[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 75 (Friday, May 24, 1996)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E928-E929]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         INTRODUCTION OF A BILL

                                 ______


                        HON. BENJAMIN A. GILMAN

                              of new york

                    in the house of representatives

                         Thursday, May 23, 1996

  Mr. GILMAN. Mr. Speaker, today I am introducing legislation that will 
help this Nation struggle more effectively with the scourge of illicit 
drugs, and those who engage in this deadly trade.
  It has recently come to my attention that many illegal criminal 
aliens in our State and local prisons for drug related offenses had 
often previously been transported--after they had served their prison 
time--by air by our fine local National Guard units to Federal 
deportation centers for eventual processing out of our Nation.
  There were many important benefits to these controlled National Guard 
military flights, including security, because many of these criminal 
aliens involved with drugs and facing deportation often had histories 
of violent behavior and conduct.
  In addition, the cost of transporting these aliens individually along 
with Immigration and Naturalization Service [INS] officers accompanying 
them on commercial carriers is expensive. It also exposed these 
criminal aliens to an unsuspecting public in our civilian airports and 
on commercial flights.
  Current limits on the number and the already broad and difficult 
responsibilities of our dedicated and hardworking INS personnel, and 
the costs of commercial travel for and with these criminal aliens 
facing deportation, often makes it impossible to ensure that these 
individuals when their time served in jail was completed will ever be 
taken to or show up at deportation centers. Ultimately these 
limitations bear heavily on whether in fact these criminal aliens are 
ever eventually removed from the United States.
  In some cases, absent INS ability to effectively transport and move 
these aliens facing deportation, we may be letting these criminal 
aliens--pending eventual deportation--merely back into our local 
communities to engage in more drug related crime and violence.
  In the past State and local authorities often had consolidated a 
number of these individual aliens for a group flight under INS and 
National Guard control at the same time to these

[[Page E929]]

deportation centers. These National Guard flights made sense as a tool 
in our arsenal against drugs and those who would engage in their 
possession, use or distribution, as well as serving the Guard's 
training needs and requirements.
  However; these effective and cost efficient National Guard flights 
were I am informed, ended several years ago because there was questions 
raised about the legal authority for the National Guard to engage in 
this activity, only indirectly drug related.
  My bill, which I introduce today, makes the local National Guard's 
authority clear in this area; if it desires to promote its training and 
antinarcotics function and role in this fashion as part of its antidrug 
plans, it may clearly do so. It also limits those cases where the 
National Guard may assist the INS in transporting aliens to those 
criminal aliens, who have violated a Federal or State law prohibiting 
or regulating the possession, use, or distribution of a controlled 
substance.
  It is a reasonable use of the National Guard's air assets, pilots, 
and personnel incidental to training by the Guard. It also serves our 
national interests in the battle against drugs. As we well know, drugs 
and those involved in the deadly trade in these poisons, cost our 
society more than $67 billion annually, and threaten our cities, 
schools, youth, and future generations.
  The bill is simply authority for those local National Guard units 
that want to engage in assisting INS to transport these criminal aliens 
involved in drugs for deportation purposes. It will help this Nation 
get a handle on the many foreign born individuals in our prison system 
who have engaged in drug related criminal activity and face deportation 
spirited out of this country as soon as possible.
  We should do all we can to get these criminal aliens involved in 
drugs and related violence out of our Nation as soon as possible and 
not allow them back on our streets to affect our communities, schools, 
and childrens' futures and very lives and well being.
  I ask that the full text of the bill be printed hereafter:

                                H.R.  .

       Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of 
     the United States of America in Congress assembled,

     SECTION 1. AUTHORITY FOR NATIONAL GUARD TO ASSIST IN 
                   TRANSPORTATION OF CERTAIN ALIENS.

       Section 112(d)(1) of title 32, United States Code, is 
     amended by adding at the end the following new sentence: 
     ``The plan as approved by the Secretary may provide for the 
     use of personnel and equipment of the National Guard of that 
     State to assist the Immigration and Naturalization Service in 
     the transportation of aliens who have violated a Federal or 
     State law prohibiting or regulating the possession, use, or 
     distribution of a controlled substance.''.

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