Immigration reform will be passed this summer, Sen. Charles Schumer predicted Monday during a visit to the 12th annual Daily News/CUNY Citizenship NOW! immigration call-in.
“I want to let you in on a little secret. We are going to pass that bill and sign it into law this year,” said the New York Democrat, one of the authors of a Senate immigration bill that would provide a path to citizenship for millions of undocumented immigrants, overhaul the current system and boost border enforcement.
A reform measure is now stalled in the House.
“We will have an immigration bill — it may not be exactly the Senate bill — on the floor of the House … We will come to an agreement. They will put that bill on the President’s desk for President Obama to sign into law,” Schumer said.
“The Republican Party knows if it continues to be seen as anti-immigrant, they’re going to lose election after election … Their leadership knows it, and they’re trying to convince the rank and file.”
Daily News Chairman and Publisher Mortimer Zuckerman, CUNY Senior Vice Chancellor Jay Hershenson, Daily News President and Chief Executive Officer Bill Holiber and Daily News Editor-in-Chief Colin Myler welcomed Schumer and a host of other state, city and local officials to help launch the annual immigrant information service, headquartered at Stella and Charles Guttman Community College in midtown Manhattan.
“I’ve had a wonderful experience with this country and there’s no (other) country in the world that in a sense welcomes and gives opportunities to immigrants,” said Zuckerman, who emigrated from Canada.
“So, I’m always happy to be a part of anything that nourishes that whole process in this country.”
Myler added, “It is a great privilege, as editor-in-chief of the Daily News, to be a partner in a program like this.”
As of 5:30 p.m. 1,865 calls had been answered. During this year’s Citizenship NOW! hotline, phones and TTY/TTD lines for the hearing impaired will be open from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. through May 2. It’s the largest program of its kind in the nation.
Hundreds of volunteers — including lawyers, paralegals and law students — will give free, confidential citizenship and immigration information during the hotline’s 2014 run.
The volunteers speak English, Spanish and a long list of other languages. Those present on Monday had the combined capacity to answer questions in a total of 48 different languages.
Mayor de Blasio thanked them for their service and vowed to create a municipal ID card that’s open to undocumented immigrants this year.
“Almost half a million New Yorkers happen not to be documented — they are just as much our brothers and sisters, our neighbors, our coworkers, the people who make our neighborhoods great,” he said.
City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito sat down to answer the Spanish phone lines herself — with backup from a CUNY lawyer — telling a caller eager to become a U.S. citizen that she will need to take the naturalization test in English. Mark-Viverito (D-East Harlem) recommended English as a Second Language classes.
“It’s incredible work … being here to answer questions, to make it easier for families to be able to do the work they need to do to become citizens,” said U.S. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), after stopping to pose for photos with Guttman students and shaking hands with hotline volunteers.
“Not only is the day, and the entire week incredibly inspiring, but I’m so grateful for the work that’s being done here,” she said.
CUNY Interim Chancellor William Kelly; New York Secretary of State Cesar Perales; City Council members Ruben Wills (D-Queens) and Mathieu Eugene (D-Brooklyn); Nisha Agarwal, city commissioner for immigrant affairs; and New York’s Mexican Consul General, Embassador Sandra Fuentes-Berain Villenave stopped by hotline headquarters Monday to thank volunteers for their important work.
Arturo Vargas, executive director of the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials; Phyllis Coven, New York District Director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services; Jorge Montalvo, director of the New York State Office for New Americans; Paula Forero and Jessica Peña of International Rescue Committee; and John Catsimatidis, CEO of hotline sponsor Gristedes Foods also helped kick off the 2014 call-in on its first day.
The call-in numbers for the Citizenship NOW! Immigration hot line are:
English: (646) 746-9636
Spanish: (646) 746-9634
TTY/TTD: (212) 221-2419
This year’s call-in media partners include WXTV Univision 41 and WABC-TV. The program is also supported by Stella and Charles Guttman Community College, Gristedes, Cisco, Presidio, the Mayor’s Office of Immigrant Affairs, CUNY School of Law, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, International Rescue Committee, the Legal Aid Society, New York State Office for New Americans, the American Immigration Lawyers Association, the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials and the New Americans Campaign.
