[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 156 (Tuesday, November 13, 2001)]
[House]
[Pages H8126-H8131]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                        ANTI-AMERICAN SENTIMENT

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Forbes). Under the Speaker's announced 
policy of January 3, 2001, the gentleman from Colorado (Mr. Tancredo) 
is recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the majority leader.
  Mr. TANCREDO. Mr. Speaker, as we face the calamity and the calamitous

[[Page H8127]]

events of September 11 and recognize what our Nation now needs to do in 
response to that, we also recognize that there are literally hundreds, 
thousands, perhaps, hundreds of thousands of incidents of incredible 
patriotism that have been expressed by the average American citizen. We 
have seen the many pictures on TV and the representations of the flag 
being held aloft, and it is truly inspiring. And it is indeed necessary 
for our country to survive, to have that kind of united agreement upon 
our principles about who we are and what we are trying to accomplish in 
this conflict.
  But recently it has come to my attention, and I am sure to the 
attention of many of my colleagues, that we are also reaping what the 
seeds of political correctness that have been sown in this Nation over 
the last several years are producing for us.
  For years we have, I should not say we perhaps, because it is 
predominantly liberal political thought that has initiated a hatred for 
everything American, for everything with expressions of what might be 
called patriotic. Textbooks all over our land for the last 20 years or 
more have been purged of anything resembling an appreciation of those 
who fought and died for our freedom.
  We make fun of the people who constructed the most brilliant 
political document ever to be conceived of by the mind of men on this 
planet. And we taught our children to ignore or even deride these 
people and our heritage. We look down upon any act of patriotism. It 
was not perceived to be politically correct.
  Our media, of course, aided and abetted this anti-American spirit 
under the guise of an intellectual superiority and political 
correctness. Our courts on far too many occasion have encouraged this 
anti-American sentiment by interpreting the Constitution in a way that 
would have had Madison and Adams spinning in their graves.
  All of these things, in fact, comprise old news. No one is really 
surprised about that. We have talked about it certainly on this floor. 
I know many, many individuals have expressed their concern over the 
past years about the way in which American children were being taught 
in terms of our heritage and appreciation of those values that we call 
American.
  By and large, as I say, Americans have reacted to the events of 
September 11 with great courage and great patriotism. But amazingly, 
amazingly there were many places in America where expressions of anti-
American sentiment are still prevalent. Oftentimes, of course, they are 
college campuses where this goes on.
  As recently as September 22, a gentleman by the name of Zewdalem 
Kebede, he is a recent American immigrant, he is from Ethiopia, he was 
studying in the campus library at San Diego State University, when he 
overheard a group of Saudi students discussing the suicide bombings of 
the Pentagon and the World Trade Center. They started talking about 
September 11, he said, and with the action that they were deeply 
pleased. They were happy.
  The anti-American group, speaking in Arabic, thought that no one 
would be able to hear what they were saying. Kebede, who speaks fluent 
Arabic, surprised the anti-American students by interrupting their 
conversation in their native tongue. Guys, what are you talking about? 
And you are being unfair, he said. How do you feel happy when those 
5,000 to 6,000 people are buried in two or three buildings. He said, 
You are proud of these terrorists. You should feel shame.
  Kebede claims he addressed his fellow students in Arabic because he 
did not want to embarrass them in front of others. A Saudi student 
sitting at a nearby table then angrily confronted Kebede in English. 
The ensuing conversation grew heated. Thirty minutes later the police 
came for Kebede.
  They informed him that a complaint had been issued against him. Soon 
the University Center for Student Rights ordered him to attend a 
disciplinary meeting because it was alleged he had been verbally 
abusive to other students. He received a letter ordering him not to 
respond to his accusers or he would face sanctions.
  This is all from a story written by Daniel Flynn in Human Events the 
week of October 29, 2001.

