[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 66 (Tuesday, May 6, 2003)]
[House]
[Pages H3668-H3674]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Ms. Ginny Brown-Waite of Florida). Under the 
Speaker's announced policy of January 7, 2003, the gentleman from 
Colorado (Mr. Tancredo) is recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of 
the majority leader.
  Mr. TANCREDO. Madam Speaker, I rise tonight to bring to the attention 
of the body an addition to the list of homeland heroes that we 
periodically bring forward to focus a little attention on because these 
folks face an incredible task. They have been waging a battle on their 
own property and their open land for quite a number of years now. I 
simply believe that it is deserving of our attention.
  Tonight I want to talk about Larry and Toni Vance. These are homeland 
heroes residing near Douglas, Arizona. Larry Vance lives only one mile 
from the Arizona border and three miles

[[Page H3669]]

west of the border town and port of entry of Douglas. Larry is the son 
of a legal Mexican immigrant. He and his wife Toni have lived in the 
area for 29 years. The Vance family has seen many changes in that 
nearly 30 years that they have lived a mile from the border.
  Among the changes they have witnessed is the character of the illegal 
aliens crossing their land. In the 1970s and 1980s, they told us when 
we were visiting down there not too long ago, there were very few drug 
smugglers, that most groups coming across their land were small, three 
or four or five people; that they were polite and often asked to stop 
for directions or ask for water. The Vances were friendly and 
accommodating. There were periods during the late 1970s and early 80s 
when bandits posed a real danger to the residents along the border and 
burglaries were common. The Vance home was burglarized twice. There was 
a crackdown on the border crossings, the border patrol was beefed up; 
and the crime problem was brought under control.
  But in the mid-1990s they noticed that groups of illegal trespassers 
were getting larger and that there were many more of them. By 1997, the 
Vance family was seeing a daily pattern of 20 groups of 20 or more 
people passing through at all hours of the day and night.
  I want to say here that this is something that we heard over and over 
again while we were visiting around the Douglas, Arizona, area, that 
is, that something is changing, something is happening in the character 
of the immigrants coming through, illegal immigration into this 
country. It is certainly not a pleasant thing for the people who live 
in the area. The groups were not only men. Now they were women and 
children and also sometimes pregnant women and elderly people. Groups 
were coming through their property so close to the house that they 
could not sleep at night because the dogs would bark so much. In fact, 
the dogs literally would lose their voice, become hoarse, I suppose, is 
one way to say it, from barking night after night.
  In September of 1999, his two dogs were poisoned, the Vances' two 
dogs were poisoned. One of them eventually died. Bandits from across 
the border preyed on helpless illegal aliens that were crossing. They 
robbed them, they beat them, they raped them. The screams of the 
victims were often heard across the desert at night. The Vances had to 
install a high chain link fence around their house and wrought iron 
window guards. Such measures were unheard of in rural Arizona until the 
mid-1990s, and it is traceable to the rising crime from illegal aliens 
crossing their land.
  The illegal aliens often asked for rides to Tucson or Phoenix, and on 
several occasions Larry Vance was offered $300 to $500 to transport 
people to Phoenix. The Vances' horses often escaped and had to be 
chased the next day because their fences were knocked down or 
cut. Three years ago, he quit trying to keep horses; it became so 
difficult and expensive to keep the fences repaired. Larry Vance used 
to keep water troughs filled for the wildlife, but he cannot do that 
anymore because the illegal aliens constantly break the water lines. 
They do not merely drink the water. That would be okay. In fact, 
oftentimes I have seen where these ranchers along the border would 
actually put out cups, hang a cup along the water trough and along the 
water well for people to use themselves. But unfortunately they do not 
just take the cup and drink, now they destroy the water lines. The 
environmental damage to their land is tremendous. Trash is left in huge 
heaps and left everywhere. Both cattle and wildlife are killed because 
they eat the plastic bags and other trash. Traffic accidents caused by 
illegal aliens chasing other vehicles or just careening into a ditch 
have become regular occurrences. Many local residents have been killed 
by crashing with rampaging cars and trucks driven by illegal aliens 
fleeing across the border. A young father of two children was killed in 
such an accident just a short time ago.

