Sebastian Velasquez saw his family for the last time when they were helping him move into his Georgetown University dorm before the start of his first semester. A few months later, he found out that his father, mother and sister were in deportation proceedings. They were eventually deported to Colombia.

Forty faith, labor and community activists prayed, sang and protested outside Manchester’s Norris Cotton Federal Building this afternoon to express outrage about recent actions by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers in area homes and businesses.

Recently, the bipartisan group of senators—known as the “Gang of Eight”—who are crafting immigration legislation in Congress signed off on yet another piece of the reform puzzle: a mechanism for new workers to come to the United States regardless of whether they have family living here or the ability to qualify for one of the existing visa programs.

Thousands of working families rallied at the U.S. Capitol yesterday to support a commonsense immigration process that will include a road map to citizenship for the nation's 11 million aspiring Americans. 

See the tweets from yesterday below from AFL-CIO Latino and AFL-CIO digital strategist Jessica Morales, along with other ally groups.

Change your Facebook and Twitter avatars. 

Ana Avendaño, assistant to the president and director of immigration and community action at the AFL-CIO, will appear on the Melissa Harris-Perry show on MSNBC Saturday morning at 10 a.m. EDT to discuss creating a commonsense immigration process for America's 11 million aspiring citizens. 

Follow the Melissa Harris-Perry show and Avendaño on Twitter.

This week, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) joined what Washington Post's Greg Sargent calls the "slow down" caucus. Meaning Rubio, who is a member of the "Gang of Eight", and a group of Republicans are starting to back away from creating a commonsense immigration process for the nation's 11 million aspiring citizens. 

In case you missed it over the weekend, check out C-SPAN's Newsmakers segment with AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka talking about creating a commonsense immigration process for aspiring Americans that benefits all workers. 

See video after the jump or click here:

It was announced over the weekend the bipartisan Senate "Gang of Eight" came to an agreement in principle on a major aspect of creating a commonsense immigration process that benefits all workers. 

This agreement includes a new kind of worker visa program called the W-Visa, which will work for everyone, not just employers. 

Read five things you need to know about this new employer-based visa after the jump. 

What’s behind Republicans’ demands that surfaced last week that legislation to create a commonsense immigration process for America's 11 million aspiring citizens institutionalizes poverty wages and drags down workers already in the United States? Bloomberg columnist Margaret Carlson sums it up succinctly.     

Who wants to adversely affect “wages and working conditions” of American workers? Employers, that’s who….Businesses (read: “Republicans”) would like an oversupply of labor to ensure a cheap price.

Imagine 2050 sends us the following story from its blog.

The AFL-CIO and the SEIU are standing up to Republicans and business groups for fair wages in federal immigration reform. While the group of bipartisan senators, called the “Gang of Eight,” working on the immigration bill say that the bill is 90% done, much contention remains around the "guest" worker provisions in the bill. [In fact, the so-called “guest” worker provisions in the bill are not “guest” worker provisions at all. The AFL-CIO has insisted that any new foreign workers be allowed a road map to citizenship and portability between employers so that they are not indentured to a single employer as a condition of remaining in the United States —as is the case under most existing temporary worker programs.]