Congressional Record, Volume 151 Issue 46 (Monday, April 18, 2005)

[Congressional Record Volume 151, Number 46 (Monday, April 18, 2005)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3775-S3812]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

EMERGENCY SUPPLEMENTAL APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 2005

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the hour of 2 p.m.
having arrived, the Senate will resume consideration of H.R. 1268,
which the clerk will report.
The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

A bill (H.R. 1268) making emergency supplemental
appropriations for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2005,
to establish and rapidly implement regulations for State
driver's license and identification document security
standards, to prevent terrorists from abusing the asylum laws
of the United States, to unify terrorism-related grounds for
inadmissibility and removal, to ensure expeditious
construction of the San Diego border fence, and for other
purposes.

Pending:

Mikulski amendment No. 387, to revise certain requirements
for H-2B employers and require submission of information
regarding H-2B nonimmigrants.
Feinstein amendment No. 395, to express the sense of the
Senate that the text of the REAL ID Act of 2005 should not be
included in the conference report.
Bayh amendment No. 406, to protect the financial condition
of members of the reserve components of the Armed Forces who
are ordered to long-term active duty in support of a
contingency operation.
Durbin amendment No. 427, to require reports on Iraqi
security services.
Salazar amendment No. 351, to express the sense of the
Senate that the earned income tax credit provides critical
support to many military and civilian families.
Dorgan/Durbin amendment No. 399, to prohibit the
continuation of the independent counsel investigation of
Henry Cisneros past June 1, 2005 and request an accounting of
costs from GAO.
Reid amendment No. 445, to achieve an acceleration and
expansion of efforts to reconstruct and rehabilitate Iraq and
to reduce the future risks to United States Armed Forces
personnel and future costs to United States taxpayers, by
ensuring that the people of Iraq and other nations do their
fair share to secure and rebuild Iraq.
Frist (for Chambliss/Kyl) amendment No. 432, to simplify
the process for admitting temporary alien agricultural
workers under section 101(a)(15)(H)(ii)(a) of the Immigration
and Nationality Act, to increase access to such workers.
Frist (for Craig/Kennedy) modified amendment No. 375, to
provide for the adjustment of status of certain foreign
agricultural workers, to amend the Immigration and
Nationality Act to reform the H-2A worker program under that
Act, to provide a stable, legal agricultural workforce, to
extend basic legal protections and better working conditions
to more workers.
DeWine amendment No. 340, to increase the period of
continued TRICARE coverage of children of members of the
uniformed services who die while serving on active duty for a
period of more than 30 days.
DeWine amendment No. 342, to appropriate $10,000,000 to
provide assistance to Haiti using Child Survival and Health
Programs funds, $21,000,000 to provide assistance to Haiti
using Economic Support Fund funds, and $10,000,000 to provide
assistance to Haiti using International Narcotics Control and
Law Enforcement funds, to be designated as an emergency
requirement.
Schumer amendment No. 451, to lower the burden of gasoline
prices on the economy of the United States and circumvent the
efforts of OPEC to reap windfall oil profits.
Reid (for Reed/Chafee) amendment No. 452, to provide for
the adjustment of status of certain nationals of Liberia to
that of lawful permanent residence.

Amendment No. 418

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Georgia.
Mr. CHAMBLISS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the
pending amendment be set aside be in order that I may offer an
amendment.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. CHAMBLISS. I call up amendment No. 418.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

The Senator from Georgia [Mr. Chambliss], for himself, Mr.
Isakson, Mr. Pryor, Mr. Inhofe, Mr. Lugar, Mrs. Dole, Mrs.
Lincoln, Mr. Bayh, Mr. Reed, Mr. Chafee, and Mr. Byrd,
proposes an amendment numbered 418.

Mr. CHAMBLISS. I ask unanimous consent that reading of the amendment
be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The amendment is as follows:

(Purpose: To prohibit the termination of the existing joint-service
multiyear procurement contract for C/KC-130J aircraft)

On page 169, between lines 8 and 9, insert the following:

PROHIBITION ON TERMINATION OF EXISTING JOINT-SERVICE
MULTIYEAR PROCUREMENT CONTRACT FOR C/KC-130J
AIRCRAFT

Sec. 1122. No funds appropriated or otherwise made
available by this Act, or any other Act, may be obligated or
expended to terminate the joint service multiyear procurement
contract for C/KC-130J aircraft that is in effect on the date
of the enactment of this Act.

Amendment No. 418, As Modified

Mr. CHAMBLISS. Mr. President, I send a modification to the desk and I
ask unanimous consent that Senator Allen be added as a cosponsor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The amendment is so modified.
The amendment, as modified, is as follows:
On page 169, between lines 8 and 9, insert the following:

PROHIBITION ON TERMINATION OF EXISTING JOINT-SERVICE MULTIYEAR
PROCUREMENT CONTRACT FOR C/KC-130J AIRCRAFT

Sec. 1122. During fiscal year 2005, no funds may be
obligated or expended to terminate the joint service
multiyear procurement contract for C/KC-130J aircraft that is
in effect on the date of the enactment of this Act.

Mr. CHAMBLISS. Mr. President, this amendment will prohibit any fiscal
year 2005 funds from being used to terminate the C-130J multi-year
procurement contract.
In hearings before this body over the past several weeks Department
of Defense personnel have admitted that when they made the decision to
terminate this contract in December of last year that they did not have
all the information needed to make that decision. Since PBD 753 was
drafted in December 2004, we have learned that the cost to terminate
this contract is approximately $1.6 billion.
Also over the past several months we have seen the C-130J, KC-130J,
as well as C-130s operated by our coalition partners in Iraq perform
superbly throughout USCENTCOM. To date, C-130Js in Iraq have flown over
400 missions, with a mission capable rate of 93 percent and have
performed all assigned missions successfully. KC-130Js have flown 789
hours in Iraq with mission capable rates in excess of 95 percent.
Nevertheless, the Department of Defense has not yet submitted the
amended budget request for this program that they discussed during
hearings. That is why this amendment is necessary.
I am introducing this amendment to make sure that this program, which
is performing extremely well and which meets validated Air Force and
Marine Corps requirements, is not prematurely cancelled and that the
Department of Defense follows through with their commitment to complete
the multi-year procurement contract.
There are some issues with the current contract being a commercial
contract versus a traditional military contract. My colleague, Senator
McCain, and I agree that a traditional contract is more appropriate in
this case and applaud the Air Force's decision to begin

[[Page S3776]]

transitioning the program in that direction. However, I think we can
all agree, that regardless of how these planes are procured, that the
United States military needs them and they are demonstrating their
value to the warfighter, and to the taxpayer today.
Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for
the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I think we are now ready to begin a
conversation. There are several colleagues here, including the Senators
from Georgia, Alabama, and Idaho, we would like to discuss this issue
we are going to be voting on tomorrow. Our colleagues need to have a
clear picture of what we will be voting on.
There are two basic versions of legislation to try to make it easier
for agricultural employers to hire people who are temporary workers or
who have been in the United States illegally and can be employed under
the bills proposed here. There are two different approaches. One is the
approach of the Senator from Idaho--I will defer to him in a moment to
have him discuss his approach--and the other approach Senator Chambliss
and I have offered. There are a couple of key differences. They both
approach the problem from the standpoint of broadening the way in which
legal immigrants can come to the country and be employed legally in
agriculture and taking illegal immigrants who are currently not working
within the legal regime, using counterfeit or fraudulent documents--
and, everybody knows, being employed illegally--and enabling them to
work for a temporary period of time legally in this country.
The primary difference between the approaches is over the question of
amnesty. Regarding that, I think everybody would have to admit--and
different people have different definitions of what amnesty is--
everybody would have to agree, if there is a difference in how you can
become a legal, permanent resident in this country or a citizen, you
would have to agree, if someone is granted an advantage over an
applicant for legal permanent residency or citizenship status in
another country, if they are given an advantage because they came here
illegally and counterfeited documents to get employment and worked here
illegally, to give them an advantage over people who are seeking to
come here legally is giving them an advantage that would amount to
amnesty. You should not be able to use, in other words, your illegal
status to bootstrap yourself into a position of legal, permanent
residency or citizenship.
I pointed out before, under the bill of the Senators from
Massachusetts and Idaho, there would be an ability for people not in
the United States but who would like to come here to claim they worked
in the country illegally, and that would give them an ability to come
here and apply for this same status. So, ironically, we would be
turning on a neon sign that says come here with documents--they could
be fraudulent and you could have defrauded us before--and claim that
you worked in the country illegally, and we will let you come back in
again.
I don't know how you give people an advantage on the basis they
violated our law. You would think you would want to give people an
advantage who have played by the rules. That is the second way in which
this bill grants amnesty and is not the right approach. As my colleague
from Georgia talked about, we would be changing, for the first time, a
law to allow the Legal Services Corporation to represent these illegal
immigrants, which is something we have not been willing to do in the
past. We have to be careful because the reason illegal immigrants are
working here is the current H2-A law is so cumbersome to use, it is so
subject to abuse and costs money and takes time and you can be sued,
and so on, that employers don't like to use it. It is just not worth it
to them. If we are going to have a bill that is no easier to use, there
is not going to be any advantage over the current law and, as a result,
it is going to be difficult for farmers to utilize this new provision
if they have to look over their shoulder and wonder if the Legal
Services Corporation is going to file a lawsuit.
Mr. CHAMBLISS. Will the Senator yield?
Mr. KYL. Yes.
Mr. CHAMBLISS. Mr. President, I ask the Senator, doesn't the AgJOBS
bill, as well as the Chambliss-Kyl amendment, recognize there is a need
in this country for agricultural workers to do the job that is not
being done by American workers today, and we are not displacing
American workers?
Mr. KYL. Mr. President, that is a very good question. I think all of
us would agree that we cannot be displacing American workers. We are
currently not doing that today. There is a need for these employees,
and it is really a question of which approach is the better one, to
ensure we can match a willing worker with a willing employer without
granting amnesty.
Mr. CHAMBLISS. Would the Senator from Arizona yield for another
question?
Mr. KYL. Yes.
Mr. CHAMBLISS. Does the Chambliss-Kyl amendment not take the current
H2-A program, which is very cumbersome and requires a lot of paperwork
and requires the adverse effect wage rate to be paid, and streamline
that program to where it is more easily usable by farmers who now
simply don't use it because it is cumbersome? Does it alleviate some of
the problems?

Mr. KYL. Yes. We change the wage rate to the prevailing wage. We make
it easier for the farmer to demonstrate that there are not American
workers available to do the jobs. We make it easier, cheaper, faster,
but with protections for the employees.
I think all of that is why the American Farm Bureau Federation has
endorsed our legislation as the best way for them to satisfy these
employment needs.
Mr. President, I will close and allow my colleagues the opportunity
to speak. Senator Craig wants to disagree with us, and I want to give
him that opportunity. Let me allow him to describe his bill, and we can
have a debate back and forth as to which bill better satisfies our
employment needs or requirements but doing so in a way that we can
actually get a bill passed and sent to the President; i.e., a bill that
doesn't include amnesty.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Idaho is recognized.
Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I appreciate the Senator from Arizona
finally coming to the floor with a piece of legislation. For the last
several years, I have challenged the Senate to deal with what I
believe, and I think most colleagues believe, is a very urgent problem.
Our borders, as much money as we have poured into them and as many new
border patrolmen as we have put along them--primarily our southern
border today--are still being overrun substantially by illegal people
crossing.
While we have been trying, since 9/11, to understand and reform our
immigration laws, there has been a great deal of talk, but very little
done--some 1,300 days now of high-flying political talk about the
dramatic problem that we awakened to post-9/11, and that was that there
were between 8 million to 12 million undocumented illegal people in our
country--most of them here and working hard to help themselves and
their families. But it was obvious there were a few here with the
evilest intent in mind: to destroy our country and to destroy us, too.
While I accept the argument, as most do, that comprehensive
immigration reform is critical, right now we have a critical situation
in front of us as it relates to agriculture. Starting about 5 years
ago, and before 9/11, American agriculture was attempting to get the
Congress to look at their plight. The plight was obvious and simple--
and criticize it if you will--but the reality was that 50 to 70 percent
of their workforce was undocumented, and the law we had given them, as
the Senator from Arizona has so clearly spoken to, was so cumbersome,
costly, and so untimely--and the key to timeliness is when the crop is
in the field and ripe, it has to come out or it rots--that American
agriculture could not depend on it. The workforce who was seeking the
work in American agriculture began to recognize it. If you will, the
black market or the illegal processes began.

[[Page S3777]]

It should not be a surprise to any of us that when government stands
in the way of commerce, stands in the way of an economy, usually people
find a way around it. Tragically enough, it happened. But, by
definition, it was an illegal way.
Last year, in our country, there were 2 months in which we were a net
importer of food. This year, it is guesstimated it could be in as many
as 6 months that we will be a net importer of food, and that will be
the first time, in the history of American agriculture, that becomes
the situation. So why we are here on the floor today debating a piece
of a much broader overall immigration problem is because it is urgent,
it is important we deal with it, and we deal with it now as
thoughtfully and as thoroughly as we can. That is why I insisted that
the Senate come to this issue.
I am glad my colleagues have come up with an alternative. I think the
provisions in it are quickly thought up. They were criticizing my bill
earlier because I offered a temporary visa. They offer a visa. They
offered it for 3 years--3 years--as many as 9 years. What I am glad to
hear said, for those who argue what we were doing was an amnesty issue,
is that it is no longer viewed as that, that we recognize there is a
legitimate need for an American agricultural workforce, and it is
critically necessary we make it a legal workforce for the sake of our
country, for the sake of our borders, and for the sake of American
agriculture.
That is what this debate will be all about in the next several hours
and tomorrow morning before we vote on this issue. Both sides have
accepted a rather unusual procedure, Mr. President--a supermajority
procedure. Why? Well, we are germane to this supplemental bill because
of what the House did earlier with a Sensenbrenner amendment dealing
with what is known as REAL ID. It dealt with immigration and, as a
result of dealing with immigration in the House, we were legitimized to
do so, in a germane way, in the Senate. We will do that.
At the same time, we all understand that in legislative procedures,
on cloture 60 votes are required. We have agreed to do so. Tomorrow, we
will vote--first on the Chambliss-Kyl amendment and then on the Craig
amendment. It will require 60 votes to proceed. Whether we succeed or
fail--and I think I can succeed--what is most important is that the
American people are beginning to hear just a little bit about what they
have deserved to hear for the last 1,300 days, since
9/11 awakened us all to the dysfunctional character and the lack of
enforcement of immigration law that has been going on for well over two
decades. It was so typical of a Congress that wanted to talk a lot
about it but do very little about it.
The Senator from Arizona and I and the Senator from Georgia, without
question, agree on the critical nature of American agriculture today.
What we also agree on--symbolic by their presence on the floor today,
debating the issue and offering an alternative--is that we cannot build
the wall high enough along our southern border, we cannot dig its
foundation deep enough to close that border off, that it requires good,
clear, simple, understandable, functioning law, not unlike the old
Bracero Program of the 1950s when we had a guest worker program, when
we identified the worker with the work, and they came, they worked, and
they went home.
Up until that time, illegal immigration was astronomically high. It
dropped precipitously during that period of time when we were
identifying and being able to work about 500,000 workers who were
foreign national in American agriculture. It was a law that worked.
Then somehow, in the sixties, Congress got it all wrong again. Why?
Because they thought they were protecting an American workforce. But
what the AFL-CIO found out and why they support my legislation is that
there are unique types of employment in this country with which the
American workforce will not identify.
I am pleased to hear that the Chambliss-Kyl bill, along with mine,
provides a first-hire American approach. We create a labor pool. The
employer must first go there, but if that workforce is not available,
they do not have to languish there because, in essence, they have a
crop to harvest, and the crop is time sensitive. We understand all of
that.
I will get to the detail of my bill over the course of the afternoon
and tomorrow. This is a bill that for 5 years has been worked out
between now over 509 organizations. It is interesting that the Farm
Bureau supports the Kyl-Chambliss approach, but they do not oppose my
approach. And last year they supported my approach. In other words,
they are as frustrated as all of us are about this very real problem of
immigration. First they are here and then they are there. What is most
important is that we are here on the floor of the Senate this afternoon
talking about an issue on which this Senate has been absent way too
long.
What the Senator from Arizona, the Senator from Georgia, and I and
others who will be on the floor--I see my prime cosponsor Senator
Kennedy is on the floor--believe is that this is an issue whose time is
coming, and we believe for agriculture it is now because it is critical
and it is necessary. We are learning at this moment that as much money
as we throw at the border, as many Border Patrol men as we hire, if the
law on the other side does not back them up, if the law on the other
side does not create a reasonable pathway forward for a workforce to be
legal and a workforce that is necessary in this country, then you
cannot put them along the border unless they are arm length to arm
length from the Gulf of Mexico to San Diego. And even then, those folks
have to sleep.
The reality is, we have to get the law right, and the law has been
wrong for a great long while. In the absence of a functioning,
reasonable law, we have set up for our country a human disaster. Not
only do we have an uncontrolled illegal population in our country, but
because they have no rights, because of the way they are treated, it is
not unusual in the course of a given year to see 200 or 300 lose their
lives along the southern border of our country, to see our emergency
rooms in Texas, Arizona, New Mexico, and California flooded, to see the
very culture and the very character and foundation of our country at
risk because we do not control process, we do not control immigration,
and we do not do so in an upright, legal, and responsible way.
We are here. We are going to debate this for a time, and there will
be much more debate tomorrow. We will have some key votes to see
whether we proceed to deal with the bill that I call AgJOBS and that
509 organizations across the country that have worked with us for the
last 5 to 6 years call AgJOBS. It is a major reform in the H-2A law. It
is a simplification. It is a clearer understanding. It is a reasonable
process: The blue card, if you will, or the green card that is
acceptable, normal, and understandable and provided in a temporary and
earned way, as my bill does, is simply a point in transition, and it
ought to be viewed as that.
You will hear the rhetoric that it will allow millions of people to
become legal. The Bureau of Labor Statistics, the Department of Labor,
does not agree with that at all. The Department of Labor says there are
about 500,000 who they think will responsibly and legitimately come
forward, and of that, there may be dependence of around 200,000 that
are already in this country because that workforce has been here 5 or 6
years or more, for that matter. So those numbers are reasonable and
realistic, and that is a moment in time, a transition as we create a
law and allow American agriculture to work their way into a functioning
realistic H-2A program that is timely, that is sensitive, that
meets their workforce needs, and recognizes the value and the
production of American agriculture.