                              {time}  2300

  The university, after a lot of outrage was expressed by some Members 
of the alumni especially, concluded the matter with an October 9 letter 
threatening disciplinary action against the political science senior: 
``You are admonished to conduct yourself as a responsible member of the 
campus community in the future,'' San Diego's missive warned. Of 
course, I and many others would say that is exactly what Mr. Kebede was 
doing on September 22. He was conducting himself in a completely 
responsible manner, and yet he is the one attacked by the institution, 
by some of his fellow students.
  Unfortunately, what happened to Mr. Kebede at San Diego is not an 
isolated incident. At Marquette University, undergraduates were blocked 
from holding a moment of silence around the American flag on September 
11. The gesture, the school's president and advisers felt, might be 
``offensive'' to foreign students. The administration felt that it 
showed too much nationalism or patriotism and respect to foreign 
students.
  At Lehigh University, the vice provost for student affairs initially 
reacted to the tragedy of September 11 by banning the display of the 
American flag. Lehigh spokesman explained, ``The idea was to keep from 
offending some of our students, and maybe the result was much to the 
contrary.''
  When officials at Arizona State removed the American flag from a 
school cafeteria out of fear that it might offend international 
students, Syrian immigrant Oubai Shahbandar introduced a bill in the 
student senate, paving the way for its return. Shahbandar's bill was 
defeated, but the ensuing bad publicity he generated against the school 
forced the administration's hand. The alumni threatened to pull their 
funding for the school. Money talked and the flag was returned.
  Professor Robert Jensen of the University of Houston pronounced that, 
``My primary anger is directed at the leaders of this country.'' That 
is his response to September 11. ``The attacks on the Pentagon and the 
World Trade Center are,'' he said, ``no more despicable than the 
massive acts of terrorism, the deliberate killing of civilians for 
political purposes that the U.S. Government has committed in my 
lifetime. We are just as guilty,'' he concluded.
  University of New Mexico Professor Richard Berthold bluntly declared, 
``Anyone who would blow up the Pentagon would get my vote.''
  Undergraduates writing in campus newspapers echoed this hatred 
against the United States, and I cannot imagine that we would be too 
surprised at that. Is that not just exactly the results that these 
professors would want? Is that not exactly what these students had been 
taught for years, that it is always our fault; that there is nothing in 
this country worth dying for; that there is nothing special, nothing of 
uniqueness that would give us the right to defend our way of life? That 
is what they have been taught.
  I remember, Mr. Speaker, it was years ago now, but it was a 
demonstration against the war in Vietnam, and there was a young man at 
my college, and he was carrying a banner, a poster; and it said there 
is nothing worth dying for, and I remember thinking to myself even at 
the time here is a fellow who is tan, just coming back from spring 
break, somewhere probably in the Bahamas. That is where a lot of the 
folks went in those days at spring break. He was certainly well 
dressed. He was well fed, well taken care of. It was apparent that he 
was not at all in need of any physical help or he was certainly well 
off and certainly a representation of the average American student on a 
college campus; and here he was carrying a sign saying that there was 
nothing worth dying for, not home, not heart, not kith, not kin, 
nothing worth dying for.
  We had hoped that that sentiment would be squelched by life's 
reality, frankly. It is understandable that idealistic students would 
seek this alternative way of expressing themselves or this way of 
expressing themselves, perhaps, because it is a part of growing up and 
being disruptive and that sort of thing, but it goes deeper than that I 
believe, Mr. Speaker.
  I believe that it infects our institutions, and it will infect our 
society to our great detriment. These students,

[[Page H8128]]

who I started to mention, who wrote in various campus publications 
about America's involvement in Afghanistan, one of them said, ``We are 
kidding ourselves in thinking we have been wronged.''
  This is Lisa Mann of Wake Forest University. She added, ``Sometimes 
it's our fault.''
  ``We sponsor dictators who maim. We defend corporations that enslave, 
and then we have the arrogance to pretend we are safe and 
untouchable,'' said a West Virginia University student, Joshua Green.
  In light of the current destructive nationalism that calls for a war, 
a Duke student opined, the sight of the flag burning would be 
preferable to its display.
  Mr. Kebede found out the hard way that if one loves America they are 
going to get in trouble, especially if they are on a campus and 
especially if they express that opinion. He was harassed by the 
university simply for disagreeing with people who welcomed the killing 
of thousands of Americans on September 11.

