Scaling a business in the US can feel like a maze.
Each state has its own payroll benefits and compliance rules, pulling your focus away from growth, which is why founders use DEAL.
DEAL is the Professional Employer Organization, or PEO, that gives you a dedicated HR expert plus Fortune 500 level benefits for your team.
The National Association of PEOs says businesses can grow twice as fast if they use one.
So if you're scaling, make it simple with Deal.
Go to deel.com slash MOS and get up to three months free.
Your company's data is everywhere, in systems, in silos, and across teams.
But if your AI can't reach it, then that data isn't working for you.
Every business has unique data.
What really makes a difference is how you use it.
IBM helps your AI access your data wherever it lives to change how you do business.
Let's create smarter business.
IBM.
Some parts of the administration would like to deport up to a million people by the end of this year and 22 million by the end of next year.
So you know that's who's picking our food, who is taking care of our American elders and who's building our homes right.
And so if the level of removal is achieved, I mean that's going to impact every single American citizen, whether we realize it or not.
That's Rebecca Shee, executive director of the American Business Immigration Coalition.
I wanted to talk with Rebecca about the controversy over ISIS immigration raids at workplaces across the US.
Rebecca takes us through the looming impact on the US workforce, plus the internal conflict within the Trump administration over deportation, and how business leaders are pressing the White House and lawmakers for alternate solutions.
Rebecca also explains why counterintuitively, RightNow offers a rare moment of opportunity to update US immigration policy.
Her insights manage to be both eye-opening and optimistic.
So let's get to it.
I'm Bob Safian, and this is Rapid Response.
I'm Bob Safian.
I'm here with Rebecca Shih, Executive Director of the American Business Immigration Coalition.
Rebecca, thanks for joining us.
Thanks, Bob.
It's great to see you.
So for our listeners, can you explain what the American Business Immigration Coalition is, when it came together and why?
Yeah, so ABIC.
We are a bipartisan coalition of 1700 employers and CEOs around the country representing agriculture healthcare, long-term care construction hospitality, manufacturing and technology.
Really any and all sectors that depend on immigrants as their workforce, as entrepreneurs.
And our goal is to advocate for common sense immigration solutions that both ensures a managed, secure border but also supports a legal and stable workforce to keep our economy competitive.
This year has seen a dramatic change in immigration policy, including a major increase in immigration raids, people arrested in public at work.
ICE says it arrested 30,000 people in June alone, which was a record in the last five years.
How does your coalition view this change in policy, this change in activity?
What's been your response?
It's been a really uncertain and anxiety-inducing time for employers, and especially our smaller mom and pop, local farmers, restaurant owners.
So if they are looking for somebody who's a violent criminal, who's convicted MS-13, they shouldn't be in the community.
But, as we know, and FBI's own data shows, that immigrants by and large are law-abiding and they're working.
And so employers and ABIC.
We've dedicated an enormous amount of time and energy and lobbying efforts to try to change the law so that we can actually have a modern and legal immigration system that can benefit both employers but everyday Americans.
I mean the number of undocumented immigrants who came to the US during the Biden administration was unprecedented right.
I mean, it was a huge wave.
The impetus to address that.
Does APIC object to that or just sort of how it's being done?
The American public and employers are in the same boat, that they don't like a chaotic disorderly, unmanaged border and that we have to restore some type of sanity.
And President Trump has secured the border.
Last week, border crossings are down by 99.5% from a year ago.
So The border is secure.
And that's why as employers and we're working with both sides of Congress right now.
And you know we're reasonably encouraged by what the president has actually said, that we can't just deport everybody because nobody's going to be picking our food or preparing.
You know our favorite dishes.
We're caring for our you know, elderly American citizens, but that we have to have a balanced approach.
And that includes a legal work permit for people that are working.
They're law abiding, they're paying taxes.
And so there's just got to be a balanced approach here.
The style of immigration enforcement has changed, with National Guard mobilized and, like proliferation of these sort of masks and other identity shields.
I mean, enforcing the law is laudable and appropriate, but these tactics seem like they send other kinds of messages too.
Exactly.
And I think we're seeing it in the polls.
I mean the polling in the last few weeks and we actually did some polling ourselves that says like look, Americans support a secure border and deporting violent criminals.
But you know, if you're talking about somebody getting picked up at a work site and is vetted, is law-abiding, those people shouldn't be deported.
