John Cornyn: “less than 24 hours after the Senate voted to protect American workers and to put them first when it comes to competition…”

“less than 24 hours after the Senate voted to protect American workers and to put them first when it comes to competition for jobs in this country, the Senator from Massachusetts has now offered an amendment that would literally gut the amendment that was adopted yesterday and put American workers in the back seat and foreign workers who wanted to come here and participate in a guest worker program in the front seat. President Bush has spoken time and time again about a guest worker program that matches willing workers with willing employers. But Senator Kennedy's amendment would do nothing of the kind. It would allow people to come to the United States and to self-petition without having an employer sponsor their petition, and it would not require proof that an American citizen is unavailable to perform that type of job. Yesterday, the Senate--wisely, in my view--changed the underlying bill to require that American workers be put first before a guest worker could be provided a job and that, under the provisions of this bill, No. 1, they had to identify a job so they would not be here unemployed; and No. 2, that job first be offered to qualified American workers. Then, in that event no American workers were found available to perform that job, of course the guest worker provisions of the bill would kick in.…”