  All that he is guilty of, Kebede insists, is loving his adoptive 
country. Is that a crime, he asks? At San Diego State, unfortunately, 
some people think it should be.
  Public colleges that force patriotic students to remove American 
flags because they are potentially offensive and threaten to expel 
students who scold terrorists, cheering foreign students should 
immediately lose their government funding. This is something I agree 
with entirely. These examples that I have given and others that I will 
add to it are so disconcerting that I think it deserves our attention 
in this body.
  I am going to go on and add a few more. At Central Michigan 
University, a school administrator told several students to remove a 
patriotic poster and an American flag from their dormitory. A 
residential adviser said that pro-American items were offensive.
  At Pennsylvania State University, a professor was told that his Web 
site, which advocated military action against terrorists, was 
insensitive and perhaps even intimidating. Under Penn State speech 
codes, intimidating language is grounds for dismissal.
  At Florida Gulf Coast University, Dean of Library Services Kathleen 
Hoeth demanded that employees remove ``proud to be an American'' 
stickers from their work areas on the grounds that they might offend 
international students.
  At the University of North Carolina in Wilmington, a professor is 
under an investigation for harassment after he told a female student 
that he supported U.S. military action in Afghanistan. The student said 
that the position made her feel uncomfortable.
  These things are incredible; and they are, as I say, worthy of our 
note.
  Recently, and this one is, I suppose, striking closer to home as one 
that really got me thinking about the issue to a greater extent, a few 
weeks ago Marcelee Gralapp, the Boulder, Colorado, Boulder Public 
Library's art director, recently turned down employee requests to hang 
a large flag from the glass entrance of the main branch. She said, ``It 
would compromise our objectivity and we do have many flags outside,'' 
she said. ``The idea is to make the environment of the library 
politically neutral to every one of the two to 3,000 Boulder residents 
that walk in each day,'' she said. ``We have people of every faith and 
culture work walking into this building and we want everybody to feel 
welcome.'' ``Library employees,'' she said, ``can wear flag pins and 
ribbons,'' but she urges them to do it thoughtfully, whatever that 
means.
  Now this has caused quite a stir in the Colorado papers because the 
same time that this particular library/art director had turned down a 
request to hang a large flag in front of the library, she approved a 
bizarre sort of artistic representation, I do not even know how 
graphically I can describe what was in the library. Suffice it to say 
that it offended the sensibilities of many members of the community, 
one to the point where the gentleman actually took down the display.