  In the weeks and months immediately following the terrorist attack of 
September 11, 2001, there was a dramatic decrease in the flow of 
illegal aliens across the land. The ports of entry at Nogales, Naco, 
and Douglas had been strengthened and more border patrol agents added 
to the ranks. But by mid-2002, the flow had resumed. The groups merely 
went around the ports of entry and came across the miles of unguarded 
fence that opened onto private lands. I often talk about the very 
peculiar and ironic view that we had from a helicopter when we were 
flying over this area, this area he is talking about here, Nogales, 
where there is a port of entry and there are large numbers of cars all 
lined up trying to come into the United States at that port of entry. 
We have got all these guards stationed where the cars come through, at 
these ports of entry; but you can, of course, see for many miles there, 
because it is just flat desert land, you can fly for a couple of miles 
either side of that port of entry and see people coming across at their 
will, driving cars right through the desert, walking across; but, of 
course, right there at the port of entry, they are checking IDs and all 
that sort of thing. It is ironic to say the least. It is a microcosmic 
look, if you ask me, of the entire system, of the entire problem.
  The groups merely went around the ports of entry, as I say. By late 
2002, the drug smuggling had risen dramatically and marijuana-laden 
trucks crossed the border regularly in the area far away from the ports 
of entry but right near Larry and Toni Vance's home. During December of 
2002 alone, there were 41 reported incidents of drug seizures. We can 
only imagine how many trucks got through the border patrol and made it 
to Phoenix and Los Angeles and elsewhere.
  The lives of ranchers like Larry Vance and his wife, Toni, have been 
radically altered in the last 10 years because their government, their 
own government, has failed to protect them and their property from the 
invasion across their land. Invasion is exactly what this is. That is 
the proper term to use to describe what is happening on the border and 
what these people along the border are facing. As I say, the Vances are 
just one of many couples, one of many families that we visited, that we 
became acquainted with just a month or two ago down on that border. I 
determined at that point in time that it would be important to bring 
their story to this body and to the Nation, because frankly, Madam 
Speaker, not many people know about them. Not many people beyond their 
immediate family and the immediate area around Douglas know of the 
Vances. But they should know, because these people are truly in a war 
zone. They are fighting a war and they feel like they have been 
abandoned, abandoned by their own government. And, in fact, they have.
  I could not bring them good news when I was down there. I could not 
say to them, not to worry, the government is going to come to your 
rescue. The Federal Government is going to do what it promises it 
should do and what it promises to do for every American citizen, and, 
that is, to protect their lives and property. I wish I could tell them 
that. I cannot do that in all candor. I cannot say that. Because this 
government has chosen to ignore the Vances, ignore all of the families, 
all of the homeland heroes that I have brought to the attention of the 
body over the last several weeks.
  They have chosen to ignore the millions of people in this country who 
plead with us, plead with Members of Congress, to do something about 
illegal immigration, to try to stem the flow of illegal immigration 
into the country, to try to get a hold of this problem. Not to slam the 
door to people, not because anyone is doing this or is concerned about 
the issue from racial lines or any of the ugly aspects of the 
immigration debate. Certainly there are people like that on both sides 
out there. You can go to the Web sites on both sides of this issue 
and find people who are racially motivated. I guarantee you it is on 
both sides of this debate. Racism can be a factor. It is not what 
motivates people like the Vances, I say, Mr. Vance himself, the son of 
a legal Mexican immigrant. He is devoted to his land. He is devoted to 
the country. He is devoted to the United States of America. He believes 
in the United States. He believes in the rule of law. All he asks is 
that the law be enforced, especially in his area, that his property be 
protected from this invading force. Is that too much to ask, I wonder. 
I do not think so. I only wish the public officials of this Nation had 
as much courage as the Vance family.

[[Page H3670]]

We need to follow their example and take our responsibilities 
seriously. We need to gain control of our borders so citizens like the 
Vances can live their lives free of this constant threat.

  Madam Speaker, I am going to go on to another aspect of this 
discussion, beyond the Vances and the homeland heroes; and I want to 
talk a little bit about one other aspect of this whole immigration 
dilemma that we face. We have tried to break down the discussion of the 
immigration debate into several component parts. Over the weeks I have 
come to the floor of the House with a discussion of one particular part 
of the immigration dilemma or debate. I have talked about the national 
security implications of open borders, of the porous borders that we 
now have, the fact that people can and do come into this country at 
their will, some of them to do great harm to the United States. It is 
to the credit of many of our agencies, many of the law enforcement 
agencies that are devoted to the task of protecting America that some 
events have not already occurred with people who have come into this 
country illegally for the purpose, as I say, of doing us great harm.
  But we have a significant national security problem because of open 
borders and because of our unwillingness as a Nation to actually secure 
our own borders. That was the first night that I focused on that. And 
then we talked about the cost to the Nation, the infrastructural costs 
to the Nation of massive immigration. I talked about the fact that 
there are hospitals all over the Southwest that are going broke. I 
talked about the fact that hundreds of billions of dollars are being 
expended by citizens of this country through the health care process in 
order to provide health care for illegal immigrants into the country. 
Sometimes situations occur where we actually see ambulances coming up 
to the ports of entry carrying people who need help and they are waved 
into the United States, go to a hospital, obtain the help they need, 
and then they go back to Mexico and, of course, pay no bills. I talked 
about the infrastructural costs of housing, of schools, of highways, of 
imprisonment. Upwards of 25 percent of the population in Federal 
prisons are noncitizens. There is an enormous cost to massive 
immigration into the country, both legal and illegal.
  People suggest that it is of benefit to the country to have massive 
immigration and that it is economically beneficial, that these people 
pay a lot of taxes and that they do jobs no one else would do and so 
our economy prospers. In reality, the costs of immigration are far 
greater than the contributions in terms of either the labor or 
certainly the taxes that are paid. Another thing that I talked about 
was the damage to the environment. I mentioned a little bit in my 
discussion here tonight about the Vances, the amount of trash that 
despoils the land in this area, where people are coming through by the 
hundreds of thousands, in fact, over time millions of people crossing 
the border on foot, sometimes, of course, in an automobile simply 
driving off the road. We could see it time and time again where people 
drove off the road right into the middle of the desert, right off the 
desert floor. Those tracks will not go away for generations. Not in my 
lifetime, anyway.

