Eric Thomas or Frances Cox 202-822-9491 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE June 8, 2007

Compete America Urges Senate to Continue Work on Comprehensive Immigration Bill

Washington, D.C. – Citing the vital importance to the U.S. economy, Compete America today urged the U.S. Senate to continue negotiating and pass comprehensive immigration reform. 

“While many issues remain to be resolved, including meaningful visa reforms for highly educated foreign professionals, the debate over immigration reform has progressed significantly over the past few weeks,” said Robert Hoffman, Vice President for Government and Public Affairs at Oracle and Co-Chair of Compete America.  “Compete America will continue to advocate for ways to improve the current legislation, but we remain fully committed to the process.  Fixing a broken immigration system is essential to U.S. economic and security interests, and the Senate should continue to move forward as soon as possible.”

Compete America will continue to support inclusion of provisions to reform the H-1B visa and employment-based green card systems to allow U.S. employers to recruit and retain highly educated foreign professionals.  These provisions are included in the bipartisan “Cantwell / Cornyn amendment.”

“We believe the reforms sought by Senators Cantwell and Cornyn are vital to our innovation leadership, and we will continue to work closely with key Senators to accommodate all concerns,” Hoffman continued.  “We urge the Senate to continue debate and resolve the issues so critical to U.S. competitiveness.”

For more information on how highly educated immigration benefits America, please visit www.competeamerica.org

Compete America (www.competeamerica.org) is a coalition of corporations, educators, research institutions and trade associations concerned about legal, employment-based immigration and committed to ensuring that the United States has the highly educated workforce necessary to ensure continued innovation, job creation and leadership in a worldwide economy.

###