustment allowing people to get their visas in the US rather than have to leave the US to get them is an important factor for those concerned. One can obtain employer sponsorship the same as people always could. One can be sponsored by an employer but one must wait three or four years because of the backlog of applications before one is called for interview. However, one must travel to one's home country to get a green card.

Once a person leaves the United States that is when the bar to entry to the US kicks in. If one has overstayed a visitor visa and leaves the US, one is barred from re-entry to the US. All these issues are important and they would be taken care of if a comprehensive Bill were introduced. The Kennedy-McCain Bill takes care of all that, which is one of the reasons we promote it. One would find it difficult to deal with all these issues in a piecemeal fashion. That is the reason all the immigrant organisations are seeking a comprehensive approach.

The Kennedy-McCain Bill includes a provision to repeal the three-year and ten-year bar from entry to the US. The Sensenbrenner measure proposes to go even further in not only retaining it but also in abolishing the waiver programme. Is there a possibility that in a compromise Bill — the Chairman's Mark — which takes on board elements of Sensenbrenner's measure, that it might still be retained because of the hostility?

Ms Gleeson

The Chairman's Mark is a fairly good Bill although it needs to be improved in a number of different aspects. We are working to try to get some improvements, with less emphasis on enforcement and more on the comprehensive piece. That is just the starting point for the discussion in the judiciary committee. The advantage of having all this happen in the judiciary committee is that, hopefully, there is at least some thoughtful discussion on it. There are some good members on the committee who are committed and will have a rational discussion on it. If it goes to the House, there is the talk of enforcement and the type of debate that was seen on the Sensenbrenner Bill. It was just negative. It was distressing to listen to C-SPAN. All the words I mentioned earlier were repeated over and over. Everybody who spoke said the same thing.

Thank you, Ms Gleeson. You have given us great encouragement today. I can assure you that we will seek the best possible time to go there. The reason I asked that question in the first instance was to get your view on it. You have a comprehensive knowledge of the situation and that is impressive. You are doing great work mobilising support, which is very necessary at this stage. We wish you well in your work on behalf of the vulnerable Irish citizens living in the United States. Every member of the committee fully supports you and we will do all we can to be of assistance.

Ms Gleeson

I appreciate the opportunity to come before the committee and I thank the members for listening.

The joint committee went into private session at 4.30 p.m. and adjourned at 4.50 p.m. until 2.30 p.m. on Tuesday, 28 February 2006.

Top
Share