                              {time}  2100

  We can see from the air where the footpaths go on and on and on, and 
they spread out like cobwebs over the land where people come walking 
across that land, thousands of feet, hundreds of thousands of feet, 
millions of feet, plodding the ground in areas that are quite pristine, 
and they destroy the environment. They affect the migration pattern of 
animals in the area, of endangered species. They deposit trash in huge 
amounts. They congest in these areas called pickup sites where people 
dispose of the trash they have been carrying to get ready to be picked 
up by the next form of transportation, usually a car or a truck, moving 
them into the interior of the United States, into a city in the United 
States away from the rural areas where they are congregated. But where 
they congregate in these pickup sites, the trash problem is enormous. I 
am going to talk about a little bit later and show something that we 
found in one of these trash sites, but there is that aspect, the 
environmental damage to the land.
  I talked last week about the culture, about the danger immigration, 
massive immigration, poses to the culture and especially because it is 
connected, massive immigration is connected unfortunately with 
something happening in the United States. The sort of cult of 
multiculturalism is the best way to describe what is going on here, 
where we teach our children that there is nothing unique about the 
United States or Western civilization and if there is anything unique, 
it is uniquely bad, that there are no aspects of Western civilization 
worth mimicking. We tell our children they should not say the Pledge of 
Allegiance in schools. We ban it. We attempt to erase any sort of 
semblance of patriotism, any commitment to the idea of America, and I 
talked about the implications of such a phenomenon, the very serious 
implications of this combination of massive immigration into the 
country, both legal and illegal, combined with the cult of 
multiculturalism.
  Tonight I want to talk about another aspect, and that aspect is the 
attack on citizenship that is represented by massive immigration into 
this country, especially illegal immigration into the country. It is an 
attack on the concept of citizenship. That is, I suppose, the best way 
for me to describe my concern.
  There have been several very good books written about this and a lot 
of articles. I will quote liberally from one book in particular by 
Georgie Anne Geyer. It is called ``Americans No More,'' and, Mr. 
Speaker, I certainly suggest it to anyone who wants an interesting read 
on this particular subject. We start out talking about the importance 
of citizenship. Does it matter? Does the idea of citizenship matter? Is 
it an important element of our society, of any society? Citizenship is 
more than just banding together for protection against enemies. 
Citizenship particularly as it has evolved throughout the Western 
world, as Georgie Anne said, is the unique and ennobling story of the 
post-feudal modern relationship of the individual human to the state, 
of the state to the individual, and of the human being to his fellow 
man. It is a dignified component of respect, responsibility, even 
friendship and love.
  Citizenship I think is important. We are seeing everywhere, however, 
that the whole concept of citizenship is being attacked, as I say. It 
is being eroded by a variety of actions, by a variety of different 
kinds of laws that are being adopted, by States and localities and 
certainly even by this body. It is being eroded by the aggressive 
actions of other nations.
  I want to talk about one specific aspect of this. There is today a 
card that is being used by several governments distributed to their 
nationals, to their citizens and their nationals, and it is the 
Matricular Consular. It is a card given out by foreign governments to 
their people. It is an identification card that is provided by a 
foreign government to their nationals. Interestingly, this is not a new 
phenomenon. It has been available for a long time, but only recently 
have governments realized that it can be used, this process, this idea 
of the Matricular Consular, can be used as a way of avoiding and 
getting around the roadblock that the Congress of the United States has 
presented in the form of an opposition to amnesty, to amnesty for all 
people living here who came in illegally, which is an assault on 
citizenship as far as I am concerned.
  The desire of many people, Mr. Speaker, the desire of many people 
even in this Congress, is to eventually eliminate anything that would 
distinguish a citizen of the country from someone who is not a citizen 
of the country. How do we do that? We do that by providing all of the 
benefits of citizenship to people who are simply here, to people who 
are residents, and pretty soon it simply becomes impossible to tell the 
difference. We just do not know, and that is the desired goal of many 
people, foreign governments, and the Government of Mexico is heavily 
involved in this process, certainly Members of the Congress of the 
United States. Even others I think in the administration want to push 
this concept that there is nothing that really should distinguish an 
American citizen from someone who is here ``illegally'' or someone who 
is here legally but not a

[[Page H3671]]

citizen. Eventually they want to reach a point where there is nothing 
that distinguishes any of those people from each other, and so one of 
the things that has happened is that they begin to push this Matricular 
Consular.

