That’s the question we asked 1,000 registered voters in new polling together with the Bullfinch Group. The responses send a clear message: Voters of all stripes still want Congress to act now. 

Support ran 73% overall, 70% among conservatives, and 72% among evangelical Christians, just for starters. 

Will Republicans and Democrats respond? The odds may be steep, as Michelle Hackman reports in the Wall Street Journal. But the broad support — not to mention the urgent need to address Dreamers, farmworkers and the border — should be compelling. 

Reforms could address many economic issues, including food prices and inflation, as my policy colleague Arturo Castellanos Canales highlighted recently. (Arturo also recently wrote about bilateral labor agreements and is presenting his paper today at the Metropolis Conference in Tijuana. He's available for interview — contact me.) 

Welcome to Thursday’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].  

PRECARIOUS — Abdul "Wasi" Safi helped U.S. forces counter the Taliban before the takeover last year. But because he wasn’t paid by the U.S. government, he could not get a Special Immigrant Visa to flee, reports Allison P. Erickson of The Texas Tribune. Safi went into hiding with 10 other family members, then began a harrowing journey of more than 12,000 miles to the U.S.-Mexico border. He requested asylum but was arrested because he had not presented himself at a port of entry with required documentation. "I think my brother is the first in my whole tribe to be in chains, ever," Safi’s brother Sami-ullah said after the court denied Wasi’s bond. "It was very difficult to see him like that. He’s not a criminal." Also today, take a deep breath, then watch the New York Times’ opinion video in which American veterans and civilians talk about why they remain dedicated to saving Afghan allies left behind — and read allies’ text messages. Kirk Semple and Alexander Stockton of the Times produced the video. 

DETENTION CENTERS — The publicly run Berks County, Pennsylvania, detention facility is slated to close at the end of January, Karen Shuey and David Mekeel of the Reading Eagle report. Meanwhile, The Washington Post editorial homes in on President Biden’s unfulfilled campaign promise to shutter for-profit migrant detention facilities. Of about 30,000 migrants in detention, about 80% are in private facilities, the board notes. And Hamed Aleaziz of the Los Angeles Times reports that ICE mistakenly published the identities of more than 6,200 asylum seekers, all currently in detention centers. The information included names, case status, detention locations and other information. ICE is investigating the incident. 

HARSH CONDITIONS — Some undocumented workers on livestock farms are living in inadequate housing because they lack legal protections, Lucy Grindon of NPR reports. "Federal law says H-2A housing has to be inspected annually, but dairy workers aren’t eligible because they're not temporary workers. They work year-round," Grindon says. A young Guatemalan woman said that some of the farms where she has lived in New York were full of cockroaches and bedbugs that made her break out in hives. "It’s certainly up to the farmer on how well they manage that facility and how good of a communication system that they have established with the residents," said Rich Stup, an agricultural workforce specialist at Cornell University. The Farm Workforce Modernization Act could expand the H-2A visa program to include year-round workers, but for now many undocumented workers live in the shadows.  

COLOMBIA’S REQUEST — Luis Alberto Murillo Urrutia, Colombia’s ambassador to the U.S., recently sent a letter to the Biden administration requesting deferred immigration enforcement for Colombians already living in the U.S., report Manuel Rueda and Elliot Spagat of the Associated Press. It is unclear how many Colombians reside in the U.S. without legal status, they note. Colombia has taken in 2 million Venezuelans who have fled and is now asking for additional support: "For more than 60 years, hundreds of thousands of Colombian citizens have been forced to leave the country because of the conflict seeking to rebuild their lives, many of the more recently arrived still remain vulnerable and unprotected in the United States," Murillo Urrutia wrote.  

‘A WASTED OPPORTUNITY’ — The Boston Globe’s editorial board urges the Biden administration to grant work permission to Venezuelan asylum seekers. The board cites the story of José, one of the migrants sent to Martha’s Vineyard, who tried to start a life in Massachusetts but couldn’t get hired because of his lack of documents. "Without a legitimate chance to obtain legal employment, people like José are going to keep finding illegal work," the board writes. "It’s a massive headache for them and a wasted opportunity for the economy. Given the current workforce shortages in different industries across the nation." Asylum seekers must currently wait at least six months before applying for a work authorization. 

Thanks for reading, 

Dan 

P.S. A welcoming community in Owensboro, Kentucky, has helped support three resettled Afghans who are now opening the first Afghan eatery in town, reports Keith Lawrence of the Messenger-Inquirer. Check out the story of these three cooks who started as volunteers in a shelter kitchen and made everyone fall for their food.