                              {time}  2310

  As I say, it is very graphic, and I will not go into it here. It is a 
comparison of attitude. That is something that is very, very difficult. 
If I can describe it here, it would be very difficult to describe this 
particular display as artistic in any shape or form, and yet it was 
approved to put up, and an American flag was not approved to put up 
because it might offend somebody.
  That is where we are, Mr. Speaker.
  I cannot imagine, frankly, that an American flag flying can offend 
anyone in the United States of America. I know we offend people or it 
is offensive to people like bin Laden and his supporters. We see them 
burning it every day on the news. We see other terrorists throughout 
the world who do take offense at the American flag, and that is 
dutifully carried by all of the media throughout the world, whatever 
they do to the flag. There is little that we can do about that except 
to stand in revulsion of it.
  But here in the United States of America, Mr. Speaker, here, where 
that flag has draped the coffin of so many men and women who have given 
everything, their lives, their limbs, their health, for us to enjoy the 
freedom that we every day experience here. To be offended by that 
symbol is incredible, of course, to most of us. I would assume everyone 
in this Chamber would agree that it is incomprehensible.
  I would add, Mr. Speaker, as dramatic as this statement may seem, or 
I guess some would say bombastic, the reality is if one enjoys the 
freedoms provided by this country, if one enjoys the economic benefit 
provided by our system, by a free enterprise, capitalistic system, if 
one has sought that and come across our borders, oftentimes illegally, 
and has gained access to that freedom and economic opportunity, if you 
are offended, if you indeed take offense at the sight of an American 
flag flying from any building, from any porch, from any car antenna, if 
you take umbrage at that and if you are offended by that sight, then I 
say, get the hell out of the United States of America.
  I do not believe there are millions of people who respond that way, 
but I believe there are some, undeniably, who do, who do take offense, 
and that is what these incredibly ultra-politically-correct librarians 
and school superintendents and principals are trying to reflect, 
because they themselves to a large extent take offense at the sight of 
the American flag, at the sight of its depiction. I say to them the 
same thing. How can you take advantage of everything this country has 
to offer and be offended by its symbol? It is truly incredible to me.
  I will be attacked, of course, for being closed-mind and chauvinistic 
and all the rest of those things, I recognize that; but perhaps someone 
can explain to me in the midst of the attacks that I know will come as 
soon as I get back to the office, the phones have a tendency to light 
up when this subject is discussed, but perhaps someone can take the 
time to explain to me why I should not be offended personally at 
someone who says that they take offense at the flying of the flag.
  Mr. Speaker, to that end, I have introduced H.R. 3201 which prohibits 
any department or agency of the United States from transferring any 
funds to any individual or entity that prohibits the display of the 
flag in the United States of America. That is it. It is one sentence.
  I recognize full well that these people may have the absolute right 
to hate the United States as much as they do, to hate everything that 
we stand for. They have that right, but they do not have the right to 
command the tax dollars from hard-working Americans who do love this 
country, they do not have the right to take that money and then so 
callously disregard the system and the people who have created this 
wonderful experiment in freedom we call America.
  Mr. Speaker, I would just go on now to one other topic, and that is 
the topic of immigration and immigration reform. To a certain extent my 
previous remarks did reflect my concerns about massive immigration, 
legal and illegal into this country. Immigration that has had 
incredibly detrimental effects, massive immigration that has had 
massive detrimental effects.
  I want to go on with a series of discussions I have been having on 
the floor of the House over the last several weeks in which I have 
indicated that there are innumerable stories which have been brought to 
my attention

[[Page H8129]]

with regard to the issue of immigration and the problems inherent in 
the system that we presently operate, or perhaps I should say the lack 
of a system that we presently operate.
  We are just building a file of incredible, but true and let me get 
something here, Mr. Speaker. This is an e-mail address that we have, 
Tom.T[email protected], and the fax number is (202) 226-4623. We 
use this for people to communicate with us. There is no way to do that 
through the regular mail, and yet we have had lots of people, actually 
several thousand people, try to communicate with us about this issue, 
about immigration reform, expressing their concerns and opinions and 
their willingness to try to do something about it, and also bringing to 
my attention and to the attention of the body some of the incidents 
which I call unbelievable but true.

  Here is one more for this evening. This comes from an article 
originally published in the New Times Broward Palm Beach on November 8, 
2001.
  ``The INS' Mary Schneider warned of the terrorist threat, but no one 
listened to her. More than 2 years before the September 11 attack, a 
seasoned Federal immigration officer named Mary Schneider vehemently 
complained that Islamic visitors who were possibly terrorists were 
moving into the Orlando area. She told INS officials that hundreds of 
aliens, some of whom she suspected were tied to Osama bin Laden, were 
illegally gaining residence. She further alleged that several INS 
supervisors had accepted bribes in return for allowing those aliens to 
remain in the country.
  ``Rather than investigate Ms. Schneider's complaints thoroughly, the 
INS began a campaign of retaliation against the 21-year immigration 
employee that nearly led to her termination.''