  Here is how it works. It is interesting. I have to give them credit. 
This was a smart move on the part of the Government of Mexico now being 
followed by four or five others, most recently Honduras. As I say, 
every government is allowed to do whatever they want, to provide their 
citizens with whatever kind of I.D., identification, that they want; 
but only recently have they found out that this can be used to advance 
the whole concept of amnesty or of the elimination of a distinguishment 
of citizenship. By giving the Matricular Consular, this I.D. card, to 
all of their nationals now living in the United States illegally, and 
frankly that is the only type of person that would actually need the 
Matricular Consular or this card from the Government of Mexico and four 
or five other South American/Central American countries. The only 
people in this country, I repeat, the only people in this country who 
need a form of identification provided by some other country is someone 
living here illegally because if they are here legally they have a 
document that the United States gave them, a visa, green card, or a 
passport given to one by the Nation that they came from. But they have 
something. They have an I.D. given to them, and that is a legitimate 
form of identification. They do not need the Matricular Consular, but 
they are now handing them out in the thousands. One can go to almost 
every Mexican consulate in America, the 40 some Mexican consulates in 
America, and one will usually see a line of people sometimes around the 
block. This is just recently happening because they are now handing out 
the cards to people who are here illegally; then the Mexican consulate 
goes out and lobbies States, cities, police departments, school 
districts, lobbies them to get them to accept the Matricular Consular 
for the provision of services as identification, and they have been 
quite successful. Scores of cities have done this. Many, maybe in the 
hundreds, police departments have agreed to accept the Matricular 
Consular as an identification. We have already, by the way, arrested 
people carrying multiple Matricular Consulars with their picture on it 
but with a whole bunch of different names, easily forged of course, but 
the desire is to establish a different immigration policy from the one 
that the United States Federal Government runs and to get a local 
government, a city or a State, to accept these cards. It is happening 
all over.
  In my own State of Colorado, four cities, Denver, Colorado Springs, 
Glendale, and Boulder all agreed to accept the Matricular Consular for 
the provision of services and for identification purposes. Police 
departments all said yes, sure, we will do it. Some of them, not 
knowing exactly what the implications of this were, looking at it in a 
very short-sighted way, saying we need something to identify these 
people, not realizing that once they use that, once they say that we 
have accepted this form of I.D. that is provided by a foreign 
government, they have immediately conferred status upon the person who 
has it, a status that that person does not deserve because that person 
is here illegally.
  Colorado, to its credit, was the first State in the Nation, I think 
just a couple of days ago, I think no longer ago than last week, passed 
legislation to stop this thing, to say no entity of the State of 
Colorado, no city, no department in the State of Colorado could accept 
the Matricular Consular, or what I think the legislation was that they 
could not accept any card that was not issued by the Federal Government 
or by the State for purposes of identification.
  I hope other States do this. I understand that there are at least two 
other States that are looking at this, and I certainly hope that that 
legislation will progress. I believe Iowa and Arizona are the other two 
States that are looking at this.
  Banks are using these cards to allow people to open up bank accounts. 
Remember, if one is here illegally they do not have a true Social 
Security number. I always wonder, when the bank allows someone to open 
up an account using these Matricular Consular cards for identification 
purposes, whether or not they are actually listing the Social Security 
numbers because of course they cannot because they are here illegally. 
So what happens to the interest on that account? How does that get 
identified come income tax time?
  This Matricular Consular is a tool that is being used, as I say, to 
acquire what they could not get through this Congress, and that is 
amnesty, and that is a an attack on citizenship. It is part of the 
movement to eliminate the whole concept of citizenship. Mexico and the 
Mexican government, as I say, has tasked these consular officials, and 
we have tons of documentation to show where Mexican consular officials 
have gone out to lobby.
  Let me ask the Members, Mr. Speaker, what do they think would happen 
if an American consular official would go to an official in the State 
of Chihuahua in Mexico and say, ``Look, we need your help in allowing 
people from the United States to come down here and violate the law?''

                              {time}  2115

  We would like you to help us out. Would you please accept an ID given 
by our government? Even though people are here illegally in Mexico, we 
would like you, nonetheless, to accept our ID for all the services that 
might be rendered to an illegal American citizen living in Mexico.''
  What do you think would happen? First of all, the Mexican Government 
would throw you out on your ear. The Governor of Chihuahua is, by the 
way, now visiting, as I understand it, the Governor of Colorado to get 
him to be a little more lenient with regard to the immigration issues.
  That is another interesting aspect of this. We see all this 
communication now between the Government of Mexico and State 
governments, this ongoing lobbying activity with States and localities, 
on immigration issues.
  Immigration is supposed to be uniquely a Federal responsibility; yet 
because of the fact that they cannot achieve their goals through this 
body, they are taking and doing the next best thing. And they admit 
this. They have stated on many occasions, Mexican officials have stated 
quite publicly that their desire is to obtain amnesty for, obtain all 
of the benefits of citizenship, for the people who are living here 
illegally. Even though they cannot do it through this body, they will 
do it through things like the advancement of the Matricula Consular 
being accepted all over the place.
  But as I say, what do you think would happen? First of all, the 
Mexican Government would demand an apology from the State Department 
for having an American consular official go down to Mexico, or any 
other country on the planet, and try to lobby them, lobby their local 
government leaders, to get them to help people violate the national 
law.
  That is exactly what is happening here. Yet we have said nothing to 
the Government of Mexico. We have filed no protest. I brought this up 
to the Secretary of State, Colin Powell, in a hearing on the Committee 
on International Relations on which I sit, and he said he was 
concerned. He was concerned. He did say that. That is as far as it has 
gone.
  I want the American people to know, Mr. Speaker, that apparently the 
policy of this government is to allow the law of the land to be eroded; 
and in order to erode the law of this land, they conspire, our own 
government conspires with foreign governments to help them lobby State 
and local communities to obtain what they cannot obtain through the 
Congress of the United States.
  The California Assembly last Monday approved legislation that would 
allow legal and illegal immigrants from Mexico to obtain city and 
county services by displaying the identification card issued by the 
Mexican consulate. Under the terms of the legislation, these cards 
would enable illegal aliens to do everything from acquiring a marriage 
or business license, borrowing books from the public library, securing 
senior citizen or student discounts or public transportation, and on 
and on and on and on.
  According to a recent news article, few of the 5 million undocumented 
Hispanic immigrants had bank accounts

