Immigration changes could pave path to workforce growth.

Frank Knapp sees one straightforward solution to the labor shortage facing many industries as the nation continues to navigate the COVID-19 pandemic: Make more workers available.

Three pieces of legislation currently before the U.S. Senate can help accomplish that goal, said Knapp, president and CEO of the S.C. Small Business Chamber of Commerce. The bills, including the bipartisan Durbin-Graham Act of 2021 co-sponsored by Sen. Lindsey Graham, would provide a path to legal status for three key groups of potential laborers: immigrants brought to the U.S. as children, known as Dreamers; recipients of Temporary Protective Status; and farmworkers.

"If we're going to do anything about immigration reform, let's take care of the people who are here working, contributing, paying their taxes," Knapp said. "This is the time to do it. We have an economic need for them to contribute more."

In February, Graham, a South Carolina Republican, and Sen. Dick Durbin, an Illinois Democrat, introduced for the third time the Dream Act, which would allow immigrant students without lawful status brought to the U.S. as children to earn lawful permanent residence and eventually American citizenship. Dreamers, granted work permits and freedom from deportation under DACA, or Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, would have to meet educational and work requirements and have not committed a felony, among other stipulations.

Immigration reform efforts could also be addressed more sweepingly in a $3.5 trillion budget resolution that has passed the Senate and moved forward in the U.S. House of Representatives last month. The resolution, to be voted on again in the House on Sept. 27 before returning to the Senate, would allocate $107 billion to legalize the status of up to 7 million undocumented workers, including Dreamers, TPS recipients, and farmworkers.

"These Dreamers have been here since they were children. A lot of them are in their 20s now," Knapp said. "They've figured out how to go to school and pay for school. They've graduated. They've got jobs. Some of them have started businesses. They've got families. The United States of America is all they know. What purpose does it serve to keep them in a state of constant worry about their future status and about some policy change from the executive level to end DACA or simply to tell ICE go round up everybody? They could be contributing more to our economy if they could plan their future with certainty.

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