If we do not correct this law and correct it now, Americans have a
choice because we already decided years ago, based on the character of
the work, that most Americans would not do it. They had better jobs and
alternative jobs. So American agriculture began to rely on a foreign
workforce.
I say this most directly, and I mean it most sincerely. Either
foreign workers will harvest America's agricultural produce for
America's consumers or foreign workers will harvest agriculture in
another country to be shipped to American consumers. Ask an American
today what they want. They want a safe food supply. They

[[Page S3778]]

want an abundant food supply. They hope it would be reasonably priced.
But most assuredly, they want to know that it is safe and it is
reliable. The only way to guarantee that is that it be harvested in
this country, as it has been from the beginning history of our great
country. It was not for 2 months last year and possibly not for 6
months this year.
We have a choice to make. We either create a legal workforce, a
workforce that is identifiable, or we keep stumbling down this road
that no American wants us to go down, and that is to not control our
borders, to not identify the foreign nationals within our borders, and
to not have a reasonable, legal, and timely process. That is what the
debate is all about.
I am pleased to see the other side, having been in opposition for so
long, finally say, Whoa, I think maybe we ought to try to get this
right. We disagree on process, we disagree on their approach, but there
is similarity in many instances on reform of the H-2A program. We will
work over the course of this afternoon, evening, and tomorrow to break
all those differences out so all of our Senators can see these
differences and sense the importance of what we debate.
There are many others who have come to the floor to discuss this
legislation this afternoon. I yield the floor so the debate can
proceed.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oregon.
Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, I rise in strong support of the proposal
offered by Senators Craig and Kennedy. I see Senator Kennedy on the
floor and Senator Craig on the floor. Their work is a testament to
their persistence and the staying power of a handful of agricultural
workers and employers who have been willing to set aside ideology and
partisanship to hammer out a major overhaul of our law in this area.
Mr. KYL. Mr. President, will the Senator from Oregon yield for a
procedural question?
Mr. WYDEN. Yes.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Arizona.
Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I ask the Senator from Oregon, we have the
Senator from Massachusetts here, and the Senator from Alabama has been
here, as has the Senator from Georgia been on the floor when there was
no one else present. I wonder if we can get some general agreement of
going back and forth between proponents or opponents or proponents of
the two separate bills so the Chair has some idea of order and the
debate participants do as well.
I offer this as a suggestion. I have not proposed a unanimous consent
request, but perhaps some of the staff can work this out while the
Senator from Oregon is speaking.
Mr. CRAIG. Will the Senator yield?
Mr. KYL. Yes.
Mr. CRAIG. Because our debate time, as I understand it, is actually
tomorrow, and I think we will go off and on this issue today, and
because the chairman of the Appropriations Committee is on the floor
managing the supplemental and may have other amendments he wants to
deal with, I would hope we can rely on the Chair for moving us back and
forth in a balanced way from side to side before we look at a
structured way to proceed. I have difficulty with that.

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I join the Senator from Arizona in his
request. I think it is important if we are to spend most of the
afternoon on the issue. If we could work out an orderly arrangement,
that would be good.
Mr. KYL. Let me propose this unanimous consent, Mr. President, if I
may. The Senator from Oregon is speaking right now. I ask unanimous
consent that after the Senator from Oregon is finished, so there would
have been two Members speaking on behalf of the legislation of the
Senator from Idaho, that at that point, the debate next go back and
forth between proponents of the Chambliss-Kyl amendment and then back
to Kennedy-Craig, and anyone offering an amendment can obviously seek
to ask unanimous consent to lay the pending business aside, but in the
meantime the debate on these two provisions that will both be voted
upon tomorrow proceed with speakers on either side rotating.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection? The Senator from
Massachusetts.
Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I see my friend from New Mexico who was
here before I was here. Let him proceed.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Mexico.
Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I have two amendments to offer, and it
will take a total of about 3 minutes. I do not expect votes on them
today, of course, but I would like a chance to very briefly offer them,
and then have them set aside, if I can do that after the Senator from
Oregon concludes his remarks and before the rest of the debate
continues.
Mr. KYL. That is accommodated in the unanimous consent request which
I proposed.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Massachusetts.
Mr. KENNEDY. Reserving the right to object, I welcome the opportunity
to work this out. Can we perhaps get some time understanding as well?
The Senator from Oregon mentioned he will probably need 15 minutes.
Could we get some kind of understanding about the length of time?
Generally we go from Republican to Democrat. Now we are looking at
going from proponents to opponents. I do not mind that, but if we can
limit this to 15 minutes each--I see we have a number of people--would
that be agreeable? So we would go to Senator Wyden, and because the
Senator from Arizona has been so persuasive, we will hear two on his
side, and maybe Senator Bingaman can be recognized after Senator Wyden,
and then two for the Senator's side, 15 minutes each, and then I be
recognized.
Mr. CRAIG. Will the Senator yield?
Mr. KYL. I am happy to have my unanimous consent request amended
along the lines of what the Senator from Massachusetts said.
Mr. CRAIG. It is clear anybody coming to the floor to offer
amendments to the supplemental would have that right.
Mr. KYL. They could ask unanimous consent to intervene, and obviously
it will be granted.
Mr. CRAIG. I thank the Senator.
Mr. KYL. Let me propound the unanimous consent request again, if I
can. I ask unanimous consent that in 15-minute blocks of time Senator
Wyden proceed without any of this time coming off his, there then be
two 15-minute blocks for the Senator from Alabama and the Senator from
Georgia, followed by a 15-minute block for the Senator from
Massachusetts, but in the meantime, Senator Bingaman be able to offer
his amendments.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The Senator from Oregon.
Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, a remarkable coalition of agricultural
employers and farm workers has come together behind the Craig-Kennedy
amendment. I commend them for all of their efforts. I simply wanted to
spend a few minutes and talk about a bit of lineage behind this whole
effort.
To some extent, this began on the afternoon of July 23, 1998, when I
had the opportunity to join with my friend and colleague Senator Gordon
Smith and we offered an amendment to overhaul this program. It was, in
fact, entitled the AgJOBS amendment. It had the strong support of
Senator Craig at that time. We received 68 votes for that legislation.
I think it was an indication then, as we see today, how the system
works for no one.
To a great extent, we see so many who feel we have lost control of
our borders. The system surely does not work for the honest
agricultural employer, and the vast majority certainly meet that test,
and for many farm workers who work hard and contribute every single
day. The system simply does not work for anyone. So what Senator Smith
and I tried to do that July day in 1998 was to begin to address the
foundation of a sensible immigration policy based on the proposition
that what we have been doing does not work for anybody. It does not
work for our country.
We live under a contradiction every day with respect to immigration.
We say we are against illegal immigration. One can hear that in every
coffee shop in the United States. Then we look the other way so as to
deal with agriculture or perhaps motels, hotels, restaurants, and a
variety of other establishments. We have to resolve that contradiction.
We ought to resolve it by making the kind of start the Craig-Kennedy
legislation does by saying we

[[Page S3779]]

are going to put our focus on legal workers who are here in compliance
with the law. That is what we sought to do that July day in 1998,
requiring the growers to hire U.S. farmworkers first before they could
seek alien workers. Then we took steps to try to ensure a measure of
justice that would be required in our legislation for the migrant
farmworkers by providing employment, housing, transportation, and other
benefits, access to Head Start. I think Senator Kennedy remembers this
well from 1998. One would have thought Western civilization was going
to end when that amendment offered by Oregon's two Senators got 68
votes in the Senate. I think it was an indication of how the animosity
and fear that has surrounded this issue has enveloped the whole debate
over the last few years, and that is why I commend Senator Craig and
Senator Kennedy for the thoughtful way they have worked since 1998 in
order to build a coalition for this idea and to refine what the Senate
voted for in 1998.
For example, in 1999, the National Council of Agricultural Employers,
the employer group that helped start the process that led to the first
AgJOBS bill of 1998, started reaching out directly to the Hispanic
community representing agricultural workers, as well as churches and
community groups. A dialog was begun then about how reform could
benefit everyone.
In 2000, people from the agricultural employer community and those
representing the farmworkers started talking more publicly about some
of the issues that were particularly contentious. All of a sudden,
there was an extended and thoughtful debate among people who were
avowed enemies with respect to the topic of H-2A reform. Those people
who had fought each other so bitterly began to come together and form a
coalition that is behind the Craig-Kennedy amendment today.
In 1996, I formulated certain beliefs with respect to this issue that
still hold true today. First, I believe willing and able American
workers always should be given a chance to fulfill the needs of
employers seeking agricultural labor. This was addressed in 1998 and it
remains in the language before the Senate today. The amendment offered
by Senator Craig and Senator Kennedy requires employers seeking to use
the H-2A program to first offer the job to any eligible U.S. worker who
applies and who is equally or better qualified for the job, and then
issue notice to local and State employment agencies, farmworkers
organizations, and also through advertising.
We also said back then we wanted to have recommendations for a more
straightforward, less cumbersome, less unwieldy process to address the
shortage of primary foreign workers.
I commend Senator Craig and Senator Kennedy because what we had been
concerned about then--the need for simplicity and certainty--is now
embodied in a number of aspects in this amendment. Employers are
required to provide actual employment to the worker, a living wage and
proof of that employment so the worker can move freely between jobs.
The employee is required to show proof of legal temporary worker status
in the United States to the employer before becoming employed. Each
party shoulders the burden of ensuring their documentation is legal.
That is the way we said it ought to be in 1998. That is the way it is
in the Craig-Kennedy proposal.
Third, I have always maintained and still maintain that a farmer
using the H-2A program should not be able to misuse it to displace U.S.
agricultural workers or make U.S. workers worse off. The language
before us today meets that test by ensuring that H-2A workers must be
paid the same wage as the American worker. There is no incentive to
seek a guest worker because there is no opportunity to indenture that
worker by paying lower wages or not providing enough work.
Fourth, and perhaps most important, we said then and it is clear in
this amendment as well that any program must not encourage the illegal
immigration of workers. This bill addresses that by requiring
agricultural workers to show they are legally in the United States in
order to collect the benefits available under this program, such as
housing, transportation, and the civil right to sue their employers for
back wages or for wrongful dismissal.
So the goal of this legislation is to take out some of the
uncertainty and the lack of predictability that has been in this
program, and that uncertainty would be removed for both growers and
workers.
Certainly my State has a great interest in agriculture. There are
certainly billions of dollars of direct economic output in this sector
and there is a need to enact H-2A programs for my State, where we feel
we do a lot of things well, but what we do best is we grow things, and
the need for enacting this program is as great today as it was in 1998.
Both sides in this debate are going to continue to have their
differences, and my guess is, as the Senator from Idaho knows, there
are probably some residual and historical grudges. This Craig-Kennedy
proposal shows that in a very contentious area that has been gridlocked
in the Senate since a July date in 1998, we can still find a creative
process that brings people together to solve mutual problems.
I hope my colleagues will support this historic effort. I look
forward to working with Senators on both sides of the aisle on this
matter.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Mexico.
Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, what is the pending business? Is there
an amendment pending?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The pending amendment is the Chambliss
amendment.

Amendment No. 483

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to set that
aside so I can call up an amendment numbered 483.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. The clerk
will report.
The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

The Senator from New Mexico [Mr. Bingaman] proposes an
amendment numbered 483.

Mr. BINGAMAN. I ask unanimous consent the reading of the amendment be
dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The amendment is as follows:

(Purpose: To increase the appropriation to Federal courts by $5,000,000
to cover increased immigration-related filings in the southwestern
United States)

On page 202, strike line 24, and insert ``$65,000,000, to
remain available until September 30, 2006, of which
$5,000,000 shall be made available for costs associated with
increases in immigration-related filings in district courts
near the southwestern border of the United States:''.

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, this amendment would provide an
additional $5 million for the U.S. district courts along our southwest
border with Mexico. Due to the increased immigration enforcement
efforts along that border, southwest border courts have seen an
extraordinary increase in immigration-related filings. This amendment
would help border courts cover those expenses as we continue allocating
resources to secure our Nation's borders.
Since 1995, immigration cases in the five southwest border
districts--that is, the District of Arizona, District of New Mexico,
Southern District of California, and the Southern and Western Districts
of Texas--have grown approximately 828 percent. In 2003, overall
immigration filings in all U.S. district courts surged 22 percent. In
2004, they jumped 11 percent. Of those cases, 69 percent of them came
from these five districts I have listed.
In recent years, Congress has appropriated millions of dollars to
hire additional Border Patrol officers. Obviously, the more Border
Patrol officers you have, the more cases you have coming into the
Federal district courts. We need to recognize this. We need to
recognize the enormous impact this is having on our courts in this part
of the country.
This amendment would add an additional $5 million to southwest border
courts to the existing $60 million that is currently allocated under
the supplemental to cover expenses related to recent Supreme Court
decisions and the class action bill. The Administrative Office of the
Courts should be free to allocate the funds as it deems necessary among
the various courts. I hope my colleagues will support that amendment.

Amendment No. 417

At this point I ask that amendment be set aside, and I call up
amendment

[[Page S3780]]

No. 417, the Grassley-Baucus amendment.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. The clerk
will report the amendment.
The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

The Senator from New Mexico [Mr. Bingaman], for Mr.
Grassley, for himself, Mr. Baucus, and Mr. Bingaman, proposes
an amendment numbered 417.