                              {time}  2320

  Ms. Schneider has information from five informants on long-running, 
extensive, felony bribery conspiracies engaged in by Orlando INS and 
staff at former congressional offices, unnamed. The bribery ring 
involved over 50 Islamic Muslim Moroccans, an unknown number of whom 
had ties to Ihab Ali, an Egyptian who lived in Orlando before he was 
imprisoned in 1999 in New York City for ties to Osama bin Laden and 
East Africa embassy bombings.
  INS officials stole cash and jewelry from illegal aliens who had been 
detained, she claims.
  Records of more than 200 felony immigration fraud cases were secretly 
removed from her office.
  Whatever the merit of her allegations, Ms. Schneider's warnings 
certainly proved prophetic. Numerous Orlando ties to the suicide 
bombings and bin Laden have been uncovered both before and after the 
attacks, so many that the Orlando Sentinel recently suggested that 
Central Florida should be dubbed ``Terroristland.''
  Ms. Schneider has retained the services of an attorney. Her one-time 
attorney, Mr. Ross, said that the INS and the FBI both dropped the ball 
in a big way. ``I was shocked that the Justice Department never 
investigated this. I don't think INS officials thought that what 
happened on September 11 would ever happen. Now people are actually 
going to look at this. Had the government followed Schneider's 
philosophy, we probably would have stopped some very bad people.''
  Schneider would say, ``We are in danger. They are sending these 
terrorists into this country and I can't understand why more isn't 
being done. They are going to commit acts of terrorism in this country. 
She happened to hit the nail right on the head.''
  This is just one individual. We have had literally scores of 
communications of a similar nature, many of them from INS officials, 
who today have told us that they are willing to provide testimony. One 
of them is actually going to provide testimony to this body. Mr. 
Speaker, I am the chairman of the Immigration Reform Caucus here and 
our caucus will hold a hearing on Thursday, this week, at which one of 
these individuals, a 30-year INS employee, perhaps we will have two but 
we know right now of one for sure who we were able to obtain 
whistleblower status for and eventually the INS agreed to allow him to 
testify when they recognized they really could not stop it although 
they threatened to fire him shortly after his decision to speak to 
various congressmen was made known. But he is going to be here.
  As I say, we have had all kinds of information like this, from INS 
agents who are good, solid Americans wanting to do their job and who 
recognize that the organization for which they work is incredibly 
corrupt and incompetent. Those are strong words, I recognize, Mr. 
Speaker; but they are the only ones that accurately portray the system 
itself. Corrupt and incompetent.
  She alleges, as I said, INS officials stealing cash and jewelry from 
illegal aliens who had been detained. She suggests that a bribery ring 
was involved and that many officials, even staff at a former, quote, 
unnamed congressional office was involved. These things have got to be 
dealt with. The INS refused to deal with it. Even the Justice 
Department refused to deal with it.
  Mohammed Atta, a name all too well known to everyone in the United 
States now as the ringleader of the group of 19 terrorists who hijacked 
the planes on September 11, Mohammed Atta here on a visa, left the 
country and did so illegally. He was to fill out a particular form, he 
did not do that, saying that I am going to leave the country, I will be 
returning on a certain day. He did not do it. He left; he came back. He 
came back through Miami in January of this year. He should have been 
stopped at that point in time. The INS actually recognized that he had 
not in fact informed them, he had breached his contract, if you will, 
which is what a visa really is; and they could have at that time denied 
him entrance into the United States.
  Mohammed Atta could have been stopped from coming back into the 
United States, at least in January. But the INS overlooked it, chose 
not to pay the slightest bit of attention to it. The INS time and time 
and time again, far too numerous to lay out in any 1-hour Special 
Order, but so many times that it is beyond imagination. It is 
unfathomable that this agency could be in charge of our security, our 
border security. They have put almost all of their resources into what 
I call immigration social work. When I was on a talk radio show in 
Denver not too long ago, shortly after I was on the radio the person 
running the show called the INS and had a spokesman for the INS come 
on. They said something like, isn't it your job to go after these 
people who are here illegally and get rid of them? And she said, well, 
kind of in a way. But really, she said, our main focus is to explain to 
these people why they are here illegally and then help them get 
benefits.
  Mr. Speaker, I may be just confused about what I thought the INS was 
all about; but I think that that statement, that paraphrase in a 
nutshell describes the problem and the problem with which we must deal, 
and we must deal with it before leaving here this year. We have spent 
countless hours in the discussion of the degree to which we can make 
our airports more secure by improving the quality of the people that 
actually do the baggage screening. I have yet to hear any discussion of 
the literally hundreds of thousands of other people who have access to 
planes every single day, whether they be baggage handlers, whether they 
be food service workers, whether they be the people who repair the 
airplanes.
  None of them fall under the scrutiny of this particular piece of 
legislation that we are spending an inordinate amount of time debating 
and was brought up many times by our friends on the other side here 
just a little bit ago. Is it not the least bit peculiar, is it not the 
least bid odd that we spend this amount of time focusing on one small 
part of the entire airport security problem, one tiny part, frankly, 
the baggage screening people, a very small number relatively speaking, 
but the sound and fury coming from this body and the other body about 
this would make you think that if we just solved this problem, we will 
all be okay, we can rest easy at night if we just simply make baggage 
screeners Federal employees, as if somehow magically by changing who 
their employer is, we will make these people much more competent. It is 
idiotic.
  I personally, of course, support our efforts to try to improve 
airline security. I certainly support the House's bill which does so in 
a fashion far more definitive, far greater than the other body. As a 
person who flies twice a

