Sen. John Curtis proposes ‘amnesty’ for illegal immigrants to provide ‘enough workers’ in Utah

"Utah employers tell me time and again how difficult it's become to find enough workers to meet growing demands. Our bill allows states to sponsor visas tailored to their unique workforce needs, while ensuring rigorous federal vetting and accountability," Curtis posted to X with an article from the Deseret News detailing his proposal.

The bill would create a voluntary state-sponsored visa program, which would allow states themselves to expand their number of temporary work visa holders. He introduced the legislation with Democrat Senator Mark Kelly from Arizona. Curtis, who previously chaired the Utah County Democrats before switching parties in 2006, has been slammed online over the issue, with immigration hawks pointing to a provision that would allow illegal immigrants a pathway to legal residency.

The provision would allow for some immigrants living illegally in the US prior to December 31, 2016, to obtain legal residency if they pay a $1,000 fine and are accepted into the visa program, according to the bill.

The bill would amend the Immigration and Nationality Act to allow for state-sponsored visa workers to come with their spouse and children up to three years and the visas would be limited to 5,000 per year per state. This is in addition to the share of a 245,000-visa pool based on state population. Utah, according to a US Chamber of Commerce report, has a "severe" labor shortage with 96 workers for every 100 open jobs. The figure is better than August 2025, where there for 72 workers available for every 100 open jobs.

The Utah College Republicans responded to the post from Curtis, calling on the lawmaker to prioritize younger workers in Utah. "We have an extensive network of eligible college graduates from Utah searching for work in the state. We're Utahns, shouldn't we be prioritized here?"

Utah is a common destination for higher education for members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, even if they do not live in the state. Many young college-aged students move from around the country to then attend BYU, the University of Utah, Utah Valley University, or multiple other Utah-based schools. The Beehive State’s labor force participation rate is also higher on average: 66.4 percent, or 8th in the nation in contrast to the national average of 61.5 percent in June.

This is even more true for younger workers. For the teen labor force participation rates in July of 2023 and 2024, the Utah rate hovered around 65 percent while the national average was around 44 percent, per a University of Utah study.

Other users said that the move is meant to give companies the opportunity for lower wage workers. Tayler Hansen wrote in response to Curtis, “Advocating for cheap foreign slave labor while the state has already been overrun by foreigners who won’t ever assimilate isn’t as popular of a position as you expected it to be."

Another X user said in response, “My huge Utah tech employer imports H1B employees rather than hiring qualified native Utahans because the H1Bs are cheaper. The only people you're helping are out-of-state institutional investors and the non-assimilating H1B imports. You're killing everybody else."

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis came out swinging against the proposal, and said, "No thanks. This would allow states that are weak on immigration (which is most of them) to engineer a de facto amnesty."