Grassroots Activists and 5 Others Against Immigration Reform

May 20, 2013— -- intro: Grassroots conservative groups are credited with helping kill the last immigration reform effort in 2007.

Now, with a bill moving forward in the Senate, they're starting to mobilize again.

Anti-amnesty activists will hold press conferences around the country on May 21, under the common banner of the "Remember 1986" coalition. That's in reference to the 1986 immigration reform law that eventually allowed 2.7 million undocumented immigrants to become legal permanent residents.

The message: the 1986 bill didn't stop illegal immigration and neither will this one.

But compared to the pushback in 2007, vocal grassroots opposition has been tepid so far.

Rusty Childress, the founder of Remember 1986, said that's partly because Republican party leaders are now supporting an immigration overhaul. That includes Arizona Sens. John McCain and Jeff Flake, who are part of the so-called Gang of Eight that drafted the immigration bill in the Senate.

"You would have to ask the Gang of Eight what their motives are, but for the most part I think they're trying to get more control of Washington," Childress said. "The Republicans feel that's slipping away because of the Hispanic vote, and they just seem to be misguided in this topic."

Don't expect thousands of people marching in the streets, at least not yet. But Childress and other activists will be targeting lawmakers to make their voices heard, even as those voices are increasingly on the margins of the public debate.

Here's a look at some of the other factions that are opposing the immigration reform bill in the Senate.

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title: Federal Immigration Workers

text: Immigration reform has the support of the AFL-CIO, representing 12 million union members across the country.

But there are a couple unions that aren't supporting the immigration package.

A union representing federal immigration agents has been against the overall from the outset. But now they've joined forces with another federal immigration agency, the one that handles immigration paperwork.

Together, the unions for employees of U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement (ICE) and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) have 20,000 members.

That's not much compared to the greater labor movement. But these are the people who will be charged with implementing the bill if it becomes law.

The main complaints are that the border security goals in the legislation aren't strict enough and that the path to legalization is too broad.

The president of the union representing USCIS employees, Kenneth Palinkas, explained why they're opposing the immigration bill in a statement released on Monday:

"The attitude of USCIS management is not that the Agency serves the American public or the laws of the United States, or public safety and national security, but instead that the agency serves illegal aliens and the attorneys which represent them," he wrote. "While we believe in treating all people with respect, we are concerned that this agency tasked with such a vital security mission is too greatly influenced by special interest groups-to the point that it no longer properly performs its mission."

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title: The Old Guard

text: Then there are the traditional "anti-amnesty" groups.

FAIR, NumbersUSA and the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) have all been campaigning against illegal immigration for decades, and they're still at it.