Mr. BINGAMAN. I ask unanimous consent the reading of the amendment be
dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The amendment is as follows:

(Purpose: To provide emergency funding to the Office of the United
States Trade Representative)

On page 200, between lines 13 and 14, insert the following:

OFFICE OF THE UNITED STATES TRADE REPRESENTATIVE

For an additional amount for necessary expenses of the
Office of the United States Trade Representative, $2,000,000,
to remain available until expended: Provided, That the entire
amount is designated as an emergency requirement pursuant to
section 402 of the conference report to accompany S. Con.
Res. 95 (108th Congress).
Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, this is an amendment I am offering on
behalf of Senator Grassley and Senator Baucus and myself. It would
provide an additional $2 million in funding to the Office of the U.S.
Trade Representative for the balance of the current fiscal year. The
reasons for the amendment are straightforward. As many of us have
heard, because of the lack of funding, the Office of the Trade
Representative has been forced to eliminate a substantial portion of
its foreign travel. It has placed a freeze on all its hiring. It is
essentially no longer able to do the job we are requiring it to do.
In my opinion, the U.S. Trade Representative's Office is chronically
underfunded and understaffed as it is. It is the principal agency in
charge of negotiating and enforcing our trade agreements, and it
certainly deserves our support, particularly in this time of
unprecedented trade imbalances.
We talk a lot about holding our partners to their obligations in
trade agreements. We talk about protecting U.S. jobs. Unfortunately, we
have not dedicated a proper amount of resources to this effort.
This fiscal year, the Trade Representative's Office has faced
unexpected additional constraints as a result of the WTO Ministerial,
travel related to enforcement, the need for more staff to pursue
congressionally mandated enforcement actions, and substantial
fluctuations in the exchange rate, almost all of which fluctuations, I
would point out, have been adverse to the dollar.
This amendment will provide the Trade Representative's Office with
the emergency funding needed to get through this fiscal year. It is an
investment well worth making. It will add to U.S. competitiveness and
economic security. I hope my colleagues will support the amendment.
I ask that amendment be set aside and the earlier amendment by
Senator Chambliss be brought up again.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

Amendment No. 483

Mr. BINGAMAN. I yield the floor.
Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I do not see Senator Chambliss, but I
would like to enter into a discussion. We will be voting tomorrow on
the AgJOBS bill and the Kyl-Chambliss bill, and maybe other bills--the
Mikulski bill and who knows what else--in the next few days as we are
debating the emergency supplemental. These are amendments filed to the
emergency supplemental, legislation to provide funding for our
magnificent soldiers who are ably serving our country in harm's way to
carry out a national policy that we sent them to carry out.
We have been told that since the House of Representatives, when they
passed their emergency supplemental, added several provisions to
enhance our border security, recommendations that were in substance
made by the 9/11 Commission to provide greater protection to our
country against attacks by terrorists, such action by the House has
opened the door to any immigration language and bill that we want to
offer, that any Member may favor, to be added right onto a supplemental
for our soldiers. There is a tremendous difference between those
provisions, in my view. The Sensenbrenner language in the House bill is
narrow, based on recommendations of the 9/11 Commission, related to our
national defense and should have broad-based support. I hope it does.
The President supports it. The AgJOBS bill, however, is controversial.
It deals with a very large and complex subject that affects our economy
and our legal system in a significant way. We absolutely should not be
attempting to slip such legislation of such great importance, and on
which our country is so divided, onto the emergency defense
supplemental.
Let me speak frankly on the issue. There is no legislative or
national consensus about how to fix our immigration system. I serve on
the subcommittee on immigration of the Senate Judiciary Committee. We
have been having a series of important hearings on this subject. Our
chairman, Senator John Cornyn, has been working very hard and providing
sound leadership, but our subcommittee and the full Judiciary Committee
and this Senate are nowhere near ready to develop a comprehensive
immigration proposal. This is made clear when we see that a number of
outstanding Senators who worked on immigration over the years--such as
Senator Kyl, Senator Dianne Feinstein, Senator Saxby Chambliss--are
working on legislation, also.

Surely no one can say this AgJOBS bill that really kicked off this
debate is not a colossally important piece of legislation. Every one of
us in this body knows that immigration is a matter of great importance
to our country and one that we must handle carefully and properly.
After the complete failure of the 1986 amnesty effort, surely we know
we must do better this time.
Let me state this clearly. I believe we can improve our laws
regarding how people enter our country, how they work here, and how
they become citizens in this country, and we should do so. We
absolutely can do that. Many fine applicants are not being accepted,
applicants who could enrich our Nation.
Further, as a prosecutor of 15 years, a Federal prosecutor for almost
that long, without hesitation I want to say this: If we improve our
fundamental immigration laws and policies, and if at the same time we
work to create an effective enforcement system, then we can absolutely
eliminate this unconscionable lawlessness that is now occurring in our
country and improve immigration policies across the board, serving our
national interests and being certainly more sensitive to the legitimate
interests of those who would like to come here, live here, work here,
or even become citizens.
Any such legislation we pass should, in addition, protect our
national security. Of course, we need to keep an eye on our national
security--Have we forgotten that? Surely not--and allow increased
approval for technically advanced, educated and skilled persons and
students, as well as farm labor.
More importantly, under no circumstances should we pass bad
legislation that will further erode the rule of law, that will make the
current situation worse and will violate important principles that are
essential for an effective national immigration policy.
Some will say, Well, Jeff, it is time to do something, even if it is
not perfect. My direct answer to that is it is past time to pass laws
that improve the ability of our country to protect our security from
those who would do us harm. That is our duty. But we simply are not
ready to legislate comprehensively on the complex issue of immigration.
We have not come close to completing our hearings in the appropriate
subcommittees and the Judiciary Committee.
More importantly still, time or not, we must not pass bad
legislation. The Nation tried amnesty for farmworkers in 1986 and few
would deny it was a failure. That legislation, the Immigration Reform
and Control Act, established within it section 304. The Commission's
duty was, after the act had been in effect for some time, to study its
impact on the American farming industry. The Commission issued its
report and found, in every area, farm labor problems had not been
improved and as many as 70 percent of the applications for amnesty were
fraudulent.
I wish that weren't so. I wish we could pass laws that people conjure
up

[[Page S3781]]

which would solve the complex problems and it will all just work like
we think it might. I am sure those people, in 1986, heard the exact
same argument we are hearing today why this kind of legislation is so
critical. They tried it. But they put in a commission to study it.
The Commission was clear. The Commission said:

In retrospect, the concept of worker specific and industry
specific legislation was fundamentally flawed.

That is exactly what the AgJOBS bill is, industry and worker
specific. Indeed, it is the same industry and the same workers--
agriculture--that the 1986 sponsors said would be fixed by their bill.
It was an amnesty to end all amnesty. That is what they said. Now we
are at it again in the same way.
Later, in 1997, former Congresswoman Barbara Jordan, an African-
American leader of national renown, was authorized, by a 1990
immigration law, to chair a commission. The Commission reported to
President Clinton on the status of existing immigration law. The Jordan
Commission found that the guest worker programs do not ``reduce
unauthorized migration. To the contrary, research consistently shows
that they tend to encourage and exacerbate illegal movements by setting
up labor recruitment and family networks that persist long after the
guest programs end.''
The Commission further concluded that what was needed was an
immigration system that had integrity where laws were enforced,
including employer sanctions. I will quote from their report. They
stated:

Illegal immigration must be curtailed. This should be
accomplished with more effective border controls, better
internal apprehension mechanisms, and enhanced enforcement of
employer sanctions. The U.S. Government should also develop a
better employment eligibility and identification system,
including a fraud-proof work authorization document for all
persons legally authorized to work in the United States so
that employer sanctions can more effectively deter the
employment of unauthorized workers.

Our enforcement efforts remind me of the man who builds an 8-foot
ladder to try to reach across a 10-foot chasm. While he may have been
close, close doesn't count in such an event. He is heading for
disaster.
We are not as far away as most people think from an effective
enforcement mechanism. It is absolutely not hopeless for this country
to gain control of its borders, especially with the new technology we
have today--biometrics and that kind of thing. We are spending billions
of dollars, but we are spending that money very unwisely. The solution
to our immigration situation is to review the procedures by which
people come to our country, and the procedures by which people become
citizens, and to then steadfastly plan a method that will work to
enforce those rules. Without that enforcement, no matter what changes
we make in our current law, we will be right back here discussing
Amnesty III for agricultural farmworkers before this decade is out.
This is plainly obvious to anyone who would look at our current system.
By all means, this Nation should not, in response to this current
failure, pass a bill like what has been offered which basically says
our current system has failed and we intend to give up and do nothing
to fix it. It says we have failed, our system is not working so we are
just going to quit trying and let everybody stay in. The American
people are not going to be happy if they learn that is what we are
about here. They surely will learn about it sooner or later.

Polls show huge majorities, upwards of 80 percent, want a lawful
system of immigration. Why are we resistant to that?
It has been amazing to me, anytime a piece of legislation is offered
that might actually work to tighten up the loopholes we have, it is
steadfastly opposed and seems never to become law.
I feel very strongly about this. If it is not amnesty, I don't know
what amnesty is.
This bill will bestow legal status and a guaranteed pass to
citizenship for over a million individuals, perhaps 3 million, perhaps
even more.
The Commissioners who studied the last bill all agreed the number
that actually obtained amnesty was far greater than anticipated.
In addition, it makes no provision whatsoever for commensurate
improvement of law enforcement.
It hurts me, as somebody who spent most of my professional life
trying to enforce laws passed by Congress, to see us undermine the
ability of our system to actually work.
The passage of this legislation will be the equivalent of placing a
neon sign on our border that says: Yes, we have laws but we welcome you
to try to sneak into our country, and if you are successful, we will
reward you, as we have done twice before, with permanent residency and
a step onto citizenship.
Under this legislation, if a person has worked within 18 months, 575
hours or 100 workdays--and a workday is defined in the act as working 1
hour--then for 100 hours within 18 months, they are eligible to apply
for a temporary resident status even though they are here plainly and
utterly illegally. They do not have to go home and make another
application; they simply apply for this. In addition, they become a
temporary resident.

It then provides they can ask for permanent resident status and that
the Secretary of Homeland Security shall grant them this permanent
resident status if they work 2,000 hours in a 6-year period. That is
about 1 year of work period. Then they apply for a permanent resident
status. In 5 years, if they have not been convicted of a felony or have
not been convicted of three misdemeanors, the Secretary shall confer
citizenship on them if they apply.
If they become a permanent resident citizen, they can call for their
family, who may be out of the country. A family who never had any
thought to come to this country is allowed to come in free. All of them
are put on a guaranteed track for citizenship.
Indeed, if they have already left the country not intending to
return, but did work 575 hours in 18 months before that period, or if
they are willing to say they did--true or not--they get to come back in
and bring their families with them. Maybe a person here never intended
to bring their family, but faced with this offer, they bring them in.
I am not sure we know how broad this bill is, how dangerous this
language is.
I have a host of specific complaints about the provisions within the
statute. I will talk about them later today or tomorrow.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Georgia.
Mr. CHAMBLISS. Mr. President, I concur in about everything my friend
from Alabama has said. Initially, he made a comment relative to
debating immigration law on a Defense supplemental bill where we are
trying to provide funds for our men and women who are serving so
bravely overseas today. I concur in that.
I had hoped we would have an expansive debate on this very sensitive
and complicated issue. I know my friend, the Senator from Idaho, feels
exactly as I do on this, but unfortunately we have been dictated to by
the rules of the Senate relative to this issue. That is why we have
both of these amendments up for discussion today.
The Senator from Alabama is exactly right. He is also right on one
other thing. There are two amendments we are debating, AgJOBS, filed by
the Senator from Idaho and Senator Kennedy from Massachusetts, and the
Chambliss-Kyl amendment. Both of these amendments recognize, as the
Senator from Alabama said, we have a problem. We have a problem in the
agriculture community relative to providing our farmers all across
America a stable, secure, and lawful pool from which to choose for
their labor needs.
We can argue over how many hundreds of thousands or how many millions
of individuals are illegally in this country today working on our
farms. The Senator from Idaho said the Department of Labor says there
will only be a few hundred thousand who will try to take advantage of
this. I don't think that is right. I don't have a lot of faith in the
numbers coming out of some of the studies that have been done.
For example, there was a study by GAO a couple of years ago which
said there were some 600,000 farmworkers in the United States today who
are here illegally. In my State, there are hundreds of thousands of
illegal aliens who are working in agriculture as well as working in
other industries today.

[[Page S3782]]

Those who are working in other industries probably started out working
in agriculture. That is 1 out of 50 States. Our number is dwarfed by
Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, California, by those States that are on the
border with our friends to the South in Mexico, where thousands of
illegal aliens are crossing the border every day.
However, we do recognize there is a certain number--and it is not
material as to what that number is--but the fact is we agree there are
hundreds of thousands or millions of folks here illegally.
The basic difference between the Senator Craig and Senator Kennedy
AgJOBS amendment and the Chambliss-Kyl amendment is this: Which
direction do we want to go with regard to identifying those folks here
illegally? Do we want to reward those folks here illegally, as the
AgJOBS amendment proposes to do, or do we want to identify those people
and those who are here illegally who are making a valuable contribution
to the economy of the United States and who, most significantly, are
not displacing American workers--and I emphasize that--and who have not
broken the law in this country? Do we want to make an accommodation for
those folks so they can continue to contribute to the economy of the
United States by virtue of working in the agriculture community?
We both agree we ought to regulate these folks. The difference is the
Craig-Kennedy AgJOBS amendment gives those individuals who are in this
country illegally a direct path to citizenship. The Chambliss-Kyl
amendment recognizes those folks are here illegally and it says to
them, we are going to grant you a temporary status to remain here if
you are not displacing American workers, if you are law abiding, and if
your employer makes an attestation that he needs you--whether it is for
a short period of time, as the H-2A reform portion of our amendment
calls for, or whether it is the longer term, or the blue card
application. Unlike in the AgJOBS amendment where the illegal alien can
make the application, in our amendment the application has to be made
by the employer who does have to say he needs that individual in his
employ.
Another significant difference between these two amendments is this:
Under the AgJOBS bill it is pretty easy in the scheme of things to
become legal--not maybe an American citizen off the bat, but to
position yourself to be placed in line ahead of other folks who are
going through the normal course as set forth in our Constitution today
to become a citizen, for these folks to make that type of application.
Here is why. The AgJOBS bill says if you are an illegal alien, you
shall be given status as one lawfully admitted for temporary residence
if the illegal alien has worked 575 hours, or 100 workdays, whichever
is less, during an 18-month period ending on December 31, 2004. Mr.
President, 575 hours is 14.3 weeks of labor if they work 40 hours, or
71.8 days, or approximately 3\1/2\ months. An alien can get immigration
status after working only 3\1/2\ months of full-time employment.
Under Senate bill 359, section 2, paragraph 7, a workday means a day
in which an individual has worked as little as 1 hour. So 100 workdays
can amount to, literally, 1 hour per day for 100 straight days which
would amount to 2\1/2\ weeks. That may not be the practicality of this,
but in actuality, that is what the bill says.
Coming from a very heavy agriculture area, as I do, these people for
the most part who are here working in agriculture are here for the
reason they want to improve the quality of life for themselves as well
as their families. They are basically law-abiding people who are simply
hard workers and are here because they have that opportunity to better
themselves in this country versus their native country.
But still, are we going to recognize those folks for what they are--
and that is an illegal alien--or are we going to grant them this legal
status after being here for 3\1/2\ months?
I do not think the American people ever intended for the Constitution
of the United States, and for us operating under that Constitution, to
grant legal status to anybody who breaks the law, to come into this
country, and who may break the law not once, not twice, but three times
during that 3\1/2\-month period under the AgJOBS bill, as they can do,
and get legal status. I cannot conceive that America wants us to enact
that type of legislation.
A basic difference between the AgJOBS bill and the Chambliss-Kyl
amendment relative to those issues is we do not put anybody on a path
to legal status. We grant them temporary status under the H-2A bill. If
the farmer comes in and says, ``I need 100 workers for 90 days to work
on my farm, and here is what they are going to do,'' we will have that
application processed in a streamlined fashion, compared to the way the
application would have to be processed today, and those workers can
come in, and whether they are cutting lettuce or cutting cabbage or
picking cucumbers, they will be able to come in for that 100 days, and
at the end of that 100 days, they will return to their native land.
If there are other operations, other farming operations, whether it
is a landscaper or somebody in the nursery business, that need
individuals 12 months out of the year, they will have the opportunity
under our bill to apply for the blue card--again, a temporary status.
It must be applied for by the employer, not the illegal alien, as you
can do under the AgJOBS bill. The employer must make the application
for those individuals. No preferential status toward citizenship is
given.
They can have that blue card for 3 years, and reapply on two separate
occasions following that first application. Technically, they could
stay here for 9 years, if they continue to be law abiding and if their
employer makes the proper attestation that says he needs them, that
they have been important to the economy of this country, and they are
not displacing American workers. It is significantly different from
actually the legal status given after 3\1/2\ months under the AgJOBS
bill.
Where does the AgJOBS bill move this individual relative to the
pathway to citizenship? What current immigration law says is for
somebody who is here legally, if they work for 2,060 hours under the
AgJOBS bill, at the end of that 1 year, which is approximately 2,060
hours of work, they can apply for a green card, and they are going to
be given preferential treatment in getting that green card.
What current immigration law says is anybody who has maintained a
green card for 5 years can apply for citizenship. That is the pathway
to citizenship that is being granted to folks who are in this country
illegally today, who can have broken the law in this country today, not
once, not twice, but three times, and still be looked at as somebody
who is given preferential treatment over those individuals who are
outside of this country who want to become citizens of the United
States, who want to come here legally and do it the right way.
It simply is not fair. It is not equitable. I cannot believe the
American people want to see us enact a law that will reward those
individuals who have come into this country illegally in that way.
Lastly, let me mention one other point that is critically different
between the AgJOBS bill and the Chambliss-Kyl amendment; and that is
the issue relative to control of the border. The AgJOBS bill is
basically silent when it comes to control of the border. But what it
does do is it says if you have previously worked in the United States,
and you are now back in your home country, you can come and make
application for the adjusted status by saying you did work 575 hours
within a certain period of time and, therefore, you should be given
legal status in this country. And that will happen.
The difference in our provisions relative to control of the border is
we mandate that the Department of Homeland Security come back to
Congress within 6 months after the effective date of this legislation
and report to us on a plan they are going to put in place to control
our borders. Because, let me tell you, I don't care what bill we pass,
which of these amendments we pass, or any future bill we may pass
relative to the immigration laws of this country, if we do not control
our borders, we have not made one positive step in the right direction.
We simply must figure out a way to control our borders. We think
rather than us legislating a way in which that

