CHICAGO – More than 100 business leaders – including mega-company heads such as Amazon's Jeff Bezos, Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg, and Apple's Tim Cook – signed onto a letter Monday, appealing to Congress to protect Dreamers – those that entered the U.S. illegally years ago with their parents.
The letter was published in daily news sources throughout the nation.
Chicago leaders such as ABIC/IBIC members Chris Crane (Exelon Corporation), Penny Pritzker (PSP Partners), Mike Fernandez (MBF Partners), John Rowe (Exelon Chairman Emeritus and ABIC), Bill Kunkler (CC Industries), Carole Segal (Crate and Barrel), David MacNeil (WeatherTech), Martin Slark (Molex and Koch Industries), Craig Duchossois (Duchossois Group), and many more.
The letter says:
Dear Speaker Pelosi, Leader McConnell, Leader Schumer, and Leader McCarthy,
The Coalition for the American Dream is an organization of business leaders representing every major sector of the U.S. economy pursuing a bipartisan, permanent legislative solution for Dreamers. Our membership includes more than 100 employers and trade associations spanning a variety of U.S. industries, from retail to manufacturing to tech, that represent more than half of American private sector workers.
We write to urge the new Congress to act immediately and pass a bipartisan, permanent legislative solution to enable Dreamers who are currently living, working, and contributing to our communities to continue doing so. With the re-opening of the federal government and the presumptive restart of immigration and border security negotiations, now is the time for Congress to pass a law to provide Dreamers the certainty they need. These are our friends, neighbors, and coworkers, and they should not have to wait for court cases to be decided to determine their fate when Congress can act now.
Studies by economists across the ideological spectrum have determined that if Congress fails to act, our economy could lose $350 billion in GDP, and the federal government could lose $90 billion in tax revenue. Thus, continued delay or inaction will cause significant negative economic and social impact to businesses and hundreds of thousands of deserving young people across the country.
We have seen time and again that the overwhelming majority of Americans of all political backgrounds agree that we should protect Dreamers from deportation. American employers and hundreds of thousands of Dreamers are counting on you to pass bipartisan, permanent legislative protection for Dreamers without further delay.
Respectfully,
Ginni Rometty, Chairman, President and CEO, IBM Corporation
Matthew Shay, President and CEO, National Retail Federation
Thomas J. Donohue, President and CEO, U.S. Chamber of Commerce
Mark Zuckerberg, Founder and CEO, Facebook
Brad Smith, President, Microsoft Corporation
Tim Cook, CEO, Apple
Arne Sorenson, President and CEO, Marriott International, Inc.
Alex Gorsky, Chairman, Board of Directors and Chief Executive Officer, Johnson & Johnson
Hans Vestberg, Chief Executive Officer, Verizon Communications
Jay Timmons, President and CEO, National Association of Manufacturers
Randall Stephenson, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, AT&T
Chip Rogers, President & CEO, American Hotel & Lodging Association
James L. Dinkins, President, Coca-Cola North America
Hubert Joly, Chairman and CEO, Best Buy Co., Inc.
Chip Bergh, President and Chief Executive Officer, Levi Strauss & Co.
Brian Cornell, Chairman and CEO, Target
Edmund O. Schweitzer, III PhD, President, Chairman of the Board, and Chief Technology Officer, Schweitzer Engineering Laboratories, Inc.
Drew HoustonFounder & CEO, Dropbox
Doug McMillon, President and CEO Walmart Inc.
Alfred F. Kelly, Jr., Chief Executive Officer, Visa Inc.
Tom Linebarger, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Cummins Inc.
Chris Nassetta, CEO, Hilton
Sanjay Mehrotra, President and CEO, Micron Technology, Inc.
Antonio Neri, President and CEO, Hewlett Packard Enterprise
Elie W. Maalouf CEO, The Americas, InterContinental Hotels Group
Hikmet Ersek, President, Chief Executive Officer and Director, The Western Union Company
Jeff Bezos, CEO, Amazon
Stephen A. Schwarzman, Chairman, CEO and Co-Founder, Blackstone
Devin Wenig, President and CEO, eBay
David French, Executive Director, National Council of Chain Restaurants
Marc Benioff, Co-CEO and Chairman, Salesforce
Keith Block, Co-CEO, Salesforce
Sundar Pichai, CEO, Google
Lars Petersson, President & CEO, IKEA North America Services, LLC
James F. Risoleo, President & CEO, Host Hotels & Resorts
Mary Barra, Chairman and CEO, General Motors
Dan Schulman, President and CEO, PayPal
Jack Dorsey, CEO, Twitter and Square
Julie Sweet, Chief Executive Officer Ð North America, Accenture
Barry Diller, Chairman and Senior Executive of IAC and Expedia Group
Chris Crane, President and CEO, Exelon
Shantanu Narayen, Chairman, President and CEO, Adobe Inc.
