Braley Wants to Know: What Action Against Agriprocessors?

By Becky Ogann

WASHINGTON DC - Congressman Bruce Braley is demanding answers about what action the federal government plans to take against Agriprocessors for hiring illegal immigrants.

Braley says, based on sworn statements from federal agents, it is hard to believe the company took immigration laws seriously.

"I think it's time to make sure that immigration laws are applied uniformly against both employees and employers who violate the law and that's why I'm raising these concerns," said Rep. Bruce Braley, (D) Iowa.

Braley says the prosecution of companies in violation of immigration laws has plummeted in recent years.

He says the Bush administration has also dropped the ball on immigration reform.

Wednesday, May 21 at 9:59 PM Sherri White wrote ...

I am a citizen of Postville; the way I see it, all the blame is solely on the Jews of Agriprocessors! They knew they were bringing illegals to Iowa to work for them! Our townspeople are not stupid-we knew from the start Agri would be trouble. I wish they would have never come to Iowa!! Check out the site failedmessiah.com to see what the N.Y.Jews think of the Rubashkins- it's a real eyeopener!

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Monday, May 19 at 9:46 PM bill wrote ...

so brad is now looking in to argi a lot that will do unless these politicians dem or gop finely get off there duff and round up the 12 to 20 million illegals and no amnesty

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Monday, May 19 at 2:25 PM Scott wrote ...

What we need to do here, is adopt Mexico's immigration policies...then there will be no problem! Secondly, Agriprocessors needs to be fined for having illegal workers in the plant. Read the blog I am attaching regarding Mexico's Immigration policy as defined by it's consitution, then see if you feel as angry as I do when you see illegals protesting in our streets and using our tax $$ to sue US for our immigration policies! http://pc540.blogspot.com/2006/04/how-does-mexico-deal-with-illegal.html

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Monday, May 19 at 7:42 AM Disgruntled wrote ...

The Catholic church hid pedophiles for years while they played with our children. They are now providing free housing (sanctuary) for people who have committed a variety of crimes. They are busy shaking down their church members to build new and larger churches. Do they need more room for some other criminal element? We are lucky to have the Salvation Army looking out for the homeless & hungry citizens of the USA.

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Monday, May 19 at 7:26 AM weaver wrote ...

Where is the IRS' role in these raids? Why should any company be allowed to deduct illegal labor expenses from gross income?

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Sunday, May 18 at 10:01 PM LS Porstillve Resident wrote ...

Im SO glad that he feels this way!! We in Postville are sick of the immigrants taking over!! We want our small town back and if that means no more Agri in town, so be it! We were fine before they came...better off actually...and we will be AWESOME if they leave!

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Saturday, May 17 at 9:00 AM Average Joe wrote ...

If Bruce was so demanding why wasn't he demanding action before it got to this. Pandering to your voter base is so lame I am not sure it merits news coverage. Does anyone alive honestly think anyone in the Iowa statehouse did not know about the meat packing industry???? I wish we could get Joe Arpaio to run for president then we would have no more BS no more pandering and a lot more sore backsides.

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Saturday, May 17 at 1:49 AM Anonymous wrote ...

shut them down make them bankrupt! SEND A MESSAGE TO THE USA Fine them the price of capturing, prosecuting, and deporting all the illegal immigrants that they ENCOURAGED to work at their facility. go Brad

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Friday, May 16 at 5:13 PM How About This? wrote ...

Put the Agri managers in the same jail cells as the illegal workers. They can all have a nice informative chat about what went wrong.

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Friday, May 16 at 4:34 PM Wow Braley Plugged his brain in. wrote ...

Im speechless. Braley Finally says something that actually makes sense for once. Yes, Deport the illegals, after they and who ever else helped them do the ID theft, SS # fraud and Vehicle Title Fraud. AND go FINE Agriprocessors Heavily for misbehaving. Also WE the people need to send a message to agriprocessors with our wallets.. Don't buy any of thier products. When companies misbehave they need punished. Also some of the supervisors and managers should face criminal charges.

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Friday, May 16 at 4:22 PM James in DBQ wrote ...

The audacity of this idiot! What has he done to prevent businesses from being able to hire illegal labor? Nothing! He's a dem, he's been championing and supporting the breaking of federal law.