[[Page S3783]]

be done, those folks who deal with the issue every day, those folks at
the Department of Homeland Security, are better suited to determine how
we can come up with a plan to control the border. We mandate that they
come back to us with that plan to control the border within 6 months
after the effective date of this legislation.
Mr. President, I would simply say in closing, we agree, No. 1, there
is a problem. I commend Senator Craig and Senator Kennedy for
continuing to move this ball down the field, as they have done. While I
do not necessarily agree that the Iraq supplemental is the right place
to do it, we are here today. But it simply is a matter of in which
direction we are going to go.

Is it going to be looking at folks who are in this country illegally
and rewarding them, rewarding them with a path to citizenship? Or is it
going to be in the direction of saying, OK, we know you are here
illegally, but if you are here and are a law-abiding individual in this
country, and you are making a contribution to this society, and you are
not displacing an American worker, then we are going to give you a
temporary status? We are not going to say you are here illegally. We
are going to say you are here legally, temporarily.
That is a critical difference. We are going to make sure our farmers
and our ranchers have the workforce necessary to carry out the job they
must do of feeding Americans as well as other folks around the world,
but we are simply not going to use that tool to put people who are here
illegally on a pathway to one of the most precious rights every
American citizen has, and that is citizenship of this country.
I yield the floor, Mr. President.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Massachusetts is recognized
for 15 minutes.
Mr. KENNEDY. If the Chair would be good enough to notify me when I
have 1 minute remaining, please.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair will be happy to.
Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, it is a privilege to join with Senator
Craig in offering the Agricultural Jobs, Opportunity, Benefits, and
Security amendment.
America has a proud tradition as a nation of immigrants and a nation
of laws, but our current immigration laws have failed us. Much of the
Nation's economy today depends on the hard work and the many
contributions of immigrants. The agricultural industry would grind to a
halt without immigrant farmworkers. Yet the overwhelming majority of
these workers are undocumented and are, therefore, easily exploited by
unscrupulous employers.
Our AgJOBS bill corrects these festering problems. It gives
farmworkers and their families the dignity and justice they deserve,
and it gives agricultural employers a legal workforce.
Impressive work has been done by many grassroots organizations to
make AgJOBS a reality. They have demonstrated true statesmanship by
putting aside strongly held past differences to work together for the
common good. We have our own responsibility to join in a similar way to
approve this needed reform that is years overdue.
I commend Senator Craig and Congressmen Berman and Cannon for their
leadership. I urge my colleagues to wholeheartedly endorse the AgJOBS
bill.
Our bill reflects a far-reaching and welcome agreement between the
United Farm Workers and the agricultural industry to meet this urgent
need, and Congress should make the most of this unique opportunity for
progress.
Our bill has strong support from business and labor, civic and faith-
based organizations, liberals and conservatives, trade associations and
immigrant rights groups. More than 500 organizations across the country
support it.
AgJOBS is a bipartisan compromise reached after years of
negotiations. Both farmworkers and growers have made concessions to
reach this agreement, but each side has obtained important benefits.
In contrast, opponents offer a one-sided proposal that has failed to
win the broad support AgJOBS has received. I urge my colleagues to
oppose it. It vastly favors employers at the expense of farmworkers. It
makes harsh revisions to the current agricultural guest worker program
and creates a new blue card program for undocumented workers without a
path to permanent residence, and without any meaningful governmental
oversight to prevent labor abuses.
Agricultural employers would have the freedom to avoid hiring U.S.
workers, displace U.S. workers already on the job, and force both U.S.
workers and guest workers to accept low wages. They could do all this
by claiming they can't find any U.S. workers. Even when the few labor
protections are violated, workers would have no meaningful ability to
enforce their legal rights.
This program would return us to the dark and shameful era of the
Bracero Program where abuses were rampant and widely tolerated. That is
unacceptable. We must learn from our mistakes and not repeat them.
The Chambliss amendment also ignores the needs of many growers and
farmworkers. It offers no solution to the basic problem faced by
agricultural employers--the problem that an overwhelming majority of
the workers are undocumented. By offering no path to permanent
residence for these undocumented workers, none of the guest workers, no
matter how long they have worked, will ever be able to earn their
permanent status.
Perhaps more troubling is the amendment's repeal of the longstanding
adverse effect wage rate under the current program. This wage rate was
created during the Bracero Program as a necessary program against the
depression in wages caused by guest worker programs. The Chambliss
proposal would replace it with a prevailing wage standard,
substantially lower than the adverse effect wage rate. It would be
based on the employer's own survey of prevailing wages rather than the
Labor Department's survey. Farmworkers, who are already the lowest paid
workers in the United States, would see their wages drop even lower. In
contrast, the AgJOBS bill preserves the adverse effect wage rate while
recommendations are made to Congress to resolve these long-contested
pay issues.
The Chambliss amendment also eliminates the key provision that gives
U.S. workers a job preference by employers who request guest workers.
It would end the longstanding 50 percent rule which requires employers
to hire qualified U.S. workers who applied during the first half of the
season. Studies have shown that this rule is a valid protection.
In addition, the Chambliss amendment would end what they call
positive recruitment--the obligation of employers to look for U.S.
workers outside of the government job service which currently provides
farmworkers with agricultural jobs. This proposal creates a new guest
worker program for the undocumented that would offer them visas that
would be valid only for 3 years and renewable for up to 6 additional
years. They would have no opportunity to earn a green card no matter
how many years they worked in the United States. In fact, they would
actually lose their status if they merely filed an application to
become a permanent resident.
Senator Chambliss believes that undocumented farmworkers will come
out of the shadows and sign up for such a temporary worker program, but
they are highly unlikely to do so. The vast majority will be deported
after their temporary status expires. Registering as the first step
towards deportation is unfair, and it just won't work.
In contrast, the AgJOBS bill offers farmworkers a genuine earned
adjustment program that will put these workers and their families on a
path to permanent residence. Hard-working, law-abiding farmworkers will
be able to come out of the shadows. The Chambliss amendment is far less
satisfactory than the AgJOBS proposal, and I urge my colleagues to
oppose it.
Opponents of the AgJOBS bill claim that we are rushing this bill
through Congress without full and careful consideration. This claim is
without merit. Since 1998, the Immigration Subcommittee has held three
hearings that have fully examined our agricultural workforce problems
and the need to reform our immigration laws. Last year, we considered
the issue once more. Legislation to address this problem has been
introduced by both Republicans and Democrats in every Congress since
1996.

[[Page S3784]]

In September 2000, a breakthrough occurred, and both sides agreed to
support compromise legislation that won broad bipartisan congressional
support. Unfortunately, attempts to enact it were blocked in the
lameduck session that year. The election of President Bush in 2000
changed the dynamics of the agreement, and the compromise fell apart.
A compromise was finally reached in September 2003 which led Senator
Craig and me to introduce the AgJOBS bill. Last Congress, we had, as
Senator Craig has pointed out, 63 Senate cosponsors, nearly evenly
divided between Democrats and Republicans. Despite such strong
bipartisan support, the leadership last year blocked our attempt to
obtain a vote on this legislation. This is the second Congress in which
Senator Craig and I have introduced the AgJOBS bill. Congress has had
extensive discussions of this legislation in the past, and it is long
past time for us to act.
Opponents of our amendment have offered no workable solutions. We
cannot be complacent any longer. It is time for a new approach.
The American people want commonsense solutions to real problems such
as immigration. They want neither open borders nor closed borders. They
want smart borders. They are neither anti-immigrant nor anti-
enforcement. Instead, they are anti-disorder and anti-hypocrisy. They
want the Federal Government to get its act together, to set rules that
are realistic and fair, and to follow through and enforce these
realistic rules effectively and efficiently.
AgJOBS meets these goals. It addresses our national security needs,
reflects current economic realities, and respects America's immigrant
heritage.
The status quo is untenable. In the last 10 years, the U.S.
Government has spent more than $20 billion to enforce our immigration
laws. We have tripled the number of border security agents, improved
surveillance technology, installed other controls to strengthen border
enforcement, especially at the southwest border. None of these efforts
have been adequate. Illegal immigration continues.
The proof is in the numbers. Between 1990 and 2000, the number of
undocumented immigrants doubled from 3.5 million to 7 million. Today
that number is nearly 11 million, with an average annual growth of
almost 500,000. Those already here are not leaving, and new immigrants
keep coming in. Massive deportations are unrealistic as a policy,
impractical to carry out, and unacceptable to businesses that rely
heavily on their labor.
Obviously, we must control our borders and enforce our laws, but we
first need realistic immigration laws that we can actually enforce. The
AgJOBS bill is a significant step. By bringing these illegal workers
out of the shadows, we will enable law enforcement to focus its efforts
on terrorists and violent criminals. We will reduce the chaotic,
illegal, all too deadly traffic of immigrants at our borders by
providing safe opportunities for farmworkers and their families to
enter and leave the country.
The AgJOBS bill enhances our national security and makes our
communities safer. It brings the undocumented farmworkers and their
families out of the shadows and enables them to pass through security
checkpoints. It shrinks the pool of law enforcement targets, enables
our offices to train their sights more effectively on the terrorists
and the criminals. The undocumented farmworkers eligible for this
program will undergo rigorous security checks as they apply for legal
status. Future temporary workers will be carefully screened to meet
security concerns.
The AgJOBS amendment provides a fair and reasonable way for
undocumented agricultural workers to earn legal status. It reforms the
current visa program so that agricultural employers unable to hire
American workers can hire needed foreign workers. Both of these
components are critical. They serve as the cornerstone for
comprehensive immigration reform of the agricultural sector.
Undocumented farmworkers are clearly vulnerable to abuse by
unscrupulous labor contractors and growers. They are less likely than
U.S. workers to complain about low wages, poor working conditions, or
other labor law violations. Their illegal status deprives them of
bargaining power and depresses the wages of all farmworkers. These
workers are already among the lowest paid of all workers in America.
According to the most recent findings of the national agricultural
workers survey issued last month, their average individual income is
between $10,000 and $12,000 a year. The average annual family income is
$15,000 to $17,000.
Thirty percent of their households live below the poverty line. Only
half of them own a car and even fewer own a home or even a trailer. By
legalizing these farmworkers, the threat of deportation is removed.
They will be on equal footing with U.S. workers and the end result will
be higher wages, better working conditions, and upward job mobility for
all workers.
Opponents of reform continually mislabel any initiative they oppose
as ``amnesty'' in a desperate attempt to stop any significant reform.
Instead of proposing ways to fix our current broken system, they are
calling for more of the same--increased enforcement of broken laws.
However, enforcing a dysfunctional system only leads to greater
dysfunction.
The AgJOBS bill is not an amnesty bill. The program requires
farmworkers to earn legal status. They must demonstrate not only
contributions but also a substantial future work commitment before they
earn the right to remain in our country.
First, they will receive temporary resident status, based on their
past work experience. They must have worked for at least 100 work days
in agriculture by December 31, 2004. To earn permanent residence, they
must fulfill a prospective work requirement. They must work at least
360 days in agriculture during a six-year period. At least 240 of those
360 work days must occur during the first 3 years. Temporary residents
who fail to fulfill the prospective agricultural work requirement will
be dropped from the program and required to leave the country.
It's not amnesty if you have to earn it. AgJOBS offers farm workers a
fair deal: if they are willing to work hard for us, then we're willing
to do something fair for them. It's the only realistic solution.
Contrary to statements made by its critics, AgJOBS does not provide a
direct path to citizenship. Farm workers would first earn temporary
residence if they provide evidence of past work in agriculture. The
next step would be permanent residence, but only after they have
completed thousands of hours of backbreaking work in agriculture--a
process that could take up to 6 years. Once they earn permanent
residence, these farm workers would have to wait another 5 years to be
able to apply for citizenship. At that point, they would have to pass
an English and civics exam, and go through extensive backgrounds
checks. This process is long and arduous, as it should be. There is
nothing direct about it.
To be eligible for legal status, applicants must be persons of good
moral character and present no criminal or national security problems.
Whether they are applying here or at U.S. consulates abroad, all
applicants will be required to undergo rigorous security clearances.
Like all applicants for adjustment of status, their names and birth
dates must be checked against criminal and terrorist databases operated
by the Department of Homeland Security, the FBI, the State Department,
and the CIA. Applicants' fingerprints would be sent to the FBI for a
criminal background check, which includes comparing the applicants'
fingerprints with all arrest records in the FBI's database.
Contrary to arguments made by detractors of AgJOBS, terrorists will
not be able to exploit this program to obtain legal status. Anyone with
any ties to terrorist activity is ineligible for legal status under our
current immigration laws, and would be ineligible under the AgJOBS
bill. Our proposal has no loopholes for terrorists.
Opponents of AgJOBS claim that this bill is soft on criminals. Wrong
again. AgJOBS has the toughest provisions against those who commit
crimes--tougher than current immigration law. Convictions for most
crimes will make them ineligible to obtain a green card. Generally,
these convictions include violent crimes, drug crimes, theft, and
domestic violence. AgJOBS goes even further. Applicants can be denied
legal status if they commit a felony or three

