About that first Immigration bill Bernie voted against....

[jillan]

Maybe now you will understand why.
He went there & made sure the next time the comprehensive immigration bill went to the floor of the Senate - these people were not forgotten.

I dare you to watch.... or you could continue to ignore the truth and point fingers at Bernie trying to make him look bad when he was in fact fighting for the new face of slave labor.

Working families of Immokalee, Florida, have been fighting exploitation by the agricultural industry. "I will always fight. As long as I can see my children happy and well, I will continue fighting to provide them with the best. My children are the motor that drives my life,” Udelia says.

In 2008, Bernie traveled to Immokalee and met with migrant workers who were being ruthlessly exploited. He told the story to Congress in the hopes of improving their condition, and succeeded. But how many more Immokalees are there? How many fields or factories are there? We have to ask ourselves ‘who benefits from this exploitation?' And to understand that it is not only the Immokalee workers who suffer but every worker in America because that pushes us in a race to the bottom.

&feature=youtu.be

[CaliforniaPeggy]

1. I've seen this video, and it is spot on and very moving.

It clearly shows both Bernie's heart and mind.

It was beautifully done.

K&R

[PatrickforO]

2. Excellent that you've brought this video out in the open.

The more people that see it, the better. We've simply got to start caring about each other, and not holding profit over human life.

[Haveadream]

3. Why United Farm Workers Are Not Feeling the Bern

From an article printed earlier:


"Today the United Farm Workers endorsed Hillary Clinton. Although they appreciate Senator Sander's contributions to the economic debate, they are are not feeling the bern because of his work against their chances for a path to immigration reform. They are also very concerned by his exploitation and willingness to put aside his professed aversion to the guest worker program as long as it benefits his home state of Vermont.

Sen. Sanders voted against the Kennedy-McCain bill and led the push for amendments that killed the measure because he opposed the conditions pushed by business interests for guest workers, he said during the Feb. 11 debate.


But Sen. Sanders' opposition to abusive guest worker programs didn't extend to a bill he cosponsored in 2011, to allow agricultural guest workers into his home state's largest farm sector -- Vermont's dairy industry... So the Sanders-backed measure could have let dairies replace all current domestic farm laborers with foreign guest workers -- with the same damaging impacts on wages and working conditions for both domestic and foreign guest workers Sen. Sanders decried in other industries."


http://www.democraticunderground.com/12511403095

[jillan]

4. This isn't about the United Farm workers, is it? This is about the abused migrant workers in Florida

[madfloridian]

5. Yes, it's about the great Coalition of Immokalee Workers.

They are a great group. They periodically go to the Public stores and hold rallies. Public refuses to use their coalitions tomatoes and probably other items.

[Haveadream]

6. The important point here is this

The OP's title is about the Immigration Bill and Senator Sanders support of those who literally slave in the fields. It is a national disgrace and high on my list of priorities.

The reason the United Farm Workers could not in good faith endorse Senator Sanders is because he would not support it and because he himself is guilty of exploiting migrant workers in Vermont. Do you know who the United farm Workers are? They are field laborers just like the Immokalee. They, more than anyone else, truly understand what they are up against. Did you know they desparately wanted that bill signed because it was a step towards freedom? They begged him. Even with the best of intentions, Senator Sanders doesn't always get it right. Those workers have to live with the results of his decision every single day of their lives. And, they have consistently told him he got it wrong.

To make matters worse, when the dairy industry of Vermont needed inexpensive labor, he actually introduced a bill with the exact same provisions and lack of protection for workers as the bill he had previously opposed. That's right, so the very same migrant workers could be shipped into Vermont for cheap labor.

This is not about gotcha. Senator Sanders is a very good man. That said, he put aside his human rights values when it was economically advantageous to Vermont. And, he has done so on more than one occasion. When he had compassion for the Immokalee workers in Florida, he was doing the right thing. When he refused to listen to the on the ground, lived concerns of exploited workers across this country, he did not. When he directly exploited migrant workers in Vermont for financial gain to the dairy industry there, he did not. Unless you think some migrant workers are more equal than others, the fact that he did that should bother you. It bothered the United Farm Workers enough that they protested his actions on both accounts.