[[Page H8130]]

week, as most of the Members of this body do, I have a very personal 
stake in this thing of airline security. And contrary to the 
allegations made by our friends on the other side of massive payments 
and massive influence-peddling by these corporations who want to 
maintain it, I have never heard from any of them; and I want to know 
what Member of this body would vote for a piece of legislation that he 
or she thought did not enhance the security to the greatest extent 
possible, because he or she flies a lot and my family flies a lot and 
my grandchildren get on planes all the time. I am not going to do 
anything that is going to minimize or even jeopardize their safety if I 
possibly can.
  I have voted for and I believe the House bill is better. But all that 
said, Mr. Speaker, it begs the question, is that all there is to 
security in this country? The baggage screeners and bombing 
Afghanistan, that is what we have done so far. We have not even 
accomplished the former. I totally, totally support the President's 
actions in Afghanistan. I, of course, wish he had declared war; I wish 
he would have come to this body and asked for a declaration of war, 
because that is the constitutional way to handle this particular issue 
and crisis. Nonetheless, we are where we are. We have accomplished 
great things. The courage, the fortitude of our fighting men and women 
have persevered again. As the President said from that very podium the 
night he addressed the Nation, I know you will again make us proud, and 
they have.

                              {time}  2330

  And they have. But while we are fighting this struggle, again, I 
hesitate to call it a war, it actually is not, we have not declared 
war, but while we are fighting, involved in this struggle in 
Afghanistan, risking the lives of men and women in the uniform of the 
United States, we have paid literally no attention whatsoever to the 
most basic issue of security, of national security. It is not just 
bombing the terrorists in caves in Afghanistan; it is trying to stop 
those terrorists and their colleagues from coming across the borders of 
the United States.
  If they get in here, I will worry about how they can get through a 
security checkpoint at an airport. We will do everything we can to stop 
them. But why would we not try to stop them at the border is the 
question that is begged by this discussion. Why would we not? Why have 
we not chosen to move as dramatically, as quickly, as expeditiously 
toward improving the security of our own borders as we have at 
enhancing the security of the people who look at the baggage going 
through the mechanism at the airport?
  There are plenty of reasons, of course. It is, again, politically 
incorrect, going back to a discussion of the first part of my remarks. 
It is politically incorrect for us to talk about border security, 
because we are talking about then inhibiting the ability of people to 
come into the United States. And since most of the people coming into 
the United States, both legally and illegally, are coming from south of 
our border, it is an assumption that if you talk about immigration 
reform you are naturally talking about and expressing sort of a anti-
Hispanic sentiment.
  Mr. Speaker, I, for one, could not care less about the ethnicity of 
the people that are coming. It is the fact that our borders are 
insecure, and it is the fact that too many are coming, that I believe 
we must address. It does not matter from where. I am not talking about 
whether they are from Mexico, or Belgium. The issue is, who should 
control the boarders of a Nation? Should we actually? Is it the right 
of the United States to say who gets into the country and who does not? 
And if we say some do not, then should we not also say that it is our 
responsibility to try to prevent them from doing so illegally?
  What part of this discussion is so hard for us in this body to 
comprehend? Why have we chosen not to deal with this? Many bills have 
been introduced. They have not seen the light of day. Even the 
administration has been reluctant to deal with the issue of immigration 
reform and border security, except in the most cursory ways, except 
talking about certain visa changes, changes in certain visa 
requirements.
  Now, I am for strengthening visa requirements, Mr. Speaker, do not 
get me wrong. I am especially amazed at some of the more bizarre 
examples. This is another one of those incredible but true stories we 
could tell about immigration.
  Up until just a short while ago, until we passed the anti-terrorism 
bill in this Congress and it was signed by the President just a short 
time ago, it was absolutely legal for anyone, well, put it this way: It 
was okay for someone to come to a consulate anywhere around the world, 
fill out a visa application and say on it I am a Member of al Qaeda, 
the terrorist network that is committed to the overthrow of your 
government, and I hate America, and I agree with all of the things al 
Qaeda has stated about the United States.
  You could do that, and under our laws, that alone was not a reason to 
keep you out of the United States, because of something the other body 
and the leadership of the gentleman of Massachusetts sometime ago 
passed a law saying that just because someone has these political 
affiliations, they should not be kept out of the United States.

