The Wall Street Journal reports:

Nate Koetje, chief executive of an electrical contractor based in Grand Rapids, Mich., would like to hire as many as 200 workers next year. Despite a somewhat cooling labor market, he said he would be lucky to find 150.

So if President-elect Donald Trump follows through on his pledge to eliminate programs that provide temporary work permits to immigrants with no permanent legal status, Koetje’s growing company would face even more staffing challenges. The company, Feyen Zylstra, now employs two people whose ability to continue working is at risk.

“Though the numbers are small, these individuals play a key role in the success of a company like ours,” Koetje said, adding that increasing opportunities for legal immigration is important for the continued growth of companies like his, and he sees it as a bipartisan issue.

Mass deportations are the most prominent of Trump’s immigration pledges, but a more urgent threat looms for millions of immigrants and their employers: losing access to legal work.

Trump has promised to eliminate several programs that offer deportation protections and work authorization to immigrants in the country illegally or whose visas have expired. As many as 3.3 million immigrants covered by the programs could lose their ability to work, according to the Migration Policy Institute, a nonpartisan think tank. [Continue reading…]