And over 60 of the American public don't believe this type of enforcement-only approach is the right way.
Some workers they're going to stay home or skip work because they're scared of these raids or of ICE.
Yeah, we're seeing this in North Carolina.
We have a member, U.S. military certified manufacturers of parachutes.
He had to lay off, you know, about 50 of his workers because their legal work permits have ended.
That has caused him to reduce the number of parachutes that he's able to manufacture for the US military.
And he's also found that it's having an incredible impact on his American-born workers.
People, even if they themselves are legal, are worried about their co-workers, worried about their neighbors or their family members who can be grabbed and detained and deported.
One I'm curious do you have advice for what measures business leaders can take?
Because they can't say with certainty that it's safe for people to come to work, can they?
They never know if ICE is going to take whoever they're going to take.
That's correct.
And people are reading in the stories about even U.S. citizens being mistakenly detained.
And so the fear is real.
I mean what we advise with employers and we have an employer, what we call a rights and responsibility training program in the event of an ICE visit or an audit or, you know, enforcement actions, to make sure that you're calm and you're respectful with the ICE officers, that you do have both the rights and the responsibility to allow 72 hours before you hand in documents like I-9s and that you take that time to really do a self-audit, a self-assessment.
Sometimes it might not even be an immigration issue.
It may be that you incorrectly filled out page nine of the I-9 form, right?
And so that's something very simple that you can correct.
At the end of the day, Congress has to step up and fix this issue.
We have brought members of Congress from both aisles to workplaces and job sites so that they can visit and really take the time to understand your workforce needs and your challenges.
And your members of Congress can be advocates for you, you know, with the Department of Homeland Security, with the administration, and really be able to achieve some meaningful solutions and not just this enforcement.
Only, you know, remove them all approach.
The last time our immigration system was updated was 1986.
We didn't have the internet.
Nobody talked about AI, right?
And so it's just an incredibly outdated policy that we're trying to jam into a modern, And so it is time, you know, for this administration and for Congress to really step up and fix this so that it is aligned, you know, with the economy of 2025.
There is a new legislative effort, the Dignity Act, to reset immigration policy.
Can you explain what it would do?
Is it a good solution?
Is it a likely solution?
First, it does provide a path to legal status and a work permit for people that have been here at least five years.
They're working.
They're paying taxes.
They're law-abiding.
They have to be vetted in order to get this legal status and work permit.
It has 20 members of Congress, 10 Republicans, 10 Democrats. working together to push this forward.
There are provisions in this bill that's uncomfortable for both sides.
It has border security.
It has asylum reforms.
So it is something we're very encouraged about.
And I know the sponsors have been active in terms of talking to the administration to get their support to pass.
A big immigration reset is like that is a tall order.
I mean, there's a reason that we haven't had any legislation since 1986, right?
Yeah, exactly.
I mean, both sides have kicked this tan down the road and also have rather politicked than making solutions.
I mean, this issue has really been held hostage by the extremes of both sides.
I think a couple of things that makes me optimistic in this moment are One is that voters are really, really fed up in terms of how chaotic the system is.
And then I think the second thing is that the border is secure.
I mean, I've been working on this for nearly two decades, and just the number of times members of Congress, particularly on the Republican side, have said hey, we can't do anything.
Can't do anything for the dreamers, for the farm workers, for these groups that are very, very popular, even or H-1B or tech workers.
Why?
It's because the border needs to be secured first.
And the border is secured now, right?
The president has secured a border.
And so that makes me more optimistic.
Let's work on the other steps that can secure our workforce as well.
Yeah, I mean, the president hasn't just sort of declared victory.
I mean, there's still new money that was allocated recently for more border security which, if I'm hearing you right, may not actually be what's needed at this point.
Yeah, so the 175 billion from the big beautiful bill for detention centers beds, hiring additional ICE officers to detain and arrest immigrants.
We know that you know internally, some parts of the administration would like to deport up to a million people by the end of this year.
And $2.2 million by the end of next year.
And that's extremely concerning for us because you know, when you think about it, the undocumented workforce is really only about 1 of our entire workforce.
American workforce.
So it's very small, but in certain sectors.
So agriculture over 40 of our farm workers are undocumented.
Construction over 30.
And then for elder care, long-term care.
There's about 20 to 30 of those health care aides are undocumented.
So that's who's picking our food, who is taking care of our American elders and who's building our homes.
