Joe Heck on Immigration

No blanket amnesty but earned citizenship ok

Heck: Opposes blanket amnesty but open to some earned citizenship proposals.

Cortez Masto: Yes

Q: On Immigration: Support the DREAM Act, which would allow children brought into the country illegally to achieve legal status if they meet certain conditions? (Need to have graduated from high school, have a clean legal record, and attend college or serve in the military.)

Heck: Opposed DREAM Act but offered similar alternative bill.

Cortez Masto: Yes

Stronger screening process for refugees from Iraq and Syria

Border security is a key issue for national security

Opposed resolution celebrating contributions of immigrants

"The Nevada Legislature recognizes the great contributions that immigrants have made to the vitality and growth of Nevada and America and urges the residents of Nevada to celebrate the ethnic and cultural diversity of its people and their traditions which have added to Nevada's wealth of great music, art, education, science and intellect."

Rated 63% by FAIR, indicating a mixed record on immigration issues.

The Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) is a national, non-profit, public interest membership organization of concerned citizens united by their belief in the need for immigration reform. Founded in 1979, FAIR believes that the U.S. can and must have an immigration policy that is non-discriminatory and designed to serve the environmental, economic, and social needs of our country.

FAIR seeks to improve border security, to stop illegal immigration, and to promote immigration levels consistent with the national interest—more traditional rates of about 300,000 a year.

With more than 70,000 members nationwide, FAIR is a non-partisan group whose membership runs the gamut from liberal to conservative.

The ratings are based on the votes the organization considered most important; the numbers reflect the percentage of time the representative voted the organization's preferred position.

Sponsored bill improving visa process to get more travelers.

A BILL: To promote job creation in the US by addressing inefficiencies in the visa processing system that discourage overseas business and leisure travel to the US.

Congress finds the following:
1. International travel to the US generates more than $134 billion annually in exports and supports 1.8 million US jobs
2. Global travel spending is expected to double over the next decade, reaching $2.1 trillion
3. While world-wide long-haul international travel grew by 40% between 2000 and 2010, the US market share of long-haul travel dropped from 17% in 2000 to 12% during the same timeframe
4. Lagging overseas arrivals result in large part from a US visa application process that is perceived by potential business and leisure travelers as inefficient, time consuming, and inaccessible
5. Removing the self-imposed barriers in the visa application process that currently discourage inbound international travel to the US would yield significant economic and public diplomacy benefits for the US
6. Increased international travel to the US also achieves US foreign policy objectives by introducing foreign visitors to the US and to Americans, who are the US' best goodwill ambassadors.

• The Secretary of State shall set a visa processing standard of 12 or fewer calendar days at US diplomatic and consular missions in China, Brazil, and India.
• The Secretary of State shall conduct a two-year pilot program for the processing of nonimmigrant visas using secure remote video-conferencing technology as a method for conducting visa interviews of applicants.
• If the Secretary of State can demonstrate no adversarial effects to the United States, the Secretary may modify or enter into agreements with certain countries on a non-reciprocal basis to allow for longer visa validity periods than the periods with such countries that are in existence as of the date of the enactment of this Act.