  Incredible. Incredible, but true. Now, we reversed that when we 
passed the anti-terrorism bill. We added that one clause that says yes, 
they could be kept out. That is great. I am happy. But, Mr. Speaker, 
let us be serious about this. Does anybody think for a moment that a 
terrorist, potential or real, is going to be even remotely intimidated 
by the fact that they cannot now attest to their allegiance to a 
terrorist network when they fill out their visa form, and so therefore 
they are going to say gee, you know, Mr. bin Laden, I wanted to go into 
the United States and wreak some havoc upon their people and kill as 
many as I possibly could, but, you know, I could not get my visa, so I 
just went home.
  Who thinks that? Who thinks that is going to stop them? Why would 
they not do exactly what millions of other people do every single year, 
walk across the border, north or south of the United States? Walk into 
the country, as perhaps at least six of the 19 hijackers did?
  When we asked the INS for information about these people, they said, 
oh, we are not sure. We will let you know. So they sent us eventually a 
document that indicated that ten of the people were here illegally 
because they had either overstayed their visas or were not doing what 
their visa was approved for. But, unfortunately, six of the 19, they 
said, we have no idea. This is the sort of, I call it the logo, if you 
will, of the INS. It is a shrugging the shoulders. I do not know. I 
have no idea. I do not know where these people came from. I have no 
idea what they were doing here. I do not know how. Maybe they snuck in. 
Could have been. We do not know.
  Where are the hundreds thousands of people, you could ask the INS, 
that have been ordered deported by immigration law judges across this 
country? Three hundred thousand people, Mr. Speaker, even the INS now 
agrees with this, we forced them into telling the truth about the 
numbers. Three hundred thousand, they say, so therefore I believe that 
is a very significant underestimate. But let us assume they are right, 
300,000 people have been deported.
  No, they have not been deported, they have only been ordered 
deported. They have been brought up for trial, for rape, murder, 
robbery, fraud, for you name it. Not just, by the way, for overstaying 
their visa. That never gets you in front of a court.
  There are literally millions of people in the United States here 
illegally. It is estimated that 700,000 to 800,000 enter illegally 
through the visa process, who end up staying as permanent residents of 
the United States every single year. So we asked the INS about that. 
They go, oh, I am not sure. I do not know. I am not positive. I cannot 
tell you about that.
  Where are the 300,000? I do not know. They say we cannot go look for 
these people. They were ordered deported, but we just do not have the 
resources. We have got other things to do. We have to show them how to 
get benefits.
  That is the mentality of the INS, to show them how to get benefits. 
As I say, there are hundreds of people who are dedicated workers. I do 
not want to