And so if the level of removal is achieved, I mean that's going to impact every single American citizen, whether we realize it or not.
And so you know groceries prices going up, American elderly not being cared for and housing prices going up.
And that's not something you know.
I know the president doesn't want that headed into a competitive midterms.
As you talk about this, it sort of sounds like well for business.
Continuing at the pace that we're going at with enforcement maybe isn't what's best for the business.
To what extent do you find that business leaders are wary about expressing this concern about immigration policy to the White House?
They sort of fear of becoming a target if they speak out?
Yeah, I mean, I think businesses are worried and they're worried about planning.
I know that businesses did make outreach to the White House.
Some of them were able to get to the president directly.
You know, the smaller farms and hotels have talked to the Republican members of Congress and sort of this chorus of voices from the business community, whether it was privately or some of them were public.
It did lead to the president in seven different incidences at cabinet meetings.
At press conferences or, you know, at the Iowa 4th of July celebration, the president said look, I see these ice, aggressive ice rates are hurting our farms and restaurants and hotels.
I'm hearing from the businesses.
So I'm telling people to stop and I'm moving forward on the legal work permit program.
And that was a direct result of businesses speaking up about the situation.
I mean we've seen a lot of back and forth within the administration on sort of easing rules and ice raids right for farm workers, for the hospitality industry, different statements from different parts of the administration, the White House, Homeland Security, Department of Labor, of Agriculture.
Where does all that stand?
I mean, can employers or workers trust that any announcement will stick?
That's an excellent question.
And there is a clear internal struggle within the White House on this policy.
And we want more words of legal work permits from the president.
At the end of the day, Congress has to legislate.
There is only so much they can do by executive order.
And then we're caught up in this back and forth and all of these legal fights.
And so Congress has to step up at this moment.
What our polling showed last week was really interesting that the fact that the president has said several times about a legal work permit program does give the cover for Congress to move forward.
Because the president said it, the Republican primary base are with him at 78%.
And you know.
Then you see also Hispanic voter growth up to 83 percent for this type of balanced approach.
In some ways, President Trump faces a classic innovators dilemma.
He's arguably solved the border security crisis.
But looking at how voter sentiment has shifted in the face of mass deportations, he may need to pivot to a new strategy.
In the meantime, how is the US workforce adjusting and what might the economic impacts be for American-born workers?
We'll talk about that and more after the break.
Stay with us.
Real leaders don't back down when the stakes are high.
They innovate, they push forward, and then they take the stage at the Masters of Scale Summit.
Join us in San Francisco October 7th to 9th to hear from the CEO of The New York Times, scientists using cutting-edge technology to find cures, the leader of crypto powerhouse Coinbase, a retired four-star general and many, many more.
Apply now at mastersofscale.com slash apply25.
That's mastersofscale.com slash apply25.
If you're ready to take your startup from idea to impact, then AWS is your launchpad.
From data storage to machine learning to secure app hosting, AWS gives you the tech trusted by the world's fastest scaling startups.
And here's the best part.
Join AWS.
Activate today and you could score up to 100000 in AWS credits, tailored to your stage and network.
Go to awsamazoncom slash, activate and start building.
Expanding your business in the US can feel like a maze.
Every state has its own payroll benefits and compliance rules, which can pull your focus away from growth.
That's why founders use Deal.
Deal is the professional employer organization, or PEO, that gives you a dedicated HR expert plus Fortune 500-level benefits for your team.
The National Association of PEOs says businesses can grow twice as fast if they use one.
So if you're scaling, make it simple with Deal.
Go to deel.com slash MOS and get up to three months free.
Before the break, Rebecca Shee of the American Business Immigration Coalition talked about how business leaders are quietly pressing the Trump administration to pull back on its aggressive enforcement and deportation efforts.
Now she talks about the economic pros and cons of undocumented workers, why American-born workers could pay the price for mass deportations and what makes her optimistic about the future.
Let's jump back in.
Your own family story is part of the motivation for your work.
Your mother was an undocumented worker for many years, as I understand it.
And you yourself came to the United States as an immigrant.
What was needed so that your family could have safely lived and worked here together?
Yeah.
So I came when I was 10 years old and my father is a U.S. citizen.
And then I quickly became a U.S. citizen.
And my mom struggled with her legal status while I was growing up.
And she was a doctor in China.
