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Although labor shortages have had the widest impact in places nearer to the U.S.-Mexican border, like California and Texas, Northeastern farmers have also been forced to adjust to the shortages. Growers went to Washington last week to campaign for a new Senate bill that would create a guest worker program to grant as many as 1.5 million farm laborers legal status to keep working in the United States. A similar proposal was defeated last year after legislators stonewalled immigration reform. But farm lobbyists are betting the stand-alone bill will find new supporters in the Democrat-controlled 110th Congress.