Unity Blueprint for Immigration Reform

Formed by CHRCL, over 250 organizations collaborated to create a blueprint for comprehensive immigration reform that would be rational, humane, and achievable.

The Issue

The Unity Blueprint for Immigration Reform outlines a comprehensive plan to create a humane, fair, and workable immigration system that reduces the undocumented population, overhauls visa processing, and protects the rights of both immigrants and U.S. workers.

Campaign Statement

Currently, CHRCL does not believe that the US Congress has demonstrated the necessary support to enact comprehensive immigration reform. However, if there is a change in Congress and the administration following the 2024 national elections, it may become possible to achieve comprehensive reform. This will largely depend on whether concerned organizations engage in active voter registration drives in 2023 and 2024 and support candidates who are committed to fair and humane immigration reform.

CHRCL strongly believes that concerned organizations, community members, the press, and presidential candidates must endorse and provide leadership for prompt immigration reform in line with the Unity Blueprint for Immigration Reform (UBIR). The UBIR provides a roadmap to address a wide range of policy issues that a future administration and Congress would need to tackle in order to address the shortcomings of current federal law.

A complete list of organizations that helped develop and endorse UBIR included National Day Laborers Organizing Network, American Federation of, Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO), the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union, William C. Velasquez Institute, the Coalition for Humane Immigrants Rights of Los Angeles (CHIRLA), CARECEN Los Angeles, the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), the Southern Poverty Law Center, Sweatshop Watch, Mexican American Political Association (MAPA).

Organizations Involved

The Unity Blueprint

The Unity Blueprint for Immigration Reform provides specific legislative proposals for rational and humane transformation of the current immigration policy disaster in the United States. While we encourage the efforts of all organizations to achieve broad immigration reform, these
proposals reflect the aspirations of a wide range of civic and labor organizations participating in discussions aimed at achieving a workable, just, and fair immigration system that addresses the interests of the nation and the millions of immigrants who give their labor, talents, and
investments to it without the benefit of protections and rights extended to its citizenry.

We recognize that organizations supporting immigration reform may adopt different priorities and strategies in their public education and advocacy work. However, virtually all organizations agree on the need for an immigration system that dramatically reduces the size of the
undocumented population and replaces the visa processing system with one that prevents expansion of the undocumented population in the future while protecting U.S. workers.

Get Out The Vote

Comprehensive immigration reform requires a national effort to register voters and increase voter turnout in support of candidates who will work towards passing a comprehensive overhaul of the country's dysfunctional immigration laws. These laws are currently causing the separation of hundreds of thousands of families, incentivizing illegal migration, leaving many sectors of the economy short of workers, and resulting in the deportation of refugees.

Immigration Reform Goals

Protect the well-being and safety of immigrant and U.S. citizen children.
Achieve faithful enforcement of immigration laws by fully reinstating the jurisdiction of the federal courts to review agency decisions involving immigrants.
Achieve maximum protection of the labor rights and working conditions of U.S. and immigrant workers through enhanced labor protections available to all workers regardless of immigration status.
Achieve maximum reduction in the size of the undocumented population through a program granting prompt permanent resident status to undocumented migrants.
Achieve a legal framework for future migration through the issuance of a realistic number of permanent employment and family-based visas.
Adopt rational and humane border enforcement policies that avoid more deaths, injuries, and destruction of border communities.
Adopt rational and humane interior enforcement, detention, removal, and related policies addressing the presence of immigrant communities.