Why did the AFL-CIO soften its stance against guest worker programs?
DB: The AFL-CIO agreed to a position that is much closer to Change to Win’s, specifically to SEIU’s. So you could say that this is the price of unity. But the rationale always given for this by union lobbyists was that this is just political realism. That we are not going to be able to get any kind of immigration reform without the support of the employers, and the employers are not going to support any reform proposals that don’t include guest workers. So this is surrender to that logic.
