WASHINGTON (Barbara De Lollis, USA Today)
April 27, 2006 Marriott International Chief Executive J.W. Marriott
Jr. decried the U.S. House on Tuesday for approving legislation that
would make criminals of undocumented immigrants and employers who hire
them, even unknowingly.
"Do you look upon yourselves as felons?" Marriott asked the crowd of
more than 600 hotel executives and other travel industry leaders meeting
at the Global Travel & Tourism Summit. High-level government ministers,
investors and executives from 60 countries gathered at the annual summit
to discuss the state of the travel industry.
Marriott leads the largest U.S. hotel chain by revenue, a publicly
traded company founded more than 75 years ago by his father. The U.S.
hotel business depends heavily on immigrant labor.
A key target: the bill passed by the U.S. House that would make illegal immigration a felony. It also calls for erecting a 700-mile fence along the U.S.-Mexican border. Supporters of the legislation argue that strong penalties against immigrant workers and those who would hire them are needed to secure the nation's borders.
The Senate may debate a bipartisan compromise that calls for less-severe measures.
Marriott said that hotels are one of the many industries in the United States that rely on immigrants to fill entry-level jobs, and those who take them often work their way up to better jobs. "We just can't get the work done without people from other nations," he said.
He said he understands that countries want to regulate immigration to strengthen security, but he said, "We must pursue policies that allow people to seek the chance to build better lives for themselves and their families."
After his speech, the hotel executive said that roughly half the people who work in the 2,400 Marriott hotels in the United States were born outside this country. Employees speak 47 languages. It's impossible to determine how many workers are undocumented because their documents could be forged, he said.
A longtime prominent Republican, Marriott blames the anti-immigrant mood in Congress on what he views as "hard-right Republicans."
"A lot of middle-of-the-road Republicans are in line with me," he said.
Marriott joked about being on the same side of the immigration issue as Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, the Roman Catholic archbishop of Washington, D.C. In a recent conversation with the clergyman, recalled Marriott, "I said, 'I guess we'll be in the same jail cell.' "
The House bill includes penalties for assisting undocumented immigrants.
