Coming to you this chilly Monday morning while not also watching the World Cup. Really I’m not. (Yet.) 

While we watch, it’s worth noting the poor conditions for migrant workers who have made the competition possible. That includes the "forgotten team" that helped build the stadium, including hundreds of thousands of Nepali migrant workers, as Tariq Panja and Bhadra Sharma reported in The New York Times. Human rights organizations say thousands have died in the process. And just yesterday, Panja reported on migrant workers stranded by their employers — "without food, water and toilet facilities for seven hours" — as the Cup kicked off. 

Back stateside, we’re seeing some potential movement in four areas where targeted immigration reforms are urgent. 

Senate Democrats have renewed conversations with Republicans about finding a solution at least for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) recipients — together with addressing challenges at the border — before the end of the year, Priscilla Alvarez and Daniella Diaz report for CNN. There’s new evidence that such a solution would help our workforce: A new report by two groups that mentor and financially assist students with DACA indicates that graduates of the programs have a 94 percent workforce participation rate, Rafael Bernal writes in The Hill. 

On the farm workforce side, migrant worker Lulu Guerrero of Colorado was among those advocating on Capitol Hill last week for the Farm Workforce Modernization Act, John Aguilar reports in the Denver Post. Also advocating for it: International Fresh Produce Association CEO Cathy Burns, in her conversation at our "Leading the Way" convening. "With a legal immigrant workforce, you can actually lower inflation and drive up American wages," she said. "The time is now to pass the [Farm Workforce Modernization Act]." 

And on the bipartisan Afghan Adjustment Act, our own Midwest mobilizer Jason Lief writes in the Des Moines Register that his Senator Chuck Grassley (R) should reconsider his opposition. Jason does a great job responding directly to concerns Grassley’s staff have laid out. And in The Kansas City Star, letter writer Julie Doane translates the local welcome she has witnessed into the need for senators to act now.  

Welcome to Monday’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].  

ROOM TO GROW — Eric Berger of The Guardian visits Caruthersville, in the Missouri Bootheel, to write about declining population growth and whether immigration could be the answer. "Immigration is sort of the extra safety valve we have for population growth in the United States," said William Frey, a demographer at the Brookings Institution. "It’s unaffected by the [aging] of our current population because immigrants tend to be younger, and they also have children, which makes the population younger." Our Room to Grow paper examines this question, too.  

EXPENSIVE SEATS — Curious: Florida has paid an aviation company within the state more than $1.56 million to fly about 50 migrants to Martha’s Vineyard, even though a charter flight company in Ohio had quoted a price of $153,000, Samantha J. Gross and Mike Damiano report in the Boston Globe. Florida officials had not responded to inquiries about what happened to the remaining $1.4 million. Recently released documents also indicate that the state paid for flights that have not taken place, Gross and Damiano report. 

WORK VISA PLEDGE — The State Department is pledging to reduce wait times for tourists, students and workers, Michelle Hackman of The Wall Street Journal reports. The demand for visas is so high that potential visa applicants need to book months or years ahead. The department plans to hire more consular staff and increase the number of available visa appointments to speed up processing by the end of next year. "It’s been really painful for us," said Karan Bhatia, vice president of public affairs at Google. "In a nutshell, when you have employees or partners that are unable to travel to the United States in a timely way, it just becomes really hard to operate a competitive global business." 

FIVE WEEKS — The Biden administration has five weeks to fully unwind the Title 42 policy. Felipe De La Hoz of The New Republic has a good analysis: "[H]ow it responds in this interim period will set the tone for the federal government’s posture toward humanitarian migration for the foreseeable future." De La Hoz points to solutions like reforming the refugee system and better processing migrants in advance. (Sounds familiar.) "What definitely shouldn’t happen — but is absolutely in the cards — is a turn toward draconian enforcement of a different type," he writes. 

FAITH VOICES — It was great to meet our board member Bishop Mark Seitz of El Paso in person last week, and congratulations to him as he becomes the first bishop from a border diocese to lead the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on Migration, as John Lavenburg of Crux reports. Meanwhile, Southern Baptist Pastor Eric Costanzo of Tulsa, Oklahoma, speaks with The Dispatch’s David French and Curtis Chang on welcoming refugees and immigrants — have a listen. 

Thanks for reading, 

Dan