Mrs. FEINSTEIN. The Senator from California is absolutely correct. It does. It pulls together all of us. We believe we have 60 votes in this body for AgJOBS because we believe there are 60 Senators at least who understand what the problem is, there is no question about it.

Senator Boxer has been on this issue for at least 7 years. Senator Craig, the Senator from Idaho, was the original sponsor of AgJOBS, along with Senator Boxer and Senator Kennedy. That was 7 years ago. Is that not correct, I ask the Senator from Idaho, Mr. Craig?

Mr. CRAIG. That is correct.

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Seven years ago. This bill is known by everybody in this body, and everyone in this body should know there is a need. We believe we have the votes in the House to pass the bill as well if it is a stand-alone bill, a 5-year pilot that enables farmers to hire workers.

Let me say one other thing. There is a myth out there that anybody can do agricultural labor. If you stand by a freeway and watch people pick lettuce, you will see precision movements, you will see an organized crew, you will see they are trained in how to do it, and you will also see it is backbreaking labor that Americans will not do. ...

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. If I may, through the Chair to the majority leader, my interest was piqued in what the majority leader had to say. My question is, Would the majority leader be prepared to give Senator Boxer, Senator Craig, Senator Hutchison, and me a commitment that perhaps the majority leader and the minority leader could sit down and agree to allow a vote on AgJOBS as part of the farm bill without amendments, or some version of AgJOBS?

Mr. REID. Madam President, I say to my friend, I am happy to make that commitment. I will do everything I can to make sure it is part of the farm bill. I will do what I can. I will talk with Senator Harkin. I will talk with Senator Chambliss, who is on the floor. I am sure he is in favor. I ask through the Chair, is the Senator from Georgia in favor of the temporary worker program for agricultural workers?

Mr. CHAMBLISS. Madam President, I will respond this way: Obviously, I am in favor of a temporary worker program for agriculture. We have one now. Senator Craig, Senator Feinstein, and I worked diligently to try to come to some accord on H-2A reform, but I have to tell the majority leader, we have never been able to reach that accord, and there are some issues that are going to require some major amending before we will be agreeable to bringing that bill up on the farm bill.

Mr. REID. Madam President, I appreciate the Senator from Georgia being so candid. ...

Mr. CHAMBLISS. ... My friend from California knows we have been trying to resolve this issue not for weeks and months but for years. We have been working on this issue. We have some major differences, as we have discussed. We had hoped to have an immigration reform bill on which we could resolve this issue. We moved a long ways in that direction.

Madam President, I would like to ask my friend from California a question.

As you know, I agree with everything you said, everything Senator Craig said about the dire straits in agriculture. We have a huge labor problem, and we are in need, in California, in Idaho, in Georgia, and in every part of the country, for agricultural labor to harvest our crops as we move toward the harvest season. The problem with the AgJOBS bill has always been it has an amnesty provision in it. It is called earned adjustment. That has been the major issue.

Does the Senator intend to include that earned adjustment provision in the 5-year pilot program that the Senator is talking about offering now?

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. If I may, through the Chair to the Senator from Georgia, what we have said is, a version of the AgJOBS bill.

The AgJOBS bill was negotiated over 7 years between the growers and the United Farm Workers Union and others. So it is a negotiated product. I actually thought that we had satisfied the Senator's concerns in many of our discussions. I am trying to recall, but I believe there were at least three areas where we made some changes specifically because of the Senator's concerns in the discussions that we had.

So I thought we had agreement on the H-2A part of the bill, which I believe was your interest, in return for which, with respect to the earned adjustment part of the bill, I would be happy to discuss this with you more. But the bill is based on, if a worker has worked in agriculture, he or she can submit documentation to that effect, for so many hours over so many years, that individual can get what we call a

blue card in the original bill and continue to work in agriculture for a substantial additional period. If they satisfied the hours, the filing, the taxes, and everything required of them, then they could apply after that period for a green card. That is as far as our bill went, the original bill.

Mr. CHAMBLISS. Madam President, if I can again ask the Senator a question. That has been the problem area.

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. I thought the problem area was citizenship.

Mr. CHAMBLISS. That is a pathway to citizenship, giving them priority on getting the green card.