[[Page S3785]]

misdemeanors. It doesn't matter whether the misdemeanors involve minor
offenses--three misdemeanors and you are out, no matter how minor the
misdemeanors. In addition, anyone convicted of a single misdemeanor who
served a sentence of 6 months or more would also be ineligible. These
rules are additional requirements that do not apply to other immigrants
and they cannot be waived by DHS.
There are those who would prefer to disqualify a farm worker who
commits even a single minor misdemeanor, with no jail time. But that
goes too far. In some States, it's a misdemeanor to put trash from your
home into a roadside trash can. It's a misdemeanor to park a house
trailer in a roadside park, or have an unleashed dog in your car on a
State highway, or go fishing without a license.
If we're serious about this proposal, minor offenses like these
shouldn't have such harsh consequences. We'd be severely punishing
hard-working men and women for minor mistakes, and tearing these
immigrant families apart.
It's hard to imagine any public purpose that would be served by such
a severe punishment. But it's easy to imagine all the heart-wrenching
stories and nightmares created by this proposal for people caught by
its provisions. Many of these farm workers have lived in America with
their families for many years. They've established strong ties to their
communities, paid their taxes, and contributed to our economy. They
deserve better than a punishment out of all proportion to their
offense.
Opponents of AgJOBS also claim that it will be a magnet for further
illegal immigration. Once again, they are wrong. To be eligible for the
earned adjustment program, farm workers must establish that they worked
in agriculture in the past. Farm workers must have entered the United
States prior to October, 2004. Otherwise, they are not eligible. The
magnet argument is false. New entrants who have not worked in
agriculture won't qualify for this program.
Hard-working migrant farm workers are essential to the success of
American agriculture. We need an honest agriculture policy that
recognizes the contributions of these men and women, and respects and
rewards their work.
Our bill will modify the current temporary foreign agricultural
worker program, while preserving and enhancing key labor protections.
It strikes a fair balance. Anything else would undermine the jobs,
wages, and working conditions of U.S. workers.
For many employers, the current program is a bureaucratic nightmare.
Few of them use the program, because it is so complicated, lengthy,
uncertain, and expensive. Only 40,000-50,000 guest workers are admitted
each year--barely 2 to 3 percent of the estimated total agricultural
work force.
To deal with these problems, the bill streamlines the H-2A program's
application process by making it a ``labor attestation'' program
similar to the H-1B program, rather than the current ``labor
certification'' program. This change will reduce paperwork for
employers and accelerate processing.
Employers seeking temporary workers will file an application with the
Secretary of Labor containing assurances that they will comply with the
program's obligations. The application will be accompanied by a job
offer that the local job service office will post on an electronic job
registry at least 28 days before the job begins. In addition, the
employer must post the position at the work site, notify the collective
bargaining representative if one exists, make reasonable efforts to
contact past employees, and advertise the position in newspapers read
by farm workers.
Longstanding worker protections will continue in force. For example,
the ``three-fourths minimum work guarantee'' will remain in effect.
Employers will be required to guarantee work for at least three
quarters of the employment period or pay compensation for any
shortfall. The ``50% rule'' will also continue. Qualified U.S. workers
would be hired as long as they apply during the first half of the
season. No position could be filled by an H-2A worker that was vacant
because of a strike or labor dispute. Employers will continue to
reimburse workers for transportation costs and provide workers'
compensation insurance coverage. Employers will be prohibited from
discriminating in favor of temporary workers.
The bill will modify some current requirements in important ways.
Employers must provide housing at no cost, or a monetary housing
allowance in which the State governor certifies that sufficient farm
worker housing is available. Employers will also be required to pay at
least the highest of the State or Federal minimum wage, the local
``prevailing wage'' for the particular job, or an ``adverse effect''
wage rate.
For many years, the adverse effect wage rate has been vigorously
debated, with most farm worker advocates arguing that the rate is too
low, and most growers complaining that it is too high. The bill will
freeze adverse effect wage rates for three years at the 2003 level,
while studies and recommendations are made to Congress by the GAO and a
special commission of experts. If Congress fails to enact an adverse
effect wage rate formula within 3 years, this wage rate will be
adjusted in 2006, and at the beginning of each year thereafter, based
on the change in the consumer price index.
The Secretary of Labor will establish an administrative complaint
process to investigate and resolve complaints alleging violations under
the H-2A program. Violators will be required to pay back wages, and can
also be given civil money penalties and be barred from the program.
In addition, the bill provides a significant new protection for H-2A
workers--a private right of action in Federal court. Currently, these
workers lack this right, and can seek redress in State courts only
under State contract law. Such workers are also excluded from the
Migrant and Seasonal Agricultural Worker Protection Act, which provides
U.S. workers with protections and remedies in Federal court. Although
the exclusion continues, our bill will permit workers to file a Federal
lawsuit to enforce their wages, housing benefits, transportation cost
reimbursements, minimum-work guarantee, motor vehicle safety
protections, and other terms under their job offer.
Our bill will also unify families. When temporary residence is
granted, a farm worker's spouse and minor children will be able to
remain legally in the United States, but they will not be authorized to
work. When the worker becomes a permanent resident, the spouse and
minor children will also gain such status.
Mr. President, I have a letter from the AFL-CIO that calls AgJOBS a
recent legislative compromise between farmworker advocates and
agricultural employers. I ask unanimous consent that this letter be
printed in the Record.
There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in
the Record, as follows:

American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial
Organizations,
Washington, DC, April 18, 2005.
Dear Senator: On behalf of the AFL-CIO I urge you to
support cloture on and passage of an amendment to the FY 2005
Supplemental Appropriations bill offered by Senators Craig
and Kennedy--the Agricultural Job Opportunity, Benefits and
Security Act (AgJOBS). I also strongly urge you to oppose an
amendment offered by Senators Chambliss and Kyl as a
substitute to AgJOBS. This amendment has inadequate worker
protections and must be defeated.
The AgJOBS bill is a reasoned legislative compromise
between farm worker advocates and agricultural employers.
AgJOBS enjoys strong bipartisan support and would provide an
avenue for 500,000 undocumented farm workers to qualify for
an earned adjustment program that has a path to permanent
residency. AgJOBS would both streamline the current H-2A
agricultural guest-worker program and provide additional
legal protections for migrant workers who hold H-2A visas.
AgJOBS addresses both the growing concern over the high
number of undocumented farm workers and the need for
adjustments to the H-2A program so that we do not confront a
similar crisis in the future. The Kennedy-Craig AgJOBS
amendment is necessary immigration reform that will protect
the rights and economic well-being of both immigrant and U.S.
workers.
The Chambliss-Kyl proposal would radically change the H-2A
program--stripping it of all labor protections and government
oversight. This amendment would create a new year-round guest
worker program with no meaningful labor protections and no
role for the Department of Labor to enforce housing, pay, or
other essential worker protections. The Chambliss-Kyl
proposal would tie workers to particular employers and
require

[[Page S3786]]

them to leave the country if their jobs ended and no other
employer petitioned for a visa for them within 60 days. It
would allow employers to bring in a large numbers of
vulnerable guest workers to fill year-round jobs for up to
nine years without the ability to be united with their family
members.
Also troubling is that the Chambliss-Kyl amendment would
broaden the definition of seasonal agricultural workers to
include ``related industries,'' which could include
landscaping and food processing. Currently, the use of guest
workers in these industries is capped and subject to
additional labor market tests. The H-2A program is not
subject to a cap. This further jeopardizes essential labor
protections for a broader segment of the U.S. workforce. The
Chambliss-Kyl proposal is bad for both U.S. and immigrant
workers, bad for employers who want to employ a stable
workforce, and it is a dangerous precedent in immigration and
labor policy.
Sincerely,
William Samuel,
Director, Department of Legislation.

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, this mentions:

The Chambliss-Kyl proposal would radically change the H-2A
program, stripping it of all labor protections and Government
oversight. This amendment would create a new year-round guest
worker program with no meaningful labor protections and no
role for the Department of Labor to enforce housing, pay, or
other essential worker protections. The Chambliss-Kyl
proposal would tie workers to particular employers and
require them to leave the country if their jobs ended and no
other employer petitioned for a visa for them within 60 days.

I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from West Virginia is recognized.

Amendment No. 464

(Purpose: To express the sense of the Senate on future requests for
funding for military operations in Afghanistan and Iraq)

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, from the moment our military first attacked
Osama bin Laden's hideouts in Afghanistan, through the time that our
first soldiers set foot inside Iraq, continuing right up until the
present day, the war in Afghanistan and the war in Iraq have been
entirely funded by what the American people might call a series of
stopgap spending measures. These measures, which are called emergency
supplemental appropriation bills in the parlance of our Nation's
capitol, take the form of last-minute requests by the White House for
Congress to approve tens of billions of dollars on an accelerated
timetable.
From September 11, 2001, until today, Congress has approved $201
billion in these appropriations bills, the great majority of which the
President has applied to the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. If this bill
on the Senate floor is approved, it will add another $79.3 billion to
that staggering total.
With the cost of the two wars approaching $280 billion--that is a lot
of money; that is your money, Mr. and Mrs. American Citizen--the
American people are beginning to ask how much more will these two wars
cost our country? The Congressional Budget Office estimated, in
February 2005, the cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan will cost
the American people $458 billion over the next 10 years. The $74.4
billion in military spending contained in this supplemental
appropriations bill is but a small downpayment on that staggering sum.
How accurate is this estimate of nearly half a trillion dollars more
in war costs? How accurate is it? Amazingly, the administration has
flatout refused to provide any estimates for the cost of the war in its
annual budget request. That means, then, under the administration's
budget policies, our troops are forced to continue to rely on the
stopgap spending measures that are known as emergency supplemental
appropriations bills.
I know the terms ``supplemental request'' or ``emergency
appropriations'' mean almost nothing to the average American. But each
time the White House sends a supplemental request to Congress for more
funds that have never appeared in the President's budget, it reminds me
of the way so many Americans pull a credit card out of their wallet
when faced with unexpected costs.
Like a credit card, emergency supplemental appropriations requests
can be responsibly used to cover costs that could not have been
foreseen. But most Americans know, if someone starts using a credit
card for everyday expenses, watch out, because that person is on the
path to financial ruin. Mr. President, I have never had a credit card
in my life. I don't use one. My wife doesn't use one. Using that little
piece of plastic means avoiding the tough choices and tradeoffs that
are necessary for fiscal responsibility, while reckless spending and
increasing interest payments cause a family's debt to spiral out of
control. That, in a nutshell, is exactly what is happening in
Washington, DC. Just like the slick advertising slogan for credit
cards, the administration's repeated requests for supplemental
appropriations for the war exemplify the phrase ``buy now, pay later.''
Over the last 3\1/2\ years, at a time when the Government is swimming
in red ink, the White House has charged an additional $280 billion--
that is right, $280 billion--on the national credit card, without
proposing a single dime of that spending in its annual budget proposal;
not one thin dime is seen or shown in the administration's annual
budget proposal. This is a reckless course the administration has
plotted. It is fiscal irresponsibility at the highest level. This
``take it as it comes'' approach to paying for the cost of the war in
Iraq ignores sound budgetary principles, and it is a grave disservice
to our troops who are serving in Iraq.

By separating the regular budget of the Defense Department and other
Federal agencies from the wartime costs of military operations, the
White House has effectively denied Congress the ability to get the
whole picture of the needs of our troops and the other needs of our
Nation, such as education, highways, and veterans medical care.
Instead, Congress receives only piecemeal information about, on the one
hand, what funds are required to fight the war--this unnecessary war, I
say, in Iraq--and on the other, what funds are required for the regular
operations of the Defense Department and other Federal agencies.
This is a misguided approach, and the net effect of this misguided
approach is a thoroughly disjointed and discombobulated Federal budget.
This hand-me-down process does not serve our troops well.
A unified, coherent budget for our military would allow Congress and
the administration, as well as the American people, to focus on the
future to evaluate what our troops might need to fight two wars--the
war in Afghanistan and the war in Iraq--in the next 6, 12, or 18
months.
I am fully supportive of the war in Afghanistan because in that case
our country was attacked, our country was invaded by an enemy. We
fought back. I fully supported President Bush in that war, and I do
today. I support the troops in both wars, but I do not support the
policy that sent our troops into Iraq.
Instead of looking forward, however, the abuse of the supplemental
appropriations process means the Congress and the administration are
constantly--constantly--looking backward over our shoulder to fix the
problems that might have been addressed had the cost of the wars been
included in the President's budget.
Congress has had to add money to prior supplementals to buy more body
armor, to buy more ammunition, to buy more armored humvees. All of
these costs should have been included in earlier administration regular
unified budget requests for the entire Federal Government.
What is more, this disjointed manner of paying for the wars in Iraq
and Afghanistan has a tremendous effect on the entire Federal budget.
By refusing to budget for the cost of the war, the President is
submitting annual budgets to Congress that are downright inaccurate.
These budget requests are inaccurate. They understate the actual amount
of our annual deficits by scores of billions of dollars.
If the President's emergency request for 2005 is approved, the
Congress will have approved over $210 billion just for the war in Iraq.
While the budget deficit grows to record levels, the President tells us
we have to cut domestic programs by $192 billion over the next 5 years.
The President tells us we have to charge veterans for their medical
care, that we have to cut grants for firefighters and first responders,
that we cannot adequately fund the No Child Left Behind Act, and that
we should cut funding for the National Institutes of Health. The list
goes on and on.
Since the President took office, he has taken a Federal budget that
was in

[[Page S3787]]