So for 25 years, when she didn't have legal status, she She was working in restaurants and then she had the second job, taking care of elderly in the nursing homes.
And she just, I just remember she worked all the time.
Like she was, you know, making sure that she was, you know, helping me and then, you know, paid my fees college.
But when she got her green card and she was 61 years old, the first thing she did was she applied to like 10 different jobs at the hospital for her profession.
And she ended up running a laboratory directing 20 other histologists.
And she was helping patients with ulcer, cancer, and later COVID.
And And just loved it.
And it just shows that when you legalize people who are already contributing, you just unleash their economic potential.
And that's good for all of us.
This country's relationship with immigration is so complicated because, of course, we all came here as immigrants at different times, in different ways.
And it's been a great advantage to the businesses and the economy of the US to have sort of fresh you know young, often talent be part of it.
And yet...
There's also this anxiety, this fear that, you know, new people are going to take away what we have.
How do you square that, those two different sides of this?
If you look at history, the last time that our immigration levels pushed 15, 19% was in the 1910s.
And around that time, there was huge backlash and the economy wasn't doing well.
The Chinese Exclusion Act was passed and, you know, for nearly 50, 60 years, up until the Voting Rights Act of 1965, there was almost zero immigration.
So that number of foreign born was reduced to about three, four percent.
And you know, we kind of experienced the same thing the last few years when, for the first time, our foreign-born population pushed up to 18, 19 percent.
And we are experiencing a similar backlash.
But again, we are in the economy of 2025 and no longer in 1965.
So we really should have a different response.
And we saw the jobs report last week.
And the job growth in July is 74,000.
And nearly all economists say that we need at least 100000 jobs created in order just to keep this economy moving.
And the main reason is because we're short about a million workers over this last four months.
People who have either been detained or deported, or people that, just for fear of being sent to a different country, have self-deported right.
And so it is something that we're going to have to deal with head on.
But I think we're encouraged by what the president has said recently.
And he's a businessman.
He knows the workforce that requires.
And to your point about the hunger of of immigrants and foreign born, is necessary for any company or any economy to be fully competitive.
In all the news about immigration raids, we don't hear very much about employers facing consequences for hiring people without proper documentation.
Why is that?
Might that change with more onus being put on businesses?
I think you're starting to see that change.
So there was a large raid at a meat processing plant in Nebraska and that meat processor actually was E-Verify compliant.
He did E-Verify, and ICE came and detained about and removed about 90 workers.
And his response, and he is right, this E-Verify system as is, is a really flawed system.
Sometimes it will mistaken people's names, catch people that are US citizens or just completely misidentifies people.
It's important to recognize that One of the key reasons drivers of why immigrants are in this country is because somebody gave them a job.
And so it is one of the reasons why our coalition and our employers have really taken it upon themselves to really push for a solution that they can come out of the shadows and And work legally.
And that's actually good and protects every American worker when we don't have a second class system, when we don't have a easily exploitable group of people because they're in the shadows and living in fear.
You ensure that their rights and wages are protected, not just for them, but for every American worker as well.
I mean, ABIC came together looking for sort of a lasting long-term reform to immigration policy.
And I just, I wonder, like, is that possible in an environment that's so charged?
And I know you're optimistic about it, but like, why is this all so hard?
I think it's hard because it's easy to play up the fears and it's easy to blame, to point fingers.
But I think, at the same time, the majority of Americans are, you know, do believe in steps forward, and especially for people that have been here and have earned that legal status that you know, the everyday American is a lot smarter than the professional politicians, right?
That they don't need all or nothing.
Something like a legal work permit, like the president has said, is something that's broadly supported.
And then I think the other piece is just that you know politicians, for some of them have to run every two years.
And so it's like very easy right to run and add calling something amnesty, even when it isn't to try to, you know, score cheap political points.
So what's at stake from here for businesses, you know, for all of us?
A lot of research has been done that this enforcement-only approach, this removal, say up to a million people a year can cost the economy.
It's a hit of $350 billion.
It's about up to three and a half percentage in terms of job and GDP.
It can also translate up to 2.5 million job losses for American workers.
The work that immigrants do and Americans do tend to be complementary.
You know, immigrants are say, like milking a dairy cow, while American workers are the foremen or the managers of the farm.
In a restaurant, the immigrants are the busboys or they're washing the dishes.