But let me say to the Senator from California, I think the fact that we all recognize there is a problem and that we all want to get to the end which is a viable program that will allow all our farmers access to a quality pool of people who are here in a legal capacity under a valid temporary worker program, as long as it is truly a temporary worker program, and that those individuals are required to go back home at the time their job is completed--then we don't have an argument.

But as long as you continue to give them a pathway to citizenship, it is going to be a problem. We have just had that debate. So I would say this: I would hope between Senator Craig, Senator Feinstein, myself, and others who are interested, that if we could come up with an AgJOBS-like, that would truly be a like version of AgJOBS, then perhaps that is a way that we could work our way through this year. It is going to take some time to get that done, and we don't have much time. Time is getting short. Here we are at the end of July almost, and harvest season is upon us.

If we could come up with some agreement to get us through this year, to give us time, maybe, to work out in the long run a more permanent program that does not include that pathway to citizenship, I would be in agreement with the Senator.

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. If I might, through the Chair to the Senator from Georgia, I would like to make one point.

I understand your concern is with the H-2A part of the bill. The other part of the bill is for different States because what happens in my State is, these crews work different produce. They go from one harvest to another to another to another because the harvests are staged at different times. So the bill has two component parts to it.

Of course, we are willing to talk. We are happy to sit down and talk. But we tried to do that with you, as you know, and I thought we had a product that we agreed to.

My understanding is the Senator from Idaho would like to ask a question.

Mr. CRAIG. Madam President, I would like, for a moment, to react to the Senator from Georgia. It is oftentimes confused that AgJOBS was two bills that were merged together--two problems solved. One was to create a new, modern, guest worker--or I should say flexible guest worker program that fits the needs of American agriculture. That was over here. We reformed the H-2A program. But over here was, what do you do with 1.2 million illegals who are here and are now working in agriculture and have been here for 4 or 5 years? That was the other side of it.

We said: If you stayed here and worked and became legal and met these qualifications, there would be something at the end of the road because we believe if you don't do that, if you say: Oh, yeah, you can stay and you can work, but you have to stay in agriculture to do so--specific to agriculture--you have created indentured servitude. You and I do not want that, nor do we want to be accused of that in any respect.

So we have to look at the two realities. The two realities are an H-2A program that does not meet the need of American agriculture today and a current workforce that is here and illegal.

How you bring legality to that workforce that is here and is illegal remains the question on which we differ. I think we have come awfully close to agreeing on a new guest worker program. And in that, the Senator from Georgia is right: It is very clear: They come, they work, they go home. That is a true guest worker program. Now, that is not today, that is tomorrow. Today is how do you meet the needs and solve the illegality problem of those currently here? Therein lies our struggle.

Somehow we have to be able to fix that and require compliance and not be accused or meet the test of not producing indentured servitude by saying the only way you can become legal is to stay in agriculture. That is not very fair either. So I guess they all have to go home. Some would like that, too.

You and I will never escape the definition of amnesty because anytime we touch an illegal and give them anything, we will be accused by the anti-immigration forces in this country of having morphed a new form of amnesty. At the same time, they are forcing us to refuse dealing with the real problem and solving it, or at least they are forcing some to run for cover in search of something that is impossible, and that is zero amnesty. You can't get there. I don't believe it is possible.

If you touch an illegal in any way, and in any way give them something that offers them some stability in the current environment, tomorrow morning Lou Dobbs will say: Amnesty. And it is a new creation he thought of overnight while in one of his 1932 labor dreams.

I yield the floor. ...

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. If I may respond through the Chair to the Senator from Georgia, we had hoped, I say to the Senator, that we had worked it out. We believe there are 60 votes for the bill. We are happy, all of us--those of us who have worked on this bill--to sit down with you and go over it again and hopefully have something for the September farm bill. I think it is important.

The problem with waiting until September is part of the harvest is over, and we have lost a crop. I cannot tell you how much is going to be on the ground come September, but I can tell you in my State it is going to be a substantial amount. I worry about land lying fallow and then being sold by farmers for development and the loss of rich, great American farmland. I don't think that is what either one of us want.

We will try to work with you, Senator Boxer, Senator Craig and I, and, hopefully, we will be able to come up with something by September.