[[Page H8131]]

say thousands. I do not know if there are thousands in INS, but at 
least hundreds, I am sure, who are dedicated to the cause, dedicated to 
doing a good job, and they are thwarted by an agency that is completely 
and totally out of control. It is corrupt and it is incompetent. I 
repeat that allegation, and I want someone to prove me wrong, because, 
unfortunately, we today give them the responsibility of keeping our 
borders safe and secure.
  Does anybody feel good about that? The people who have e-mailed us at 
this e-mail address or faxed us at that number, most of them, I would 
say 90 percent of them, do not feel comfortable with that, Mr. Speaker. 
They do not like the fact that the INS ignores the responsibility for 
protecting the border, for not just the protection of the border, but 
then for internal investigations; what to do about the people who got 
here, who are here illegally. To ignore them completely is something 
that is akin to a death wish for the country.
  Now, I know that most of the people who come into the United States 
illegally do not do so to do us harm. They do so mostly for personal 
benefit. Naturally. That is probably why most of our ancestors came.

                              {time}  2340

  But we cannot be that unconcerned. We do not know. It is not in our 
ability to be able to stand at the border and say, I know you are 
coming across the border illegally, but you appear to have no ill 
intent. You appear to be just coming across to get a job, send some 
money back home, improve your own life, maybe go back, maybe not. And 
we cannot determine that from the person who is coming across with the 
purpose of killing as many Americans as he or she can possibly kill. We 
cannot really decide that at the borders. So we have to do the next 
best thing. We have to secure the border from all illegal immigration. 
We have to call up the National Guard in each of the States that border 
Mexico or Canada and ask them to please use their resources, the 
National Guard, in defense of our borders. If that is not good enough, 
then we should put our own active duty troops on the border. We should 
use all the technology available to us, the sensing devices. We should 
use air flight.
  Mr. Speaker, we should do everything we possibly can to make sure 
that no one comes across that border that we do not know about. Hard? 
Absolutely. Foolproof? Absolutely not. No matter how hard we try, 
someone probably will get through. No matter how hard we try, someone 
with the intent to kill or commit acts of atrocity in the United States 
may get through. But that does not excuse us from trying.
  We have laws on the books, Mr. Speaker, against any one of thousands 
of various kinds of human behaviors, and those laws are violated pretty 
regularly and yet, no one suggests that we should simply ignore them 
because they are violated. We should do everything we can to protect 
our borders, everything we can. We should do everything we can to find 
the people who are here in the United States illegally and deport them. 
If we need workers, if we need workers in particular industries, fine. 
Establish a guest worker program that allows people to come in, allows 
their rights to be protected, and allows them to return home at the end 
of a contractual period of time, and an enforcement mechanism that 
makes sure that they do so, like a bond established for part of their 
wages or that the employer has to put up, part of the wages, that they 
can only be claimed once they return home. If we can convince this 
Congress, Mr. Speaker, that we need 10 million of these people every 
year, okay, that is fine, but bring them in here legally. Their lives 
are improved, their rights, they are not exploited by unscrupulous 
employers. That is fine with me. Then we determine how many people 
should be coming through just legally. Is it 1 million as it is today? 
I do not think so. It should be far fewer.
  But regardless of what we determine to be the legal process whereby 
anybody gets into this country, we should do everything in our power to 
make sure that the illegal process that is used is slammed shut, at 
least to the best extent possible, to the greatest extent possible. 
Because as I have said oftentimes here on the floor of the House, and 
as I will repeat tonight, if, God forbid, another event of the nature 
of those that occurred on September 11, another event like that occurs, 
or like those occur and it is perpetrated by someone who comes across 
this border and is either here illegally at the time or enters 
illegally to do it, and we have not done everything in our power in 
this Congress to prevent that; I am not saying that it is foolproof, I 
emphasize that, it may still happen, but if we had not done everything 
in our power, then we are not just irresponsible, we are culpable. We 
have to live with that.
  Mr. Speaker, I choose not to. I choose to know that I will do 
everything I could possibly do to bring to the attention of my 
colleagues and to the American people the seriousness of this debate on 
immigration reform. It is a matter now of life and death.

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