And Americans prefer roles, you know, at the front of the house in terms of waitressing or hosting where they're the bartending right.
And so then, when you remove that back of the house where there isn't sufficient labor in back of the house, that impacts the work of everyday Americans.
And then the other thing is just inflationary and food prices.
And you know we had a dairy farmer that in Wisconsin that talked to his neighbors about like look, if they continue down this road, the cost of milk.
Are you willing to pay 30 a gallon?
Or even worse, are we okay with milk not being domestically produced and having to be imported?
So I think that those are some of the consequences that we might face.
The pendulum on things like immigration tend to swing from one end to the other, you know, and certainly during the Biden administration, maybe the doors were open too much.
Maybe the doors are closed too much now.
Like, where do you feel like the pendulum is right now?
I think it is swung to the other way.
And I think Americans like the latest Gallup poll showing that Americans welcome immigrants or finding immigrants more favorable, at 79, which is the highest since the pandemic, since we called it.
You know immigrant workers essential because they were, you know when the rest of us could quarantine safely and they were still working and picking crops.
So yeah, I think it's.
The American attitude is definitely a reaction to the current more restrictive policies.
And and I think that bodes well too for solutions that does give some cover and support for particularly Republicans and the administration to move forward, especially if they want to keep power in 2026.
And so you don't, you're not relying on the Democrats retaking power to be able to get these, these changes through.
Well, in the last 20-some years I've been at this, Democrats had full control of both chambers and the White House three times and nothing was done.
And, you know, same with Republicans, right?
Like, also Republicans have had... their chance to get something done.
And we haven't.
And we see this president having just incredible influence over the Congress.
And so I think employers will keep pushing.
Well, Rebecca, this has been great.
Thank you so much for doing it.
Thanks for the conversation.
Coming away from my conversation with Rebecca, I was struck by how simple she makes the issue of US immigration sound.
While administration after administration have struggled to make headway, Rebecca manages to channel an empathic perspective to find a common sense middle ground.
I know that I've struggled personally about immigration.
I don't believe in totally open borders.
But I do think attracting talent from around the world is incredibly valuable to the U.S. economy.
And I'd be lying if I said I wasn't deeply concerned by the raids and mass deportations.
As business leaders, we pride ourselves on solving naughty challenges.
To maintain a healthy US workforce, we probably need to talk plainly about immigration, as Rebecca and her members are doing.
When any topic is politicized, it can get messy.
To avoid it, we need no-nonsense clarity.
I'm Bob Safian.
Thanks for listening.
This is Emily Worden Capital One business customer and owner of Emily Worden Designs, a bespoke, fine jewelry store that quickly gained buzz after opening its doors in Richmond Virginia.
My customer base grew exponentially once we had a storefront.
We had one engagement ring case at the time, and we had lines out the door every weekend.
As her storefront continued to have record sales, Emily knew it was time to up-level production.
We normally just purchase diamonds in very small batches or per order.
So we wanted to invest in not just one or two pieces, but a collection of natural diamonds.
Emily knew creating a collection would be a big investment but with the help of her Capital One business card, she was ready to bet on herself and bet big.
It was about $40,000, $45,000 all in up front.
Having the Capital One card was definitely reassuring to be able to make such a large investment purchase.
And of course, to get the cash back that came with it.
To learn more, go to CapitalOne.com slash business cards.
If you're in private capital, you understand that your next great deal starts with who you know.
That's why over 3000 firms trust Affinity, the CRM platform purpose-built for private capital.
Affinity's relationship intelligence reveals your team's strongest paths to founders, investors and decision makers, using insights hidden in emails, calendars and meetings.
With powerful AI tools like Affinity Notetaker and Deal Assist, you'll spend less time managing data and more time closing the right deals.
Learn more at affinity.co slash marketplace.
AI agents can make your teams more productive, but if they aren't connected to other agents or your data or your existing workflows, they can only take you so far.
Any business can add AI agents, but IBM connects your agents across your company to change how you do business.
Let's create smarter business.
IBM.
Rapid Response is a Wait What original.
I'm Bob Safian.
Our executive producer is Eve Troh.
Our producer is Alex Morris.
Associate producer is Mashimaku Tonina.
Mixing and mastering by Aaron Bastinelli.
Our theme music is by Ryan Holiday.
Our head of podcasts is Lital Malad.
For more, visit rapidresponseshow.com.