[[Page H3672]]

because they lacked sufficient identification. In late 2001 that 
changed for Mexicans when banks began accepting an ID issued by Mexican 
consulates, the Matricula Consular. Almost 2 million Mexicans have 
already obtained the card, largely because it is a key into the banking 
system.
  Some immigrants arrive with $20,000 in cash, according to this 
article. Bank of America often sends staff out to ply those waiting for 
the Matricula Consular with brochures and coffee. The banks of the 
country are aiding and abetting people who are here violating the law 
in order to get them to be customers.
  Interestingly, however, is that banks in Mexico do not recognize the 
Matricula as legal identification. It is far too easy to forge, for one 
thing.
  The Dominican consulate is planning a move that it says they hope 
will ease some of the lives of some of the Dominican immigrants, 
because they are going to start issuing the card. They are going to 
start issuing Matricula Consular. With this ID, illegal immigrants 
would find it easier to open bank accounts, they say, and identify 
themselves to the police. There are tens of thousands of illegal 
Dominicans in New York City and Chicago alone, for example.
  The longer the government waits to develop a coherent policy on 
immigration, the longer we postpone efforts to improve border security, 
the more frequently we will see thinly disguised attempts at policy-
making like the Matricula Consular cards emerge.
  That is certainly what is going to happen, because we do have a 
tendency to try to ignore this issue. In a way, I can understand why 
there is a desire to ignore it, because they are accomplishing their 
goals by ignoring it. By not dealing with it here, by this body 
refusing to deal with it, then I assure you, the people who support the 
concept of amnesty and the people who oppose the concept of citizenship 
will achieve their goals.

  What else are we doing in this country to attack the whole concept of 
citizenship? Well, recently both the State legislatures in Virginia and 
Maryland passed legislation that would give in-state tuition to illegal 
immigrants; but they were met with vetoes, at least in Maryland. I do 
not know for sure about Virginia. Perhaps they have also vetoed the 
legislation.
  In fact, what happened in Virginia is this, that they passed a bill 
to stop anyone from providing illegal immigrants with in-state tuition, 
and that bill was vetoed, it is true. Unfortunately, I should say, it 
is true. The issue has come to the State of Colorado also.
  A few States, California, Texas, New York and Utah, have already 
granted in-state tuition to children of illegal immigrants, this in 
violation, by the way, of the 1996 Illegal Immigration Reform and 
Immigration Responsibility Act. It says specifically that States cannot 
offer in-state tuition to illegal residents, unless they also offer it 
to all legal residents, regardless of what State they come from.
  So, Mr. Speaker, a parent today paying out-of-state tuition prices 
for his or her daughter or son to go to school in California, Texas, 
New York or Utah, could, I believe, file a lawsuit on the basis of our 
1996 Immigration Reform Act if California, Texas, New York, and Utah do 
not extend that same privilege to everybody. I am an American citizen, 
a citizen of the State of Colorado, a legal resident; but I cannot send 
my child to those four States and get in-state tuition.
  Unless they approve it for everyone, then they should not approve it 
for anyone. That is the law of the land. That is the 1996 act that we 
passed. But these States are doing it. I would suggest, Mr. Speaker, 
that anyone out there who is in fact paying out-of-state tuition for 
their kids in these places should think about this very seriously and 
consider the possibility that they may have some legal action against 
these States to regain the tuition that they have spent.
  But this is another attack on the whole concept of citizenship. If in 
fact you can provide all of the services, all of the benefits, all of 
the things that the California legislation provides, cards that would 
enable illegal aliens to do everything, from acquiring marriage 
licenses, business licenses, borrowing books, securing senior citizen 
discounts, getting all kinds of social services, if you can do that, if 
you can send your child to school in any State in the Nation, or at 
least these four, and several others are proposing it, and get in-state 
tuition, if you can get driver's licenses, which are now being proposed 
for illegal immigrants, do you not see, there is little if anything 
left that distinguishes you from a person who is here legally.
  If you can obtain all that by coming into the country illegally, then 
why in the world would you go through the brain damage and the expense 
of doing it the right way? Why would you spend the money or the time or 
the energy? You can get everything else, because, after a while, 
citizenship will not matter. It will be of no consequence. And that is 
the desired goal of the people who support this kind of State 
legislation and who refuse to take it up in this body.
  Luckily, there are some Members of this body who have been steadfast 
in their opposition to this kind of malarky. They have been steadfast 
supporters of immigration reform. They were laboring in this vineyard 
before I ever came to this body. One of them has joined me here this 
evening, my friend, the gentleman from California (Mr. Rohrabacher). I 
yield to the gentleman.
  Mr. ROHRABACHER. Mr. Speaker, I would just like to take this 
opportunity to point out to my fellow colleagues and those who are 
listening in on C-SPAN, as well as those reading the Congressional 
Record, the tremendous courage it takes for the gentleman from Colorado 
(Mr. Tancredo) to be leading this effort.
  This is a thankless effort. The gentleman just suggested that when 
you add up these various different approaches of things that are going 
on that it is minimizing the importance of citizenship, and that 
perhaps this is being done by design.
  Well, it is clear there is a coalition of a very powerful people in 
this country who do not really believe in the type of United States of 
America and the laws of the population we grew up with, but instead 
have more of a ``global concept'' and are willing to basically 
experiment with the rights, if not discard the rights, of American 
citizens in order to create this new dream.
  These are powerful people. These are people who have attacked the 
gentleman from Colorado (Mr. Tancredo). They are people that have great 
deals of financial resources and political power.
  I personally am just rising tonight, when I saw the gentleman from 
Colorado (Mr. Tancredo) here again trying to be like Paul Revere and 
spreading the word and talking about the danger ahead of us, I wanted 
to come down here and let everyone know what a risk the gentleman is 
taking, that he is doing this at great personal expense.
  The gentleman could be a ``go-along, get-along'' guy. Those of us who 
try to make waves here, I try to be very amicable and I know the 
gentleman from Colorado does as well. He has a wonderful laugh and 
smile. We try to be fun-loving, good people, with good hearts and of 
good will; but at the same time, we are having to tackle issues that 
mean life and death to the people of the United States. It means 
whether our people are going to have their children go to school or 
not, whether the standard of living of our people is going to decline.
  Why do we have a situation where dramatically during the 1990s, there 
was such a huge increase in the GNP in our country, and, yes, the top 
20 percent of our country did benefit, but the working people of this 
country, by and large, were kept behind? If you really trace it back, 
and the gentleman from Colorado (Mr. Tancredo) has done this many times 
before, we have looked at the charts, illegal immigration, this 
overwhelming flood of illegal immigration in the 1990s dragged down the 
standard of living, dragged down any pressure for an increase in wages 
for the working people.
  I know that I do not come from a wealthy family, and I am sure the 
gentleman from Colorado does not either. We identify with working 
people.
  There is no doubt that in the Federal Government there are many 
people who come from the elite of our society. But our job is to watch 
out for the working people and the regular human beings who go off to 
fight the wars, and

