Secure America\u2019s Workforce<\/a>, which is pressing politicians about pairing the bill with work permits.<\/p>\n\u201cJust a common sense work permit solution. We\u2019re not asking for citizenship. We\u2019re not asking for open borders or anything like that,\u201d Erickson-Streufert said. \u201cWe have hundreds of thousands of undocumented immigrants who have already been contributing to our economy, to our food supply, to our communities for decades in many instances. So, can we get these people a legal work permit? Let them pay taxes. Let them contribute in a meaningful way.\u201d <\/p>\n
If that doesn\u2019t happen, the association said Americans would eventually have to pay a higher price. Erickson-Streufert is also concerned some businesses may have to close altogether. <\/p>\n
She said America\u2019s melting pot of cultures has always been represented in the food industry.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur data suggests that immigrants make up about 20% of our workforce. Of course, many of those are documented legal immigrants, some are not,\u201d Erickson-Streufert said. \u201cOn the other hand, we know 36% of restaurant operators are immigrants.\u201d<\/p>\n
Similar to restaurants, coalition members from the construction, hospitality and elder care industries said immigrants represent a large part of their workforces.<\/p>\n
Erickson-Streufert said the TRA has been advocating for work permits for years and believes the current conversations with lawmakers are reassuring. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re actually more hopeful than we\u2019ve been in a long time,\u201d Erickson-Streufert said. <\/p>\n
She said that\u2019s partially because of where border security is at this point. <\/p>\n
\u201cWhen we used to advocate on this issue, so many lawmakers told us we can\u2019t even talk about work permits until we secure the border. Now, the border is secure,\u201d Erickson-Streufert said. \u201cUnauthorized crossings are essentially zero, and so, we think that really opens up a conversation that we haven\u2019t been able to have in decades.\u201d<\/p>\n
However, the biggest reason seems to be the demands of the people.<\/p>\n
\u201cVoters, regardless of their politics, are telling us they can\u2019t afford their groceries, their health care, housing costs,\u201d Erickson-Streufert said. \u201cAll of those industries are incredibly dependent on immigrant labor.\u201d <\/p>\n
The coalition is giving lawmakers options: add the work permits to the bill, pass a separate proposal or an executive order.<\/p>\n
Coalition members said the key is that it happens sooner rather than later, especially if HR 9773 makes its way to the House for a full vote.<\/p>\n
The TRA said it is encouraged by two other federal bipartisan bills filed within the last month. Those bills address work permits for industries such as agriculture and keeping law-abiding immigrants in the United States.<\/p>\n
Copyright 2026 by KSAT – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SAN ANTONIO \u2013 The Texas Restaurant Association is ringing the alarm as a federal immigration bill is advancing…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":392794,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[13797,918,1724,82,27,29,28,19993,13910],"class_list":["post-392793","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-texas","tag-chip-roy","tag-economy","tag-immigration","tag-san-antonio","tag-texas","tag-texas-headlines","tag-texas-news","tag-texas-restaurant-association","tag-u-s-congress"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/392793","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=392793"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/392793\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/392794"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=392793"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=392793"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=392793"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}