*Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson is pressing for expanding work permits to cover long-term undocumented immigrants, citing economic advantages.
Johnson urged President Joe Biden to grant work permits to around 500,000 undocumented immigrants in Illinois.
Mayor Johnson wants to provide economic opportunities for all immigrants. During a recent roundtable with urban business leaders, he noted that undocumented individuals could potentially enhance life in Chicago, according to Fox News.
“I want to make this emphatically clear: Chicago will never turn its back on people who wish to call the city of Chicago their home,” Mayor Johnson stated, Moguldom reports.
“We need the president to extend the same economic opportunities to our long-term undocumented brothers and sisters,” Johnson told business and immigrant advocates, per the Chicago Sun-Times.
“Leading in this moment is what the people of Chicago elected me to do a year ago, and I’m proud that we are doing that today,” he said at the Chicago Urban League in Bronzeville.
During the roundtable, business leaders emphasized the positive economic impact anticipated from granting work permits to an estimated 480,000 undocumented immigrants in Illinois. This figure encompasses 320,000 Mexican residents and 40,000 Black residents from countries such as Haiti, Jamaica, Nigeria, and others.
City and state officials have expressed frustration over the slow pace of work permit delivery, which is regulated by the federal government.
“We remain steadfast in our belief that a more inclusive and equitable future for all residents is truly possible, whether they arrived here yesterday or have been here for an extended period of time,” Mayor Johnson stated, according to Moguldom.
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