[[Page H3673]]

go to work every day, and our good citizens by way of every race, of 
every ethnic group, of every religion. America, what we are so proud 
of, it is the fact we are a combination of the whole world; but we are 
working together, and because we have this love of liberty and justice 
and these ideals that keep us together.
  That is why it is so ever-important to recognize that we are a unit, 
that Americans are a family; and if we have policies that are bringing 
in strangers, even though they may be very good strangers and very 
positive people, from the outside, but it is happening in such a 
magnitude as to prevent our people from sharing in this great 
prosperity that we had in the 1990s, keeping wages down, that it is 
wrong. It is a wrong thing.
  Ordinary people are having their standard of living brought down by 
helping strangers. Our first and foremost job is to watch out for 
America and Americans and do what is right. Sometimes it takes a very 
courageous person to do that, and the gentleman from Colorado (Mr. 
Tancredo) has demonstrated that time and again.
  For those of you who do not know, the gentleman has made every hit 
list of every radical group, and other political groups, unfortunately. 
People that should know better have targeted the gentleman.
  I am very proud of him tonight, and I hope all of you who are looking 
at the Congressional Record and are seeing this on C-SPAN and the rest 
of the colleagues here will give Mr. Tancredo his due.
  I have my own Special Order later on tonight after the gentleman is 
done, but I thought I would make sure everyone understands what a great 
job the gentleman is doing for our country and for each of them.
  Mr. TANCREDO. Mr. Speaker, I am flattered, and I am humbled by my 
colleague's kind words. I sincerely appreciate it. I have said this 
over and over again, because I know the gentleman feels this way, I 
know there are many other Members of the Congress who feel this way, 
and that is that massive immigration, combined with this sort of 
radical multiculturalism that permeates our society, this is so 
dangerous. It will not only determine what kind of a Nation we are in 
the future, that is to say divided, Balkanized, or united, it will 
determine whether we will be a Nation at all.
  Those are the stakes that I think are on the table. Therefore, I feel 
compelled to come here night after night, to stand up in any venue I am 
allowed to, and talk about this issue. I cannot think of anything that 
has more of a potential detrimental impact on the Nation than this 
massive uncontrolled immigration, combined, as I say, with this cult of 
multiculturalism.

