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Health & Fitness

Immigration: Now is the Time to Speak Up!

US Representative Elizabeth Henderson Esty  (CT-Democrat from the 5th Congressional District) is co-authoring a bipartisan, comprehensive immigration reform bill, H.R. 15 in the US House of Representatives.  This House Bill is expected to mirror the one which was passed in the US Senate.  Representative Esty is actively garnering backing from House Republicans and Democrats alike. 

 

The House Bill proposal will provide for securing our borders, providing interior immigration enforcement, enacting reform needed by both families and businesses, and provide a path that more fair, humane and logical than our current broken immigration system.

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Rather than watch our US businesses suffer from lack of unskilled laborers, watch our immigrant young people who were brought to this country through no fault of their own graduate from our schools without the opportunity to attend our colleges or join our military or contribute back to our society, or watch millions of people and families live in the shadows, Connecticut US Representative Esty has decided to take action.

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She has spoken to her constituents throughout the State of Connecticut, and has learned that almost half a million immigrants live in Connecticut, making up 16 percent of our workforce.  Speaking to her colleagues throughout the US, she has learned that immigrant-owned small businesses employ more than 4 million people and 18 % of small business owners in the US are immigrants.  In order to grow our economy and create jobs, our immigration system needs to be fixed.  The Congressional Budget Office indicates that H.R. 15 could reduce the deficit by $197 billion in the first decade alone.  Immigration Reform is not only a moral imperative, it is an economic imperative.

 

US businesses need highly skilled workers and unskilled laborers, the deficit needs to be lowered, the country needs more jobs, our military needs soldiers, families need to be reunited, and young people who have been raised and educated in our system need and want to give back to the only country that they have known.

 

The US Senate has acted, in a bipartisan majority vote of 68 to 32.  The President is ready to sign comprehensive immigration reform into law.  Now it is time for the American people to speak up and demand a vote in the US House of Representatives.  The State of Connecticut is speaking out.  What about your state?

 

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