Art Peck, President and CEO, Gap Inc.
Robert (Bob) H. Swan, CEO, Intel
Kevin Johnson, President & Chief Executive Officer, Starbucks Coffee Company
John Rowe, Chairman Emeritus, Exelon Corporation and ABIC Co-chair
Sandy Kennedy, President, Retail Industry Leaders Association
Ajay Banga, President and Chief Executive Officer, Mastercard
Neil Blumentha, lCo-Founder & Co-CEO, Warby Parker
Dave Gilboa, Co-Founder & Co-CEO, Warby Parker
Dion Weisler, President & Chief Executive Officer, HP Inc.
Bastian Lehmann, CEO & Co-Founder, Postmates
Gerald Chertavian, Founder and CEO, Year Up
Dara Khosrowshahi, CEO, Uber Technologies, Inc.
Chuck Robbins, CEO, Cisco Systems
Sheryl Sandberg, COO, Facebook
Brian Chesky, Co-Founder, CEO and Head of Community, Airbnb
Ric Elias, CEO, Red Ventures
Stephane Kasriel, CEO, Upwork
Don Graham, Chairman, Graham Holdings
Aaron Levie, CEO, Co-Founder & Chairman, Box
Ron Conway, Founder, SV Angel
Stewart Butterfield, CEO, Slack
Stacy Brown-Philpot, Chief Executive Officer, TaskRabbit
Max Levchin, Founder & CEO, Affirm, Inc
Jon OringerFounder & CEO, Shutterstock, Inc.
Fran ois Locoh-Donou, President and CEO, F5 Networks
Erika Lucas, Founder and CEO, StitchCrew
Jeremy Levine, Partner, Bessemer Venture Partners
Jake Schwartz, CEO & Co-founder, General Assembly
Linda Moore, President & CEO, TechNet
Pedro Pizarro, President & CEO, Edison International
David Colby Reed, CEO, Foossa LLC
Logan Green, Co-Founder, Lyft
John Zimmer, Co-Founder, Lyft
Brynne Kennedy , Founder and Chairwoman, Topia
Wendy Kallergis, President & CEO, Greater Miami & the Beaches Hotel Association
Todd Schulte, President, FWD.us
Daniel James Scott, CEO, Tampa Bay Tech
Mamoon Hamid, Venture Capitalist
Justin Knight, Chief Executive Officer, Apple Hospitality REIT
John Donahoe, CEO, ServiceNow
Steven Kolb, CEO and President, Council of Fashion Designers of America
Julio Fuentes, President & CEO, Florida State Hispanic Chamber of Commerce
David Mandelbrot, CEO, Indiegogo
Marco Zappacosta, CEO, Thumbtack
Todd McKinnon, CEO and Co-Founder, Okta
Jerry Taylor, President, Niskanen Center
Zander Lurie, CEO, SurveyMonkey Inc.
Peter McPherson, President, Association of Public and Land-grant Universities
Brook Kohn, Co-Founder and CEO, DACA Time
Tony Xu, Co-Founder and CEO, DoorDash, Inc.
Dan Yager, President & CEO, HR Policy Association
Penny Pritzker, Chairman, PSP Partners
George Thomas, President and CEO, Psi
Eric Gertler, Executive Chairman, U.S. News & World Report
Jim Coulter, Co-CEO, TPG
Jon Winkelried, Co-CEO, TPG
Ali Noorani, National Immigration Forum
Amol Sarva, Co-Founder and CEO, Knotel
Maxine Clark, Founder & Retired CEO, Build-A-Bear
Thomas Reeves, President, St-Louis Market, Busey Bank
Chris Romer, IOM, President & CEO Vail Valley Partnership
Dennis Nixon, President & CEO, IBC Bank
Carole Segal, Co-Founder, Crate and Barrel
David MacNeil, Founder/CEO, WeatherTech
Martin Slark, Board of Directors, Koch Industries, and Molex Retired CEO
Craig Duchossois, Founder/Chairman, Duchossois Group
John Atkinson, Managing Partner, Willis Towers Watson Group