surplus for 4 straight years and produced deficits as far as the human
eye can see. For 2006, the President is projecting a deficit of $390
billion, but that deficit estimate does not--does not, does not--
include new spending for the war in Iraq. We are not fighting that war
on the cheap. It is costing you money, you citizens out there. It is
your money; it is costing you money. That deficit estimate does not
include new spending, I say, for the war in Iraq. Why? Why does it not?
Why does that deficit estimate not include new spending for the war in
Iraq? Because the President pretends he cannot project what the war
will cost in 2006. Well, Mr. President, I assure you the costs will not
be zero.
The President will not tell the American people what the war in Iraq
will cost. By understating the deficits, the American people are being
led down a primrose path. That is dishonesty. Neither the White House
nor Congress is making any tough choices about how to pay for the cost
of the war because the administration is not telling Congress how much
it thinks the war might cost in the next year. And as a result, there
is no talk of raising taxes or cutting spending in order to pay for the
costs of the wars.
The United States is sinking deeper and deeper into debt, and the
administration's failure to budget for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan
is sending our country even deeper into red ink. For as brilliantly as
our troops have performed on the battlefield, as brilliantly as they
have fought and died on the battlefield, the administration's
budgeteers are creating a budgetary catastrophe. But the executive
branch has not always been so neglectful of the need to include in its
budget the cost of ongoing wars. According to the Congressional
Research Service, there is a long history of Presidents moving the cost
of ongoing military operations into their annual budget requests rather
than relying completely on supplemental appropriations bills.
For example, the Congressional Research Service reports President
Franklin D. Roosevelt included funds for World War II in his fiscal
year 1943 budget request. President Lyndon B. Johnson included funds
for the Vietnam war in his fiscal year 1966 request. Military
operations in Bosnia and the U.S. operations to enforce the no-fly zone
over Iraq were initially funded through supplemental appropriations.
But in 1995, Congress forced President Bill Clinton to include those
costs in his fiscal year 1997 budget, which he did. Upon assuming the
Presidency, George W. Bush began to include the cost of the
peacekeeping mission in Kosovo in his fiscal year 2001 budget request.
I supported President Bush on that initiative because it made good
fiscal sense. Twice I have offered amendments to the Defense
appropriations bills to urge the President to add the costs of the wars
in Iraq and Afghanistan to his budget.
These amendments were approved by strong bipartisan majorities of the
Senate. The first time I offered the amendment on July 17, 2003, it was
approved 81 to 15. The second time I offered the amendment on June 24,
2004, it received even broader support and was approved 89 to 9. Each
time, this sense-of-the-Senate provision was included in the Defense
Appropriations Act and signed into law by the President.
Today, I offer an amendment that follows up on the Senate's call for
the President to budget for the cost of the wars in Iraq and
Afghanistan. Let us just have truth in accounting. This is honest
accounting. We are letting the American people know how much they are
paying for these wars.
This amendment builds on the sense-of-the-Senate language that has
been approved by strong bipartisan majorities of the Senate in each of
the last 2 years. Once again, this provision urges the President to
budget for the cost of the war in Iraq and the war in Afghanistan.
However, my amendment today goes further and urges the President to
submit an amended budget request for the cost of the wars to Congress
no later than September 1, 2005.
Although the White House should have budgeted for this war long ago,
this provision ratchets up the pressure on the administration to submit
to Congress an estimate of the cost of the war for fiscal year 2006.
Hopefully, this will be the first step in restoring some sanity to the
President's budget request that has so far ignored the enormous costs
of military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.
This amendment also contains a section of findings that illustrate
many of the points I have already made in urging the President to
budget for the war. These findings emphasize the legislative history of
the Senate urging the President to budget for the wars in Iraq and
Afghanistan. The findings also present some of the conclusions reached
by the Congressional Research Service about the funding of previous
military operations through the regular appropriations process.
Finally, this amendment includes a reporting requirement that would
help keep Congress informed--help keep us informed. We are elected by
``we the people,'' the first three words in the preamble of the
Constitution. We are hearing a lot about the Constitution these days,
and we are going to hear more. I am going to have a few things to say
about it before it is over.
As I said, this amendment includes a reporting requirement that would
help to keep Congress informed about the real costs of the wars in Iraq
and Afghanistan. This provision would require the Department of Defense
to provide Congress with the specific amounts that have been spent to
date--what is wrong with that?--for each of the wars in Iraq and
Afghanistan. Currently, the Pentagon prefers to report only a single
figure that combines the cost of these two wars, but Congress and the
American people ought to know the exact cost of the war in Afghanistan.
They ought to know the exact cost of the war that was forced upon our
country in Afghanistan, and they need to know the cost of the war in
Iraq, the war that the administration chose to begin, the invasion that
the administration chose to set forth. These wars should not be
confused one with the other. They are two different wars, and we should
say so right up front. We should know the amount of money we spend in
each.
In addition, this report would require the Pentagon to keep the
Congress continually informed of estimates of military operations in
Iraq and in Afghanistan for the next year so that Congress can have the
better lens with which to look upon future budgets for our military.
This is nothing but right. The elected representatives of the people
sitting in this body ought to know these things. We are representing
the American people in our States and throughout the country. What is
wrong with our telling them right up front? We need to know these
things. I have a responsibility to my people back home. Not only that,
but I have a responsibility to my children, my grandchildren, and to
their children. Each of us has that responsibility, and we ought to ask
for this information. We ought to insist on it.
Once again, the Senate should send a message to the administration
that it ought to budget for the costs of the wars in Iraq and
Afghanistan. My amendment sends that message in clear terms. I urge my
colleagues to join me in approving this sense-of-the-Senate amendment
with another strong bipartisan vote.
I call up my amendment No. 464.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, the pending amendment will
be set aside. The clerk will report.
The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

The Senator from West Virginia [Mr. Byrd] proposes an
amendment numbered 464.

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading of
the amendment be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The amendment is as follows:

On page 169, between lines 8 and 9, insert the following:

requests for future funding for military operations in afghanistan and
iraq

Sec. 1122. (a) Findings.--The Senate makes the following
findings:
(1) The Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2004
(Public Law 108-87) and the Department of Defense
Appropriations Act, 2005 (Public Law 108-287) each contain a
sense of the Senate provision urging the President to provide
in the annual budget requests of the President for a fiscal
year under section 1105(a) of title 31, United States Code,
an estimate of the cost of ongoing military operations in
Iraq and Afghanistan in such fiscal year.
(2) The budget for fiscal year 2006 submitted to Congress
by the President on February 7, 2005, requests no funds for
fiscal year

[[Page S3788]]

2006 for ongoing military operations in Iraq or Afghanistan.
(3) According to the Congressional Research Service, there
exists historical precedent for including the cost of ongoing
military operations in the annual budget requests of the
President following initial funding for such operations by
emergency or supplemental appropriations Acts, including--
(A) funds for Operation Noble Eagle, beginning in the
budget request of President George W. Bush for fiscal year
2005;
(B) funds for operations in Kosovo, beginning in the budget
request of President George W. Bush for fiscal year 2001;
(C) funds for operations in Bosnia, beginning in budget
request of President Clinton for fiscal year 1997;
(D) funds for operations in Southwest Asia, beginning in
the budget request of President Clinton for fiscal year 1997;
(E) funds for operations in Vietnam, beginning in the
budget request of President Johnson for fiscal year 1966; and
(F) funds for World War II, beginning in the budget request
of President Roosevelt for fiscal year 1943.
(4) The Senate has included in its version of the fiscal
year 2006 budget resolution, which was adopted by the Senate
on March 17, 2005, a reserve fund of $50,000,000,000 for
overseas contingency operations, but the determination of
that amount could not take into account any Administration
estimate on the projected cost of such operations in fiscal
year 2006.
(5) In February 2005, the Congressional Budget Office
estimated that fiscal year 2006 costs for ongoing military
operations in Iraq and Afghanistan could total
$65,000,000,000.
(b) Sense of Senate.--It is the sense of the Senate that--
(1) any request for funds for a fiscal year after fiscal
year 2006 for an ongoing military operation overseas,
including operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, should be
included in the annual budget of the President for such
fiscal year as submitted to Congress under section 1105(a) of
title 31, United States Code;
(2) the President should submit to Congress, not later than
September 1, 2005, an amendment to the budget of the
President for fiscal year 2006 that was submitted to Congress
under section 1105(a) of title 31, United States Code,
setting forth detailed cost estimates for ongoing military
operations overseas during such fiscal year; and
(3) any funds provided for a fiscal year for ongoing
military operations overseas should be provided in
appropriations Acts for such fiscal year through
appropriations to specific accounts set forth in such
appropriations Acts.
(c) Additional Requirements for Certain Reports.--(1) Each
semiannual report to Congress required under a provision of
law referred to in paragraph (2) shall include, in addition
to the matters specified in the applicable provision of law,
the following:
(A) A statement of the cumulative total of all amounts
obligated, and of all amounts expended, as of the date of
such report for Operation Enduring Freedom.
(B) A statement of the cumulative total of all amounts
obligated, and of all amounts expended, as of the date of
such report for Operation Iraqi Freedom.
(C) An estimate of the reasonably foreseeable costs for
ongoing military operations to be incurred during the 12-
month period beginning on the date of such report.
(2) The provisions of law referred to in this paragraph are
as follows:
(A) Section 1120 of the Emergency Supplemental
Appropriations Act for Defense and for the Reconstruction of
Iraq and Afghanistan, 2004 (Public Law 108-106; 117 Stat.
1219; 10 U.S.C. 113 note).
(B) Section 9010 of the Department of Defense
Appropriations Act, 2005 (Public Law 108-287; 118 Stat. 1008;
10 U.S.C. 113 note).

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Idaho.
Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I rise to speak about immigration and the
issue that will be before us for two very important votes tomorrow. My
colleague from Alabama is also in the Chamber. I will take the allotted
time under the unanimous consent, and then I think he wants to spend
more time on these issues.
What I find very fascinating is that everyone who has come to the
Senate floor this afternoon to talk about immigration agrees that our
country is in near crisis at this moment for our inability to control
our borders, to stem the tide of illegal movement into our country, and
to fashion comprehensive or targeted immigration law that effectively
works. Simply put, our Federal Government has to do better. It has to
move faster in improving our border security and meeting this
phenomenally large and important issue of illegal immigration.
Congress is no further along today on a comprehensive bill than it
was a year ago at this time when my bill, the AgJOBS bill, had a
thorough hearing before the Judiciary Committee. It is now well over
1,300 days since we woke up after 9/11 with thousands of our country
men and women dead and a phenomenal frightening awakening on the part
of the American people that there were millions of undocumented foreign
nationals living in our country.
As I said earlier, while most of them are law-abiding, are here to
work, and are extremely hard-working people, we found out tragically
enough that there were some here with evil intent, and we began to
control our borders. I think that is why Congress then again started
beefing up border patrol and buying high-tech verification systems for
the Department of Homeland Security, and that is why, whether one
agrees on the specific methods or not, the House of Representatives
just attached to the legislation we are talking about this afternoon a
national driver's license standard and asylum changes, those seeking
asylum in our country, in the so-called REAL ID provisions to the Iraq
supplemental. That is why I have supported a Byrd amendment on this
bill to take money away from certain portions of this bill that are not
immediately necessary for our troops for their security and allow our
border security to hire more investigators and enforcement agents to
boost up that whole area we are so concerned about.
That is why I am cosponsoring a bill that helps States deal with
undocumented criminal aliens. We must get it right everywhere if we are
going to reinstate in our country secure borders and functional
immigration law. That is why I have worked for the last good number of
years on AgJOBS. We talk about it here today. What does it mean? It
means Agricultural Job Opportunities, Benefits and Security Act. That
is why we are on the floor of the Senate today.
Some would argue we ought to be doing the Iraqi supplemental because
it is urgent. None of this money is immediately necessary in Iraq. The
House took 2 months to craft it. We are going to take a few days to
pass it. But I must tell you as I have before, I believe the crisis in
immigration today is every bit as significant. No matter the money we
pour along the borders, still our borders are not under control,
especially our southern border.
Senator Kennedy came to the floor a few moments ago to give a very
comprehensive analysis of how he and I, and now over 500 groups, have
come together to try to resolve the issue of immigration, specific to
American agriculture. Those are the issues at hand at this moment. We
are not in any way obstructing the process. This afternoon could have
been filled with amendments on the supplemental if those who have
amendments would have been here to offer them. We are simply taking
time in the debate. We will have those votes tomorrow. If Senators
Saxby Chambliss and Jon Kyl do not get the necessary 60 votes, or I do
not on these issues, they will be set aside. But they will not go away,
because I do believe, as I think most Americans believe, somehow we
have to get this right. Somehow it is necessary to do so.
I am committed to making this debate as brief as possible. That is
why I agreed to a unanimous consent request to conform it and to shape
it, but to allow a full and fair and necessary debate. As far as I am
concerned, a thorough debate on AgJOBS does not need to take a multiple
of days or months. Every Senator knows this issue. Every Senator knows
his and her constituents are upset at this moment because somehow
Congress has failed to deal with this issue. I have received my fair
share of criticism from some of my constituents for offering AgJOBS. I
smiled and said: You sent me to work in Washington to solve a problem.
I brought the solution to that problem. I believe it is the right one.
No one else, except for those this afternoon, has brought a second
solution. I welcome all Senators to get involved in this debate and
understand the issues. But most importantly, we cannot do what past
Congresses have done or what we have done for the over 1,300 days since
9/11, look over our shoulder and say: Oh, boy, that is a big problem;
and, oh, boy, our borders are at risk and, yes, some of those illegals
could be here to do us harm, but we can't seem to get our hands around
it because it is such a complicated issue.
I do not dispute its complications. But I am frustrated that the
Senate and the House have literally not been able to act. I believe the
Senate has had enough time. As I mentioned earlier, we have seen this
bill when it was

[[Page S3789]]

before the Judiciary Committee. I think most of my colleagues know
about AgJOBS. Yes, 63 Senators supported it last year. We are now
nearly at 50 at this time. Clearly a large number do support it. I
think that is extremely important that we do. It is so necessary that
we move appropriately to solve this problem and solve it in a timely
fashion. This now gives us an opportunity to do that.
As I said to my colleagues, I have worked on this issue with numerous
communities of interest for nearly 5 years to craft what we believe is
one of the best approaches to solving the problem, not only recognizing
that illegals, the undocumented are a problem in our country, but once
they are here, and if they are here illegally, how do we treat them?
How does the agricultural economy provide for them and respond to them
while they are so necessary in that workforce? That is what is embodied
in AgJOBS. It is not simply a threshold of how you transition through.
It is in reality a major reform of the H-2A program.
Let's continue with this issue. I am going to stop at this moment. My
colleague Senator Sessions is on the floor. I need to step away a few
moments. I know he has important things to say--many that I agree with,
but there are some I do not agree with.
Don't kick this ball down the field to another day. We look now at a
comprehensive piece of legislation. It is very necessary we attempt to
solve it now, get this Congress involved, and tell the American people
we hear them, we know our national security is at risk, and in this
instance our food security is at risk. We need to solve a very
important problem.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Alabama.
Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Idaho. Senator
Craig is one of my favorite Members of the Senate. We agree on many
things. We have not agreed on this one.
Yes, I think we all understand we are dealing with a broad,
important, and complex issue. It does require us to give it some
thought. But the point of the matter is we are being asked to vote on
AgJOBS tomorrow. People are going to have to cast a vote on this bill.
I urge you not to vote for this legislation, because it should not be
on the Defense supplemental and, second, because it is flawed,
seriously flawed. It is not consistent with what I think are the views
of most Members of Congress or the American people on how we ought to
handle this matter.

I mentioned briefly earlier how the process toward amnesty works in
this legislation. I would like to refer to this chart. I think it makes
the point rather simply. I do not think it is disputed.
You have people who came here illegally. Perhaps they are in the
country, perhaps they have already gone back to their home country, but
they have violated our law by coming here, both in coming here and in
working illegally for some firm or company.
If they have done that and if, within 18 months of December 31 of
last year, 2004, they have worked 100 workdays--and they have defined a
workday in the act as 1 hour, so that could be 100 hours of work--they
earn what the proponents of this legislation say they are earning:
their right to be here.
They are being paid for this, presumably. They didn't come here to
work for not being paid. They came for a salary they are willing to
accept. They work here for 100 hours. Then they become a lawful,
temporary resident. Then all of a sudden someone who was here
unlawfully is now converted to a lawful resident.
A number of things occur after that. If they have family here, a
spouse or children--one, two, three, four, five, six--and that spouse
or those children may have been here 6 weeks, the spouse and children
are entitled to stay as long as the person who now has become a lawful,
temporary resident; and within the next 6 years, if that person is
employed in agriculture for 2,060 hours--the average worker works about
2000 hours a year, so that would be about 1 year out of 6, being paid
for this--they have therefore earned legal permanent resident status.
That is pretty significant, legal permanent residency, because if you
become a legal permanent resident, then you are no longer an indentured
servant. You are not required to work in agriculture. You can work on
any job you want.
It might be this court reporting job right here.
I don't know what they want to work on. They became a legal,
permanent resident. They can wait for 5 years, and then they are
virtually guaranteed a citizenship unless they are convicted--charged,
convicted--of a felony or convicted of three misdemeanors. A
misdemeanor can be a pretty serious offense sometimes.
I am not sure we want somebody to want to come here to commit a bunch
of misdemeanors. You don't usually get caught for all of them. People
do things and half the time they do not get caught at all. If you catch
a victim twice on a misdemeanor, that can be very serious.
Then they are given citizenship.
By the way, if their children are not here, have never been here, and
they became a lawful, permanent resident, they can send for them--one,
two, or five members. They can come on down and be a part of the United
States and be on the road to citizenship, even though maybe that was
never the intention. Maybe it was never the intention, to begin with,
for their family to come here.
Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, will the Senator yield?
Mr. SESSIONS. Yes.
Mr. CRAIG. The Senator is making a very interesting point. Has the
Senator looked at the Bureau of Labor Statistics' numbers of those they
believe--if the law were passed--are AgJOBS eligible?
Mr. SESSIONS. About a million.
Mr. CRAIG. About 500,000 is what they estimate. When you do all of
the very thorough background checks we have within it that are
consistent with immigration law today, they figure a certain number
would fall out, and then there are the wives and dependents. A very
large number of these are not married. They have no immediate family--
about 200,000 more. It is reasonable to say the Department of Labor is
looking at a total number of workers, spouse, and dependents of upwards
of possibly 700,000. I know millions and millions are talked about. I
believe that is unrealistic based on the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Does the Senator disagree with those figures?
Mr. SESSIONS. I will say it this way: I will say it is very likely to
be a million.
Mr. CRAIG. Based on what figures?
Mr. SESSIONS. Close to a million, if you take the figure of 700,000.
I am not sure we have thought it through.
The Senator, I believe--who was here in 1987 when the 1986 amnesty
was passed--would admit that the estimate of how many people would take
advantage of it was very low. In fact, I believe three times as many
people took advantage of that amnesty as the estimators estimated. It
could happen here. I don't know.
Mr. CRAIG. I don't disagree with that. But the criteria was entirely
different. If I could be so kind, I think my colleague is mixing apples
and oranges and getting an interesting blend of a new juice. An earned
status approach has never been used before. The full background check,
and the thoroughness of that background check as we anticipate in this
legislation, is only used when you have a legal immigrant standing in
line. In fact, our law is more stringent for illegal than it is for the
legal immigrant because they can get the misdemeanors. We say, if you
get a misdemeanor with 6 months' incarceration, that is pretty serious.
The Senator from Alabama is an attorney. Would he agree with that? They
are out of here. There is a much different criteria when you start
comparing the total numbers. That is why I think they would be
different.
Mr. SESSIONS. The act says three convictions of misdemeanors. The
Senator is right. It can be up to 6 months or a year.
Mr. CRAIG. Then they are deported.
Mr. SESSIONS. Not if there are two convictions.
Mr. CRAIG. That is correct. That is the current law. That is what
current law says for the illegal immigrant.
Mr. SESSIONS. It is in the legislation.
Mr. CRAIG. It is in the law.
Mr. SESSIONS. For those here illegally and want amnesty to be given
even though they have already violated immigration laws.