                              {time}  2130

  Because it does conspire to make, for instance, a severe and very, 
very dangerous attack on citizenship itself, on the Nation itself. We 
talked about the various things that people are allowed to do now and 
that governments, State and local governments, are allowing to do who 
are living here illegally who are breaking our laws. And I mentioned 
that if you can come to the United States illegally, get your children 
educated for free, which you certainly can, K through 12, if you can 
now get your children educated at the state institution of higher 
education for in-state tuition, if you can obtain all the social 
services, all of benefits, if you can go to the hospital, get treatment 
for your ailments, get treatment for your children, get health care 
paid for, if you can use public housing get subsidized housing, if you 
can get all of those benefits, then there are very few things left that 
distinguish you as the citizen. One of those things is the ability and 
the right to vote. But guess what, this right to vote, this right to 
vote which we for a couple of centuries anyway held so dear, this right 
to vote is also being now threatened. And it is added, I should say, 
that right to vote is being added to the list of things that people can 
obtain here in the United States even if they are not citizens.
  In 1991, Tacoma Park, Maryland, not far from here, voted to give non-
U.S. citizens the right to vote in city elections. Several others by 
the way, several other cities around here have followed suit. Every 
time I say this people say no, that is impossible. That is not true. 
No, it is quite true. There are cities throughout the country, 
especially on the East Coast here, not too surprisingly I guess, that 
say if you are a resident of the city, simply a resident of the city, 
show us your utility bill, show us your driver's license, you can vote. 
Your citizenship will not be a question.
  Now, there was a former state delegate in Maryland by the name of 
Thomas Mooney. He wrote an article in the Prince George's Journal. He 
was on the opposite side of this vote. He said, ``Never have I heard of 
anything so ridiculous, so devoid of merit and so blatantly anti-
American as the recent proposal to allow illegal aliens the opportunity 
to vote in city elections. If I went to Mexico or El Salvador I would 
not expect to be involved in their electoral process. I am an American 
citizen. My allegiance is to the United States. Voting is much more 
than supporting one candidate over another. It is a positive 
affirmation of our system of government. It is an act of involvement, a 
rite of passage for defining American citizenship. It is a vital piece 
of our common culture. It is under intense, strident attack by the Hate 
America First crowd. By allowing aliens to vote we demean that act 
which legitimizes our government and is one of the essential unifiers 
of our society.''
  Absolutely true. Now, Tacoma Park, as I say, was not the only one, 
has not been the only one who has ever done this. Even in the late 
1960s a radical move occurred in New York City where the 
decentralization of the New York City schools, all parents, legal or 
illegal residents, were given the right to vote in 32 community school 
board elections. In New York City citizens were voting not only in 
elections for school boards, but, interestingly, on policy boards that 
were in charge of distributing anti-poverty funds to community groups.
  In Chicago not too long ago a television station there, WLS-TV, did a 
comprehensive investigation of illegal aliens and the vote. It was a 5-
part series in the early 1980s. They found that illegal voting was 
rampant. People were questioned on air and asked about it and they all 
said, yeah, sure, I vote. Robert Baskin states, ``Carlos is a citizen 
of Mexico, but he had no trouble registering to vote in Chicago.''
  In California there have been bills up before the state legislature 
to allow anyone to vote. Time and again we have seen where people have 
actually set up stalls and set up tables in parking areas in California 
especially that are frequented by people who are here illegally, day 
centers where people come to get jobs and things of that sort. They set 
up these tables to register illegal aliens in parking lots and then 
tell them how to vote. They complete absentee ballots by hundreds and 
thousands and give them to illegal aliens to sign them and send them 
in. They transport van loads of illegal aliens to multiple voting 
locations in various names. This has gone on for quite some time.
  Again, when you add it to all of the factors, when you add it to all 
of the things that I have said people can obtain by simply being here 
and not necessarily being a citizen, you can see why there is concern, 
why there is great concern for what is happening to the United States 
of America.
  Theodore Roosevelt said in his speech on true Americanism in 1894, 
``We have no room for any people who do not act and vote simply as 
Americans and as nothing else. We demand that all citizens shall have 
fair treatment in every way. They all alike shall have the rights 
guaranteed them. The mighty tide of immigration to our shores has 
brought in its train much of good and much of evil. And whether the 
good or evil shall predominate depends mainly on whether these 
newcomers do or do not throw themselves heartily into our national 
life, cease to be aliens and become Americans like the rest of us. But 
where immigrants or sons of immigrants do not heartily and in good 
faith throw in their lot with us, but cling to the speech, the customs, 
the ways of life, and the habits of thought of the nation which they 
have left, they hereby harm both themselves and us. If they remain 
alien elements, unassimilated, and with national interests separate 
from ours, they are mere obstructions to the current of our national 
life and get no good from it themselves, and they are who really suffer 
the most.''

[[Page H3674]]

