Agricultural Personnel Management Program
University of California

4/27/01 News Report -- Lincoln (Nebraska) Journal Star

Sen. Chuck Hagel, just back from a three-day trip to Mexico, said Thursday he anticipates "significant immigration  reform during the next two years" to accommodate Mexican and other immigrant workers.

"We need to make our immigration laws relative to today's needs and easier on families," Hagel said.

That opens the way to more guest worker and seasonal worker options as well as amnesty provisions, he said.

"In order to continue to sustain economic growth in the United States, we need migrant workers from outside this  country to fill the jobs."

Meatpacking jobs in Nebraska are a primary example of the need for immigrant workers, Hagel said. So are a number  of other service and agricultural industry jobs, he said.

"We need Mexican workers. The Mexicans need jobs. They need resources going back into their country."

Those needs emerge at a time when both nations have chosen "presidents who understand this issue very clearly,"  Hagel said.

President Bush has firsthand knowledge of immigration needs and concerns from his experience as governor of  Texas. Mexican President Vicente Fox has made immigration rights a major issue.

Hagel, one of five Senate Foreign Relations Committee members who met with Fox, Foreign Minister Jorge Castaneda  and other Mexican leaders this week, said he returned to Washington with "very positive" impressions.

"Fox has something going here," he said. "He has put together a very impressive team. He is showing some real  leadership."

On the trip's agenda were a host of issues, including trade, immigration, border control and trafficking of illegal drugs.

"The forces of reality are bringing not just Mexico and the United States together, but all of the Western Hemisphere  closer and closer," Hagel said.

"The common denominator is self-interest, starting with continuing to enhance trade opportunities."

Mexico can be helpful to the United States in the short term with energy supplies, Hagel said, some of which already  flow into California.

"We talked about a North American power grid as the answer to some of our needs," he said, "but we have to look  internally (to) produce our own energy."

That means returning to the nuclear power option, he said, and developing more natural gas and clean-burning coal.