Stephen Colbert to Testify Before Congress

The Colbert Report

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Arturo Rodriguez

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2010 Election

Fox News

Updated 6:47 p.m. Eastern Time

Comedian Stephen Colbert will testify before Congress on Friday, CBS News has confirmed.

The host of Comedy Central's "Colbert Report" plans to appear before a Judiciary Committee Subcommittee on the subject of "Protecting America's Harvest."

There is no official word yet on why Colbert is testifying at the hearing , though an unnamed Republican told the Daily Caller that he will be appearing "in character." 

In a press release, the United Farm Workers said the group's president, Arturo Rodriguez, would testify along with Colbert at 9:30 a.m.

Colbert is expected to discuss the agricultural industry's reliance on illegal immigrants to pick fruits and vegetables. In June, the UFW launched a "Take Our Jobs" campaign "inviting U.S. citizens and legal residents to replace hundreds of thousands of immigrant field laborers, most of whom are undocumented." The group says only seven people have taken them up on the offer. 

Check out Colbert's interview with Rodriguez above.

Colbert recently made headlines for scheduling a march with fellow comedian Jon Stewart on October 30th on the Mall in Washington. Colbert, whose character is a Bill O'Reilly-like conservative commentator, is calling his rally "The March to Keep Fear Alive." (Stewart's march is called the "Rally to Restore Sanity.")

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Brian Montopoli is a political reporter for CBSNews.com. You can read more of his posts here. Follow Hotsheet on Facebook and Twitter.

[Jjesse285]

All we have to do is make sure that every person who come to this country is have a ID, that would solve a lot of problems, big business should know better, no wonder the country is in the mess we are in, it always the bottom line.

[ozilot]

It is truly a sad, nay tragic, commentary on our current political climate when Mssrs Stewart and Colbert - comedians or court jesters - make more sense than our politicians and news stations.

And sadly, Jon Stewart is right it is time to take it down a notch America and look at the issues and not psuedo-political celebs of either party!

[newsbarn]

our politicians are a joke.......scum of the earth......the only good thing is most of them will soon die of old age.....

[Caustic_Commoner]

Why not make it an all-star line-up with Letterman testifying about marriage, Jay-Z testifying about selling crack in Brooklyn and a line-up of of MLB players testifying about steroids? Oops! Scratch the last one--Congress did that.

Colbert testifying in character appears to be just another waste of taxpayer dollars by starstruck pols. Guess there's nothing important needing their attention like the economy, the trade deficit, the budget deficit, the energy deficit, education, crime, two wars, or health care. On the other hand, as bad as they've screwed everything up already, maybe sending in the clowns is a good thing to keep them from doing any more damage.

[tmittelstaed]

you forgot to add having Jay Leno testify about the auto bailout.

[jd2408]

The farm workers do not add up to the millions of illegals breaking our laws and living here illegally. Canada has a farm worker program that works very well for them and we use to have one. If the agriculture department needs to be replaced as most of our government agencies have had to be because they can't seem to do their jobs than replace them. We should have guest workers for agriculture jobs. Even people as intelligent as our Congressman should know that. We do not need illegal people to do any job in this country.

[tmittelstaed]

A guest worker program is just another route for Mexicans to shortcut the red tape to become US permanent residents.

Let's be honest here. Studies have been done by the OMB that show that the US spends more money in social services on migrant agricultural workers than we save by having them work for under the table wages. By not punishing the farmers and employers who hire illegals as the law requires, the government is subsidizing cheap farm produce. It's no different than paying farmers to not grow crops.

If the farmers were to raise their wages then legal American workers WOULD take them up on their offer of work. But you cannot make a living wage picking farm produce unless your willing to live like a dog. Ask any migrant farm worker and they will tell you that while they are picking fruit or whatever, they are making darn sure their kids are in the local school and are learning English and to read and write because they want to make sure their children have enough skills to do better than pick farm produce.

[Queen0fCups]

What a circus this congress is.

[GoGoUsa]

You are correct, everyone has one and in my opinion you have as much NO BUSINESS spouting your uniformed opinion as any other non-expert.

[stn_sage]

In my opinion (everybody has one), Colbert has NO BUSINESS testifying!

This is just more of the same old 'business as usual'! That is, Congress would RATHER listen to 'non-experts' who won't contradict the lobbyists who have 'leaned on them' to decide things against the best interest of the public!

[ozilot]

Colbert is a taxpaying citizen and has every and business in testifying.

Congress wouldn't the difference between an expert and their ...holes, regardless of party affliation!