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Press coverage - Farmers in Colorado struggle with labor shortage
In the wake of repeated crackdowns on illegal workers, some farmers in Colorado are struggling to bring in their crops with fewer available migrant workers. The NewsHour reports on how the problem is affecting individual farmers and the American economy.
NewsHour Online, Aug. 20, 2007

Press coverage - Swift faces new labor challenge
JBS-Swift & Co. plans to hire 1,300 workers to staff another shift at its Greeley meatpacking plant, but it will have to overcome the tightest labor market the county has seen in six years.
The hiring spree is expected to take place quickly, over the next four months, at a company gun-shy after immigration raids in December detained 1,282 Swift workers at six plants. More than 250 Greeley workers were caught in the dragnet looking for people using false identification papers.
"It will be an interesting test. A lot of the debate around this issue is whether there are enough legal residents or American citizens willing to take some of these jobs," said Wade Buchanan, president of the Bell Policy Center, a nonprofit research-and-advocacy group in Denver.
Story by Aldo Svaldi, The Denver Post, July 28, 2007

Press coverage - Immigration debate held at UNC
Witnesses' testimony at UNC incited cheers and jeers from about 120 who attended. Some saw the controversial Dream Act, which has been reintroduced in Congress, as an argument of the rights of U.S. citizens over all others, a national security issue and a law that would create additional tax burden for Coloradans.If passed, the Dream Act would provide a path to legal citizenship for children of undocumented workers with "good moral character." It also would provide Colorado high school graduates who are undocumented immigrants an opportunity to pay in-state tuition. Eight states, including California, Texas and Kansas, have statutes that already allow for this.
Story by Millete Birhanemaskel, The Greeley Tribune, Sept. 1, 2006

Court kills immigration ballot initiative
Colorado Supreme Court rules Defend Colorado Now ballot question violates single subject rule, boots initiative from November ballot, June 12, 2006.
Story by Jon Sarche, Associated Press, on DenverPost.com

Press release - “The action of the Colorado Supreme Court saved Colorado voters from an expensive campaign on what even the initiative’s supporters agreed was a purely symbolic measure. It would have been a campaign centered on a false choice.” by Wade Buchanan, June 12, 2006.

Press coverage - Speaker: Realistic policy needed, League of Women Voters briefed on immigration reform, legislation
During the session Wednesday evening, about 30 league members and other Steamboat Springs residents listened to Daniel Spivey at the Denver-based think tank the Bell Policy Center enumerate why undocumented immigrants come to the U.S., what they do here and why federal policy needs to match the "reality of the economy."
Story by Alexis DeLaCruz, Steamboat Pilot & Today, March 2, 2006