‘Important for the valley’: Local reps. cosponsor immigration reform bill
FRESNO, Calif. (KSEE/KGPE) – A bipartisan group of lawmakers is teaming up to reintroduce a comprehensive immigration reform bill.
Rep. Adam Gray and Rep. David Valadao say The Dignity Act of 2025 will be crucial because it would provide legal status for some undocumented immigrants.
“[It’s] basically the opportunity for people who came here to have a legal process to allow them to stay,” said Valadao. “It covers a large group of people that are here illegally as we speak today. Some of them are farm, some of them are not. Some of them are Dreamers. But it is a piece of legislation that I co-sponsored in the past and I’ve introduced again.”
The Dignity Program would grant citizenship to undocumented people living in the U.S. before 2021 as long as they pass a background check.
If the person applying is approved, they would pay $7,000 over the course of the 7-year program and begin or continue paying taxes.
“It would be people who are here working, contributing,” Gray explained. “They came here to work hard, to provide for their families, to get a better opportunity for their children. The Dignity Act is about putting some legal protections in place so they can not necessarily have a path to citizenship, but have some protections to stay here, contribute work legally, and not be faced with this threat of mass deportation or things that’s just really been disruptive and disruptive to our agricultural economy.”
The legislation also requires all employers to use E-Verify and invest in border control by ramping up security measures.
“It’s important for the valley, it’s important for our country,” Gray said. “It’s got some increased funding and opportunities to strengthen our border security, which I agree with. I think that’s a bipartisan issue and certainly one I’ve been supported by. I voted for not just the inclusion in this bill, but also previous measures that have been on the floor throughout this year to really tighten the border and increase both the funding but also strengthen the policies as it relates to border security.”
It also has a number of provisions to reform the asylum process, including adjudicating most claims within 60 days.
“The current immigration system takes years, and a lot of the processes are old,” Valadao explained. “And this is something that we are working with this administration to look for ways to prevent a huge backlog and try to get things up to speed.”