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Friday, May 16 at 3:31 PM Doug wrote ...

Just think if they WOULD crack down on the employers who take in the illegals, that would sure make a good start at solving our immigration issues. We have pictures on our drivers licenses, why not on social securty cards, then if employers hired someone who didnt look the same, well Book EM Danno. That might help to.

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Friday, May 16 at 3:15 PM rickh wrote ...

very simply put, the illegal workers would not be in Postville were it not for an employer willing to hire them. i don't have much sympathy for the "illegals" but i have none for the corporate criminals who hired them. they should be prosecuted to the fullest possible degree.

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Friday, May 16 at 2:27 PM USA wrote ...

Go Congressman Braley!! He absolutely right, why should just the worker bees have the book thrown at them while the bigwigs sit back, wait for things to cool down, and then in a year or two go right back to bringing illegal immigrants in again. I'll tell you why, the immigrants don't have the big bucks needed to defend themselves, while the Agri bigwigs have loads of money and will drag anything that goes to court out for a long time.

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Friday, May 16 at 1:37 PM Anonymous wrote ...

shut them down make them bankrupt! SEND A MESSAGE TO THE USA Fine them the price of capturing, prosecuting, and deporting all the illegal immigrants that they ENCOURAGED to work at their facility. go Brad you got my vote again.

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Friday, May 16 at 1:29 PM Blake/postville wrote ...

things i postville are starting to calm down. we have a long way to go to be NORMAL again, if we CAN be normal again. things at school are STARTING to return to normal. even today the students are still helping at the church. still a sad situation!

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Friday, May 16 at 1:19 PM Double Standards wrote ...

Right - why should individuals be held to a strict, hard-to-understand, complicated, we're-punishing-you-hard standard while big corporations are held to a loose, laissez-faire, sorry-for-the-brief-interruption standard?

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Friday, May 16 at 12:53 PM Scratching head wrote ...

I find it interesting how GW is the only one responsible for all of our problems. You know we do have senators and represenatives that can go after this agri company as well but they wont because they would rather use the scap goat of George Bush. I cant wait until the next president to be elected. Oh ya everything will still be George Bush's fault.

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Friday, May 16 at 12:39 PM Ha! wrote ...

Go Bruce!

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Friday, May 16 at 12:27 PM terry wrote ...

Bush will say: looks good the gas today is 3.59 looks like it should go up a few more cents next week What!!! illegal immigrants in Iowa. How did they get there. Maybe I should take my gas guzzling helicopter and fly out there to see the damage. Looks like gas is 3.75 today

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Friday, May 16 at 11:52 AM Blake/postville wrote ...

Bruce braily rep. of iowa, thatnk god, is going to washington dc trying to get agri for somthing! 697 hired illegal immigants and they take immigration laws seriously! NO WAY JOSE!

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Friday, May 16 at 11:29 AM Here we go wrote ...

Right on cue, the politicians will start lining up now to pretend they support a get-tough approach to immigration. Don't worry though, they'll forget about it in a few days.

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Friday, May 16 at 11:19 AM Anonymous wrote ...

This is all political nonsense. That county doesn't even have enough people to fill the factory. For Braley do "come out against" Agriprocessors is nothing but pandering to the obvious. Heck, an entire town has been destroyed and for what? So we can all feel good about cracking down of those horrible illegals that work hard, support their families, and go to church. This is all a big political joke.

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Friday, May 16 at 11:02 AM Peter Hansen wrote ...

The Bush administration is very unlikely to go after any businesses. They are most comfortable going after illegal immigrants with little money who can't afford attorneys and don't make political contributions. Agriprocessors engaged in human trafficking, in other words, the recruitment, transportation, harboring, or receipt of people for the purpose of exploitation. On top of that they encouraged, organized, and facilitated the obtention of fraudulent identities.

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Friday, May 16 at 10:48 AM Anonymous wrote ...

Don't worry the government won't do anyhing about Agri. They get plenty of money from them.

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Friday, May 16 at 10:38 AM Nikko wrote ...

Good for Brailey - if the administration didn't hire illegals we wouldn't have as big a problem. Let's get all the law breakers.

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