[[Page S3790]]

Mr. CRAIG. I thank my colleague for yielding. What is important is
the bill be read very thoroughly. Extrapolations can be made. But when
it says 100 hours of work, I think it is important to assume you would
only work 1 hour a day for 100 days. That is not a very logical
process.
I thank the Senator for yielding.
Mr. SESSIONS. I agree with the Senator on that. I will disagree with
the concept that somehow, by working here, coming here, and getting a
job you wanted to get when you came, that that is somehow earning
something, if you did it illegally. You are getting what you wanted,
which was pay for the work.
That is what I would point out. Then, a family would be automatically
eligible to come into the country. I don't think there is any dispute
about that.

If a person came here illegally, if they worked here 18 months and
met those qualifications of 100 workdays, or 565 hours, I believe--
either way, it is not very much--they can come even though they are not
here now. In other words, if they did that illegally, worked here and
for some reason went back home, then they are getting a letter from
Uncle Sam saying, By the way, we know you violated our law but we are
in a forgiving mood. You can come on back and join the process toward
citizenship and bring your family, too.
I am not sure that is what we want to do. I don't think it is what we
want to do. That is the fundamental of this legislation.
I think that is what you call amnesty. Not only does it give the
person what they wanted in terms of being able to come into the country
and get a job and be paid, that puts them on a track--unless they get
seriously conflicted with the law--to be a permanent resident and then
even a citizen, and their children and family can be on that same
track.
That is a big deal. That is what I am saying. It is not something we
need to be rushing into on this legislation today.
Under section 101(d)(8), entitled ``Eligibility for Legal Services,''
it is required under the act that free, federally funded legal counsel
be afforded, through the Legal Services Corporation, to assist
temporary workers in the application process for adjustment to lawful
permanent resident status.
American workers are not always available for that. They have to meet
other standards such as need and that sort of thing.
Also, the act gives several advantages to foreign workers not
provided to American workers. Look at this.
Section 101(b), rights of aliens granted temporary resident status.
Right here--temporary resident status.
Terms of employment respecting aliens admitted under this section, A,
prohibition.
Quoting:

No alien granted temporary resident status under subsection
A may be terminated from employment by any employer during
the period of temporary resident status except for just
cause.

Then they set up a big process for this. There is a complaint
process. The subsection sets out a process for filing complaints for
termination without just cause. If reasonable cause exists, the
Secretary shall initiate binding arbitration proceedings and pay the
fee and expenses of the arbitrator. Attorneys' fees will be the
responsibility of each party. The complaint process does not preclude
``any other rights an employee may have under applicable law.''
That means they could file under this process for unjust termination
and hire a plaintiffs lawyer and sue the business for whatever else you
want to sue them for.

Any fact or finding made by the arbitrator shall not be
conclusive or binding in any separate action--

That is the action filed in the court by plaintiffs' lawyer--

or subsequent action or proceeding between the employee and
the employer.

I submit to you, by the language of this statute, it would appear
they intend for that to be admissible, if not binding. It says not
binding but the implication would be it would be admissible.
This means an employer cannot allow that arbitration proceeding to go
without an attorney. He will have to hire an attorney and go down there
because things will go wrong and that will be used against him in any
civil action that might take place. They have to pay counsel in both
places.
This section will override State laws in America. In Alabama, unless
you enter into a contract that states otherwise for employment, your
work for an employer is at will. Contracts of employment at will mean
just that: it is the will of either party. Employees can quit at will
and employers can terminate at will, with cause or without cause, and
for no reason, good or bad reason.
That is the way I think it is in most States. Certainly that is true
in my State. This provision will mean illegal aliens who file for
amnesty under the AgJOBs amendment, after coming here illegally in
violation of our law, are guaranteed to have a job unless they are
terminated for just cause. If the AgJOBS amendment passes, employers of
aliens given amnesty will be subject to forced and binding arbitration
regarding the termination of the alien, and they will have to cover
their legal bills for the defense in arbitrations even if the
arbitrator finds they had just cause to terminate the alien.
I suggest what we are about here is a provision for greater
protection for a foreign worker, one not only who is foreign but who
previously violated American law. If you were an employer and you need
to lay off one person, and you have two working for you, and one would
have the ability to take you through arbitration and argue that you did
not have just cause, and the other one had no such rights, you might
fire the American citizen first, not the foreigner.
There is another provision I will talk about later that deals with
the filing of the application. The Senator says they will be doing
background checks. I see nothing in here that provides for background
checks. It requires an application to be filed to become a temporary
resident. Get this: It can be filed with two groups who are called
``qualified designated entities.'' That can be an employer group who
wants workers to come here to work for them, or a labor group. And they
are qualified entities. The application is filed with them.
It prohibits giving the application to the Secretary of Homeland
Security unless a lawyer has read it first. It says the entities that
receive this application cannot give it to the Secretary unless they
are conducting a fraud investigation. How would they know to conduct
one if they haven't seen the documents? It might be fraudulent.
It is a rather weird idea, is antigovernment, and seems to be far
more concerned with protecting an applicant who may be committing fraud
than protecting the security and the laws of the United States.
I yield the floor.
Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I would like to express my opposition
to the AgJOBS bill as it is currently drafted.
This is a very complicated bill. It is a magnet for illegal
immigration. It has not been reviewed by the Judiciary Committee. We do
not know how many people would be affected by it.
Rather, it has come to the floor as an amendment to the supplemental
appropriations bill.
This is not the place for this bill. I believe it is a mistake to
pass this bill on an emergency supplemental that is designed to provide
help for our military, fighting in extraordinary circumstances.
That is why I cosponsored an amendment with Senator Cornyn saying
that the place to do these amendments is through the regular order,
beginning in the Immigration Subcommittee of the Judiciary Committee.
This amendment passed by a vote of 61 to 38.
And that is why I will vote against cloture on the AgJOBS bill and on
the other complicated immigration amendment, the Chambliss-Kyl
amendment.
If, however, cloture is invoked, then I plan on offering several
amendments that I believe will improve the bill.
If these amendments are approved by the full body, or are later
incorporated into the bill through an appropriate Judiciary Committee
markup, then I would be prepared to support the bill.
But otherwise, it is my intention to vote against the bill. I simply
cannot support the bill in good conscience as it is.
I believe the bill as drafted is a huge magnet. The Judiciary
Committee has

[[Page S3791]]

not had a chance to review it, amend it, mark it up. And it does not
belong on a supplemental appropriations bill.
We know that people come to this country illegally.
They come for many different reasons. Some out of fear of
persecution, some for work, all for opportunity.
In 2000, it was estimated that there were 7 million unauthorized
aliens in this country. And by 2002, this number had grown to 9.3
million. These are Census numbers reported in the CRS Report on
Immigration, updated 4/08/05.
In agriculture, approximately 1.25 million, or about 50 percent of
the agricultural work force, are illegal workers--600,000 of whom live
and work in California. These numbers are from the Department of Labor.
Many of these workers have been here for years, have worked hard,
brought their families here, and have built their lives here.
With respect to agricultural work, I know that it is extraordinarily
difficult, if not impossible, to get Americans to work in agricultural
labor.
I did not believe it. Several years ago we contacted every welfare
office in the State. And every welfare office in the State told us that
once they put a sign up, no one responded.
So I think it is the right thing to do to give the workers who have
been here for a substantial period of time, who have been working in
agriculture, who have been good members of society, and who will
continue to work in agriculture, a way to adjust their status.
What I do not support is creating a magnet that draws large
additional numbers of illegal immigration. Not only would this have a
detrimental effect on our society, but it would harm the people we are
trying to help through this bill.
Here is why: An influx in illegal immigrants would flood the labor
market, make jobs more difficult to find, and drive down wages.
For those of you who doubt the magnet effect, you have only to
examine what happened when President Bush announced his guest worker
proposal early last year.
Despite the fact that the President's proposal had no path to
legalization, the mere announcement of the proposal fueled a rush along
the Southwest border.
The Los Angeles Time on May 16, 2004, reported: ``detentions of
illegal immigrants along the border . . . have risen 30% over the first
seven months of the fiscal year, a period that includes the four months
since Bush announced his plan.''
Similarly, the San Diego Union Tribune on January 27, 2004, reported:
``U.S. Border Patrol officials report a 15 percent increase in the use
of fraudulent documents at the world's busiest land border crossing
[San Ysidro]. And more than half of those caught using phony documents
say the president's offer of de facto amnesty motivated them to attempt
to sneak into the United States.''
Does anyone doubt that this increase was related to anything but the
President's proposal? Of course not.
When I raised the concern with the authors of the legislation, that
this legislation would be a magnet that would attract large numbers,
they seemed to believe that the fact that the bill only applies to
those who were in this country and working in agriculture as of
December 31, 2004, would be sufficient to deter people from illegal
entry.
I do not believe that is the case. I think people will see that they
only need 100 days of work to qualify for temporary residence; they
will not be deterred by the operative date, and will say, ``I'll find a
job, work 100 days, and then I'm legal and can bring my family.''
The first two of these amendments I would like to offer would
increase the time someone must demonstrate he or she has been in the
United States working in agriculture in order to qualify for temporary
and permanent residence.
This would discourage others from coming to this country, and help
those who have been here for many years.
Here is what the first amendment would do. In order to qualify for
temporary residence, workers would have to demonstrate that they have
worked for at least three years in agricultural work prior to December
31, 2004.
For each of the 3 years, the worker would be required to show 100
work-days, or 575 hours, per year in agriculture.
Here is what the second amendment would do. In order to qualify for
permanent residence, a green card, workers would have to show that they
have worked at least 5 years in agricultural work following enactment
of the bill. For each of the five years, the worker would again have to
demonstrate 100 work-days, or 575 hours, per year.
So by extending the length of time a worker needs to have worked both
in the past and the future, these amendments reduce the incentives for
more illegal immigration.
The next amendment addresses another major concern that I have.
The bill currently allows someone with one or two misdemeanor
criminal convictions in the United States to apply for temporary
residence or a green card. I think this is a mistake.
So the amendment I am offering strikes this language and ensures that
those with criminal records do not qualify for benefits--if they have
even one criminal conviction in the United States, or anywhere.

I believe that no one who has a criminal conviction should be the
recipient of temporary residence or a green card under this program.
Misdemeanors include petty theft, simple assault against persons,
driving under the influence, certain drug offenses, and misdemeanor
battery.
In some States, they include cases of child abuse or domestic abuse,
public assistance fraud, or abandonment of a child under the age of 10.
I do not believe we should allow anyone to apply for a benefit as
significant as a green card under this bill if they have committed any
crime, let alone the two misdemeanors that the bill currently allows.
The final amendment I am offering would prohibit workers who are
living outside the United States from applying for temporary residence
under this bill.
The bill allows those living in other countries to apply for benefits
under this bill--as long as they can demonstrate the appropriate time
spent in agricultural work in the United States prior to their
departure from this country.
This means that someone could come to the United States illegally,
work here illegally, return to their home country, and still apply for
a green card under this bill. This simply makes no sense.
If we are going to give agricultural workers a way to adjust their
status, let us limit it to those who are living and working in this
country.
California is the No. 1 agriculture-producing State in the Nation.
I recognize that this status is based on the hard work of people who
have been living on the edges of our society, living in fear, and
constantly worried about being removed from this country.
It is time for the Government to recognize that these people have
made a substantial contribution to our country and offer them a way to
adjust their status.
Remember, there are already 1.25 million agricultural workers here
illegally, 600,000 in California.
These amendments would concentrate on their adjustment of status,
thereby moving the workers and their families from the shadows and
allowing them temporary, and subsequently, permanent legal status.
But I think that we have to be careful in how we proceed--if we do it
the right way, we can help those who have been working in agriculture
for many years and who have been good, upstanding members of society.
These are the people we should be trying to help: They have children,
many of whom are born here and are U.S. citizens. They have paid taxes.
Some have bought homes. They have worked hard for everything they have
gotten. They have been good, productive members of society.
But if we do it the wrong way--we will actually cause great harm to
the agriculture workers who have been here for years--we will create a
magnet, flooding the borders, pushing down wages, and making it more
difficult to find work.
These are simple, commonsense amendments.
As I said before, I would have preferred to do this in committee
where we could have the time necessary to consider such complicated
legislation.

