WASHINGTON, DC–Enrique Fernandez, UNITE HERE Vice President for Immigration, Civil Rights, and Diversity, released the following statement:

“UNITE HERE is a union of immigrants. The hospitality industry has long been a first destination for newcomers to this country, and UNITE HERE has been fighting for decades to reform our immigration system to be more humane and more commonsense.

Tuesday’s Executive Order is a win on both counts, allowing spouses of US citizens to apply for the rights owed to them by law without forcing them to leave their families for years to wait for paperwork to process. Keeping families together and allowing folks to work and contribute to our economy instead of standing idle just makes sense. Creating more opportunities for Dreamers to work is another win-win situation.

We are proud to have joined the Here to Work Campaign calling on the Biden Administration to extend work permits to spouses of US citizens, alongside the American Business Immigration Coalition, American Families United and fellow unions including SEIU, the Teamsters, National Education Association and the United Auto Workers (UAW).

No matter how successful immigration opponents are at stirring up fear and anger about the border, Americans continue to call for increased paths to legal immigration. UNITE HERE will never stop advocating for a real overhaul of our broken immigration system, and we won’t shy from calling out anti-immigrant actions when we see them. We also must applaud steps like these that lead in the right direction, which have the potential to change the lives of millions of families who are folks like our members.”

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UNITE HERE is the hospitality workers’ union in the U.S. and Canada, representing over 270,000 working people in hotels, gaming, food service, airports, and more. As the union of hospitality workers, immigrants are the backbone of UNITE HERE’s membership.