But you don’t have to take our word for it.  

A long line of research suggests that increasing immigration can help stave off inflation, stabilize the labor market and perhaps fight off a recession, report Ben Winck and Jason Lalljee of Insider. "Increased immigration … provides a rare chance to rebalance the labor market and drag inflation lower without driving millions of Americans out of work," they conclude. Separately, researchers at Brookings highlight how the immigrant workforce benefits U.S. workers. 

Zoom in on specific sectors: The aging services industry is struggling to fill 11 million job openings, reports Kimberly Bonvissuto of McKnights Senior Living. In construction, Sebastian Obando of Construction Dive reports that there are currently 407,000 unfilled jobs, with experts banking on immigration to help fill them.  

On the global competition side, a new report from the National Academies urges the U.S. to better compete with China and other countries, per Stuart Anderson of Forbes. The report recommends increasing immigration as well as attracting and retaining more foreign-born talent. "Internationally, the United States needs to find new and better ways to encourage scientists, engineers, and their families to come to this country to work and live," the researchers recommend in part. Our Council on National Security and Immigration leaders have sounded similar themes.  

All of this comes as inflation and immigration are top of mind for American voters, as Julia Manchester reports in The Hill. So, let’s find solutions that restore order at the border and address inflation and labor fluctuations, not to mention protect Dreamers and help farmers. Americans support such reforms.  

A quick piece of good news: On Monday, President Biden signed the bipartisan Bridging the Gap for New Americans Act. The law is a first step toward addressing employment barriers for immigrants. For more, see our recent press statement. 

Welcome to Wednesday’s edition of The Forum Daily. I’m Dan Gordon, the Forum’s strategic communications VP. If you have a story to share from your own community, please send it to me at [email protected].  

NEW PAROLE PROGRAM — The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has launched a new parole program for Venezuelan asylum seekers, as Al Jazeera reports. However, immigrant advocates continue to raise concerns about the Biden administration’s decision to simultaneously expand the use of Title 42 to rapidly expel Venezuelan asylum seekers at the U.S.-Mexico border, report Rebecca Beitsch and Rafael Bernal of The Hill. In Catholic News Service, Bishop Mark J. Seitz of El Paso, Texas, also a Forum board member, says, "Now we must all work harder, especially the faith community, to build a culture of hospitality that respects the dignity of those who migrate, and to continue to press lawmakers and the Biden administration to establish a safe, humane, functioning and rights-respecting system to ensure protection to those in need." 

MORE SOLUTIONS — Speaking of Catholic bishops, their push continues for government leaders to set partisanship aside and work together to find immigration solutions, reports John Lavenburg of Crux. "We simply cannot allow partisan divisions to continue to impede the needed interventions of government," Auxiliary Bishop Mario Dorsonville of Washington, D.C., said in a statement yesterday. "… National, state, and local governments must work collaboratively with one another and civil society to devise a collective and human response to the unavoidable reality of migration, seeking to embrace the potential it offers. In this context, strong federal leadership is especially important."  

PROTECTIONS FOR DREAMERS — Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) recipients continue to live in uncertainty as their protections could be ended by a court decision soon. In an op-ed for The Press Herald, Carroll Conley, executive director of the Christian Civic League of Maine, calls on his state’s legislators in Congress to protect Dreamers: "It’s a biblical principle that we ought not hold children responsible for their parents’ decisions. ... [Congress] should act immediately to solve multiple crises — and I’m praying that Maine’s U.S. senators will once again lead the way." Separately, some "documented Dreamers" are already facing self-deportation while waiting for a solution from Congress, Mollie Swayne reports in KCRG. An amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) could change the future of thousands of documented dreamers — and we’d note that national security leaders support it.  

LAWSUIT AGAINST ICE — Five nonprofit legal services organizations are suing U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) for allegedly preventing them from adequately communicating with their clients, reports Greg LaRose of the Louisiana Illuminator. The complaint describes limited access to private spaces for confidential conversations, expensive phone access, and difficult scheduling requirements among the obstacles lawyers face. "The right to a lawyer should be the minimum level of fairness that someone gets when the government puts them in jail," said Homero López Jr., legal director of Immigration Services and Legal Advocacy (ISLA).  

Thanks for reading, 

Dan