  ``It is an immense benefit to the immigrant to change him into an 
American citizen. To bear the name of American is to bear the most 
honorable title. From his own standpoint it is beyond question that the 
wise thing for the immigrant is to become thoroughly Americanized. 
Moreover, from our standpoint we have the right to demand it. We freely 
extend the hand of welcome and of good fellowship to every man no 
matter what his creed or birthplace who comes here honestly, intent on 
becoming a good United States citizen like the rest of us. But we have 
the right and it is our duty to demand that he indeed shall become so. 
Above all, the immigrant must learn to talk and think and be the United 
States.''
  Not too long ago I had an opportunity to have a breakfast meeting 
with a Bishop Gomez, Bishop of the Catholic Church in the Denver 
archdiocese. And he did not agree with my concerns about immigration 
and about what is happening in the country with the lack of interest in 
citizenship and the attack on citizenship. And he said to me, 
Congressman, I do not know why you are so concerned about this, he 
said. He said, Most of the people coming here from Mexico today do not 
want to be Americans. And I said, Well, of course, Bishop, that is 
exactly the problem, is that they do not want to be and, by and large, 
they are not coming to be, we are witnessing, by the way, something 
else. Even people who are here legally are choosing not to become 
citizens at a far higher rate than ever before. Two-thirds of the 
people living here legally but who are not citizens of the United 
States have chosen not to pursue the citizenship route. That is another 
new phenomenon. And, again, I guess I could say, why should they? What 
is the benefit of citizenship? Why should anybody go through it? 
Everything obtainable under citizenship can be obtained if you simply 
walk across these borders. It is a dangerous thing.
  There is a celebration for the Hispanic community in the United 
States referred to as Cinco de Mayo. It was over the weekend. It is an 
enjoyable celebration many people attend and certainly a large number 
of Hispanics in Colorado attend and enjoy it. I was listening to a 
radio talk show and they were talking to several of the vendors on the 
street. I thought it was interesting the vendor who was doing the 
biggest interest at Cinco de Mayo in Denver, according to this radio 
program on National Public Radio so it certainly had to be accurate, 
right, but the stall that was doing the most business was the stall 
selling Mexican flags. And later on that evening I saw a short clip on 
television show Cinco de Mayo and they were, of course, waving 
thousands and thousands of flags. All Mexican flags. I did not see a 
single American flag there.
  Now, there is every reason to be prideful in the country that you are 
from. I certainly am proud of my Italian heritage. I do not wave the 
Italian flag on any particular holiday of Italy, and I certainly never 
would have thought of doing so. And if I did ever put out an Italian 
flag for some reason, I think I would put out an American flag next to 
it or above it to show my commitment and loyalty is to the United 
States. It is just a little thing. It is not a huge thing. You cannot 
draw a lot of conclusions from it. I thought it was an interesting 
thing that that was the one stall doing the most business and it was 
the prominently displayed flag during this celebration.

  Why should anyone care? We encourage them not to in many ways, not to 
care about being an American, not to care about the fact that 
citizenship is a privilege, conferred upon people who have strived to 
come to the United States, overcome tremendous obstacles, devoted their 
lives in many cases to attaining that wonderful goal, being so excited 
when they were able to do so, when they were able to raise their hands 
and take that oath of allegiance to the United States of America.
  Interestingly enough, now that oath, even the citizenship ceremony, 
the INS is letting individual groups, some religious groups, actually 
determining who will pass the test. They put out little brochures 
talking about how easy it is to pass the test, so that you do not have 
to worry anymore. They are not going to ask you any really tough 
questions. We will give you the tests in your own language. Doing 
everything possible to simply eliminate anything that is sort of a 
hardship to becoming an American citizen.
  Well, I think anything that is given away is not valued. And I think 
that we should begin to be concerned about where we are going as a 
Nation, and how massive immigration combined with this multiculturist 
phenomenon in the United States has the tendency to tear us apart and 
to do great damage to this country.
  My friend, the gentleman from California (Mr. Rohrabacher), when he 
stood up he talked about courage and that sort of thing to say these 
things, but really it is imperative that all of us address these 
issues.
  I came across this, and I will just end with this. This is a speech 
given by Enoch Powell in England, 1968, on the issue of immigration. He 
said,


       ]The supreme function of statesmanship is to provide 
     against preventable evils. In seeking to do so it encounters 
     obstacles which are deeply rooted in human nature. One is 
     that by the very order of things such evils are not 
     demonstrable until they have occurred. At each stage in their 
     outset there is room for doubt, for dispute, whether they be 
     real or imaginary. By the same token they attract little 
     attention in comparison with current troubles which are both 
     indisputable and pressing. Once the besetting temptation of 
     all politics is to concern itself with the immediate present 
     at the expense of the future. Above all, people are disposed 
     to mistake predicting troubles for causing trouble, and even 
     for desiring trouble. ``If only,'' they love to think, ``if 
     only people wouldn't talk about it, it probably wouldn't 
     happen.'' Perhaps this habit goes back to the primitive 
     belief that the word and the thing, the name and the object 
     are identical. At all events, the discussion of future grave, 
     with effort now avoidable, evils is probably the most 
     unpopular and at the same time the most necessary occupation 
     for the politician. Those who knowingly shirk it, deserve, 
     and not infrequently receive, the curses of those who come 
     after.

  I choose to avoid that particular environment. I do not want to have 
to look back and think, I wonder how this all happened? I wonder what 
happened to the Nation that I knew? And I do not want to have to try to 
explain to my children and to my grandchildren that it happened on my 
watch and that I did nothing, I did absolutely nothing to prevent it.

                              {time}  2145

  I want to convince them that I tried my best and so I will come back 
to this well of the House and as long as I am able, on as many 
occasions as I possibly can, to discuss this topic and to try and get 
our colleagues and the American people, to get our colleagues to 
reflect the attitudes and the opinions of the American people, 70 
percent of whom agree with everything we are saying here tonight who 
are asking our own government for help, like this family that I brought 
to my colleagues' attention earlier and like the millions of others who 
are seeking to deal with the massive immigration and the negative 
effects it has had on their lives.
  The people of this country know there is something wrong. I do not 
think there is a bigger divide between what the people of this country 
want and what the government is willing to give them than it is on this 
immigration issue.
  So we will do everything we can; and as I say, I certainly appreciate 
the efforts of those who have labored in this particular environment 
long before I came here, like my friend, the gentleman from California 
(Mr. Rohrabacher), the gentleman from California (Mr. Gallegly), and 
others who I know have been sounding this alarm for a long time. I join 
them in that chorus, and I ask for my colleagues' support.

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