[[Page S3792]]

But if we are to pass an agricultural workers bill, let it be one
that helps those who have contributed to our society and one that will
not cause great harm to our Nation.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Texas.
Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, I was looking on our desks at the bill
that is actually supposed to be the subject of this debate. It is 231
pages long. It provides an emergency appropriation to help pay for our
ongoing global war on terror. I remind my colleagues that is the stated
purpose for this Senate time.
Indeed, last week 60 of my colleagues joined me in saying that
national security demands the passage of this bill unencumbered by a
premature debate on immigration reform.
Listening to our colleague from Alabama and others who have spoken to
this subject, we are getting a better sense of how complicated this
issue is and why it is so important, as 61 of us said last week, that
we proceed with this emergency appropriation for the ongoing global war
on terror and reserve enactment of comprehensive immigration reform for
a few months hence, after we have had a chance to go through the
appropriate committees of the Congress, the Subcommittee on
Immigration, Border Security, and Citizenship that I chair in the
Judiciary Committee. Chairman Specter of the full committee has
promised an expedited markup once we are able to go through the regular
order and develop a comprehensive plan.
Notwithstanding the sense of the Senate by 61 Members that we should
not engage in this premature debate and risk bogging down this
important bill to provide financing to our troops in the battlefield,
here we are.
What is it that the problem of this bill, the so-called AgJOBS
amendment, seeks to fix? I suggest it does not purport to fix our
porous borders. It does nothing to provide additional resources to our
beleaguered Border Patrol and others who are doing the very best they
can to try to secure our borders. We know not only do people come
across those borders to work, but the same people who will smuggle
those workers across the border are the same people who can smuggle
terrorists or criminals or others who want to do us ill across those
borders. So AgJOBS, just so everyone understands, does not purport to
deal with that problem.
Does this bill purport to deal with another glaring deficiency we
have; that is, a lack of detention facilities for those people our
Border Patrol do catch and detain at the border so we do not have to
continue in what is sometimes called a catch and release program where
detainees, people who cross illegally are detained but because we do
not have adequate facilities are released and they merely try again,
and perhaps try and try and try until they finally make their way
across the border and into the interior of the United States and simply
melt into the landscape? This bill does not have anything to do with
that. It will not fix that problem. Nor does this bill provide
additional resources and equipment to our Border Patrol who, as I
indicate, are outmanned and underequipped.
This AgJOBS amendment, nor the alternative offered by Senator
Chambliss and Senator Kyl, does not purport to deal with the problem of
40 percent of the illegal immigration in this country coming from
overstays. By that I mean people who come here legally on a student
visa or a tourist visa or some other short-term legal authorization but
simply blow past that deadline and, here again, become part of that
population estimated to be somewhere on the order of 10 million
people--although we really do not know--who are currently living in the
United States outside of our laws. This bill does not purport to even
address that.
It does not do a better job of helping identify who is in our country
and why they are here, why they chose to come outside of our laws and
live in the shadows. It does not help us do a better job of identifying
them and asserting what their purposes are in our country--whether they
are criminals, whether they are potential terrorists, or whether they
are people coming here simply to work.
This AgJOBS bill also does not deal with the difficulty involved with
employers who want to try to ascertain the legal status of their
workforce. It does not help them by providing them a database of
workers who are lawfully in the country and who are authorized to
accept employment. So employers have to persist in doing the best they
can in trying to fill the jobs that go wanting for lack of workers by
hiring people they perhaps do not know but would have to admit, perhaps
in private conversations, are people who are here illegally outside of
our laws. This bill does not help them one bit. This bill does not
provide a database of workers who are actually authorized to work and
who are legally present in the country.
My point is, there are a lot of problems that confront our national
security, a lot of problems that confront our immigration system that
need to be addressed that are not addressed in this legislation. To the
contrary, rather than trying to address immigration reform
comprehensively, rather than trying to improve our border security, our
homeland security, by knowing who is in our country and why, rather
than providing us a better means of identifying those who, although
they begin in this country legally, overstay their time and become part
of the population that is here illegally, rather than help employers,
this bill does none of that. Instead, what it does is it deals with one
segment of the industry that has grown to depend on undocumented
workers, and that is the agriculture industry.
While I am sympathetic to their concerns, the problem is that it is
only one of the industries that relies on undocumented workers. You
could as easily file a bill and rather than call it an AgJOBS bill, you
could call it a restaurant workers bill, or a residential construction
workers bill, or a hotel workers bill, or any one of the number of
different industries that has, over time, grown to depend on
approximately 6 million people who constitute the illegal workforce
currently in the United States.
This bill does not purport to deal with any of those other industries
and thus chooses one over the other in a way that I think violates one
of the fundamental principles of American law, and that is that persons
similarly situated ought to be treated as equally as possible and not
in any favorable or discriminatory fashion.
So I think this bill, as premature as it is, as well intended as it
may be, does not help us solve a lot of the problems that can only be
addressed by comprehensive immigration reform. It actually does harm by
violating some of our basic principles of equal justice under the law.
It is important we deal with these problems.
I failed to mention one of the problems is we have approximately
400,000 absconders present in the country now and we simply do not have
the adequate human or other resources necessary to find out where they
are and to show them the way out of the country. Among these
absconders, unlike the rest of the population I mentioned, the some 10
million people, are individuals who have been convicted of serious
crimes, about 80,000 of them, and who simply have melted into the
landscape. As I say, we have about 400,000 absconders, including those
80,000, the difference being those who have simply exhausted all means
of appeal and review in our immigration system, who are under final
orders of deportation, but who, rather than be deported, have simply
gone underground. Here again, this is another issue this bill does not
deal with that comprehensive immigration reform would and that we
should.
What I fear will happen, because it may be tempting to try to fix our
immigration problems on a piecemeal basis, is piecemeal solutions and
efforts will risk undermining the larger effort and the need to enact
comprehensive reform. Indeed, I would venture a guess that if the
AgJOBS bill were successful, or even if the alternative offered by the
Senator from Georgia and the Senator from Arizona were to be
successful, there would be many in this Chamber, and perhaps around
this country, who would say: OK, now we have finished that job. We do
not need to look at any further immigration reform.
The only problem with that is they would be wrong, given the glaring
problems that do exist in our country and the challenges to our
national security and our ability to look ourselves in the mirror and
say, yes, we are a nation of laws, when, in fact, we have such
lawlessness existing among us for any one

[[Page S3793]]

of us to see, if we take the time to look at it.
Well, besides dealing with one industry, the AgJOBS bill also has
some very troublesome provisions which I think undermine its claimed
status as a temporary worker provision. Indeed, an estimated 860,000
illegal alien agricultural workers could qualify, and it also permits
them to bring their spouses and children, which could bring the total
number of AgJOBS beneficiaries to as many as 3 million people.
Now, the interesting thing about that is it does not stop at the
people who are already here who came into the country in violation of
our laws. Another startling provision of this bill actually invites
back to the United States certain aliens who were here illegally and
who performed the requisite 100 hours of agricultural work between July
2003 and December 2004 but who have already left. These aliens would be
allowed, under this AgJOBS bill, to drop off a ``preliminary
application'' at a designated port of entry along the southern land
border, pick up a work permit, and reenter the United States.

So not only are we dealing with people who are here now but people
who were here illegally and who have left. We are now saying: Come on
back and pick up a work permit and reenter this pathway toward full
American citizenship ahead of all of the other people who are playing
by the rules and waiting in line. That is wrong.
Another provision of this bill which I have some concerns about is
entitled ``Eligibility for Legal Services,'' which requires free,
federally funded legal counsel be afforded--that is, paid for--by
American taxpayer dollars through the Legal Services Corporation to
assist temporary workers in the application process for legal permanent
residency.
Not only does this bill deal with a specific industry and ignore the
rest of the industries that have come to rely, in significant part, on
undocumented workers, this invites into our country the spouses and
children of these workers--a total of some 3 million people
potentially. And these workers, of course, will not be here temporarily
if they are essentially setting up home in the United States.
There is a difference between an approach that says we will set up a
framework for people to come and work but then return to their country,
which is truly a temporary worker program, and one such as this which
says, don't just work and return, but work and stay and break in ahead
of the line of all the other people who have applied to come to this
country legally, even though you have chosen to do so otherwise. Beyond
that, we are going to provide you with a free lawyer.
I think it is not a stretch to say the AgJOBS bill will invite even
more lawsuits since it expands the ability of the Legal Services
Corporation to sue growers in several areas.
The reasons the current provisions of the law which deal with
agricultural workers have been unsuccessful are, No. 1, because the
caps are set too low and, No. 2, because it has become so bureaucratic
and burdened by regulation that it basically is not a viable
alternative for the agricultural industry, and growers have come to
expect excessive litigation as a result, which this AgJOBS bill would
do nothing to fix but would aggravate.
Let me speak briefly about the bill Senators Kyl and Chambliss have
offered today. It does compare favorably with some of the provisions in
the AgJOBS bill because it does not provide for amnesty. It does not
provide a path to U.S. citizenship automatically ahead of all of the
other people who have played by the rules and who have applied in the
regular course of our laws. It has many of the same failings I
mentioned earlier about being a partial solution to a real and
comprehensive problem.
I hope my colleagues will recall the vote they cast just last week,
when 61 of us voted on a sense of the Senate to say that this
appropriations bill, providing emergency funds for the warfighters, the
people risking their very lives to defend us in the global war on
terrorism, ought to take the front seat and that we ought to reserve
comprehensive immigration reform to a later date and not slow this bill
down because of that.
Having not resisted the temptation to get embroiled in an immigration
debate, I hope our colleagues will listen carefully to the half
solutions and the special interest legislation this represents. I don't
begrudge employers who need workers from trying to find a legal
solution to that. I am for doing that but on a comprehensive basis, not
just an industry-specific basis and particularly not on a basis that
provides additional benefits to these workers in the form of amnesty
that they would not otherwise be entitled to and denies other people
equal opportunity to participate in a temporary worker program.
As complicated as this issue is and as important as the debate is,
now is not the time to be engaging in it. Certainly now is not the time
to pass a partial solution which will undermine our ability to get
comprehensive immigration reform done.
It is my distinct impression that there is a big difference between
the thinking on the part of the advocates of the AgJOBS bill in this
Chamber and our colleagues on the other side of the Capitol.
Realistically, as part of this emergency appropriations bill, to get
the warfighters what they need in order to do the job we have asked
them to do and which they volunteered to do, I cannot see the other
Chamber agreeing to this ill-considered and premature immigration
legislation at this time.
I urge my colleagues to vote against both the AgJOBS bill, to vote
against the alternative offered by the Senators from Georgia and
Arizona, but at the same time to say, you are more than welcome, as we
work together for comprehensive reform, to work with us. We will try to
meet you halfway in working out a consensus on this very tough and
complex but important issue that should not be handled in the way they
have proposed to handle it.
I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. ISAKSON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order
for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

Amendment No. 429

Mr. ISAKSON. I ask unanimous consent to temporarily set aside the
amendment, and I ask that we call up amendment No. 429.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The clerk will report.
The legislative clerk read as follows:

The Senator from Georgia [Mr. Isakson] proposes an
amendment numbered 429.

Mr. ISAKSON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that further
reading of the amendment be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
(The amendment is printed in the Record of April 14, 2005 under
``Text of Amendments.'')
Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that at 5:30
today the Senate proceed to a vote in relation to the Byrd amendment
No. 464, with no second-degree amendments in order to the amendment
prior to the vote. It has been cleared on both sides.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. ISAKSON. Mr. President, given the pending time prior to the vote
we will have in a few minutes, I ask unanimous consent to address the
Senate as in morning business for 2 minutes.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
(The remarks of Mr. Isakson are printed in today's Record under
``Morning Business.'')
Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order
for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

Amendment No. 464

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to amendment No.
464 offered by the Senator from West Virginia, Mr. Byrd.
Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays on the
amendment.

[[Page S3794]]

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
There appears to be a sufficient second.
The clerk will call the roll.
The legislative clerk called the roll.
Mr. FRIST. The following Senators were necessarily absent: the
Senator from Missouri, (Mr. Bond), the Senator from Montana, (Mr.
Burns), and the Senator from Kentucky, Mr. McConnell.
Further, if present and voting, the Senator from Montana (Mr. Burns)
would have voted ``nay.''
Ms. STABENOW. I announce that the Senator from Delaware (Mr. Biden),
the Senator from Illinois, (Mr. Durbin), the Senator from Massachusetts
(Mr. Kerry), the Senator from Louisiana (Ms. Landrieu), and the Senator
from Illinois (Mr. Obama), are necessarily absent. I further announce
that, if present and voting, the Senator from Illinois (Mr. Durbin) and
the Senator from Illinois (Mr. Obama) would each vote ``aye.''
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Cornyn). Are there any other Senators in
the Chamber desiring to vote?
The result was announced--yeas 61, nays 31, as follows:

[Rollcall Vote No. 96 Leg.]

YEAS--61

Akaka
Allen
Baucus
Bayh
Bennett
Bingaman
Boxer
Byrd
Cantwell
Carper
Chafee
Clinton
Coburn
Coleman
Collins
Conrad
Corzine
Craig
Crapo
Dayton
Dodd
Dorgan
Feingold
Feinstein
Hagel
Harkin
Hatch
Hutchison
Inouye
Jeffords
Johnson
Kennedy
Kohl
Lautenberg
Leahy
Levin
Lieberman
Lincoln
McCain
Mikulski
Murray
Nelson (FL)
Nelson (NE)
Pryor
Reed
Reid
Rockefeller
Salazar
Sarbanes
Schumer
Smith
Snowe
Specter
Stabenow
Stevens
Sununu
Talent
Thune
Voinovich
Warner
Wyden

NAYS--31

Alexander
Allard
Brownback
Bunning
Burr
Chambliss
Cochran
Cornyn
DeMint
DeWine
Dole
Domenici
Ensign
Enzi
Frist
Graham
Grassley
Gregg
Inhofe
Isakson
Kyl
Lott
Lugar
Martinez
Murkowski
Roberts
Santorum
Sessions
Shelby
Thomas
Vitter

NOT VOTING--8

Biden
Bond
Burns
Durbin
Kerry
Landrieu
McConnell
Obama
The amendment (No. 464) was agreed to.
Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.
Mr. BYRD. I move to lay that motion on the table.
The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
Mr. REID. Mr. President, the Senators from Illinois, Mr. Durbin and
Mr. Obama, are necessarily absent today to attend the dedication and
opening of the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum in
Springfield, IL.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from West Virginia.
Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the pending
amendment be set aside so I might call up the amendment at the desk,
No. 463.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection? Without objection, it is
so ordered.

Amendment No. 463

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I send an amendment to the desk.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The legislative clerk read as follows:

The Senator from West Virginia [Mr. Byrd] proposes an
amendment numbered 463.

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of the
amendment be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The amendment is as follows:

(Purpose: To require a quarterly report on audits conducted by the
Defense Contract Audit Agency of task or delivery order contracts and
other contracts related to security and reconstruction activities in
Iraq and Afghanistan and to address irregularities identified in such
reports)

On page 169, between lines 8 and 9, insert the following:

audits of defense contracts in iraq and afghanistan

Sec. 1122. (a)(1) Not later than 90 days after the date of
the enactment of this Act, the Secretary of Defense, in
consultation with the Director of the Defense Contract Audit
Agency, shall submit to the Committee on Appropriations and
the Committee on Armed Services of the Senate and the
Committee on Appropriations and the Committee on Armed
Services of the House of Representatives a report that lists
and describes audits conducted by the Defense Contract Audit
Agency of task or delivery order contracts and other
contracts related to security and reconstruction activities
in Iraq and Afghanistan.
(2) The Secretary of Defense shall identify in the report
submitted under paragraph (1)--
(A) any such task or delivery order contract or other
contract that the Director of the Defense Contract Audit
Agency determines involves costs that are unjustified,
unsupported, or questionable, including any charges assessed
on goods or services not provided in connection with such
task or delivery order contract or other contract; and
(B) the amount of the unjustified, unsupported, or
questionable costs and the percentage of the total value of
such task or delivery order contract or other contract that
such costs represent.
(3) The Secretary of Defense shall submit to the Committee
on Appropriations and the Committee on Armed Services of the
Senate and the Committee on Appropriations and the Committee
on Armed Services of the House of Representatives an update
of the report submitted under paragraph (1) every 90 days
thereafter.
(b) In the event that any costs under a contract are
identified by the Director of the Defense Contract Audit
Agency as unjustified, unsupported, or questionable pursuant
to subsection (a)(2), the Secretary of Defense shall withhold
from amounts otherwise payable to the contractor under such
contract a sum equal to 115 percent of the total amount of
such costs.
(c) Upon a subsequent determination by the Director of the
Defense Contract Audit Agency that any unjustified,
unsupported, or questionable cost for which an amount payable
was withheld under subsection (b) has been justified,
supported, or answered, as the case may be, the Secretary of
Defense may release such amount for payment to the contractor
concerned.
(d) In each report or update submitted under subsection
(a), the Secretary of Defense shall describe each action
taken under subsection (b) or (c) during the period covered
by such report or update.

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, with this supplemental appropriations bill,
Congress will have appropriated $300 billion for military operations
and reconstruction activities in Iraq and Afghanistan. That is an
enormous sum of money. We say it is for the troops in the field, for
armor, weapons, equipment, and other mechanisms necessary to wage a
war. But a significant portion does not make it to the troops. Much of
it goes to defense contractors, corporate giants such as Halliburton
that profit from the military operations and defense expenditures of
the U.S. Government.
Halliburton reportedly has been awarded $11 billion in Iraq
contracts. The war in Iraq may symbolize a time of sacrifice for
American families, but for some--not all but for some--defense
contractors, the cold, hard truth is that Iraq has become an
opportunity to reap an enormous profit from American's decision to send
America's sons and daughters into war. It is incumbent upon the
Congress to be diligent in how these moneys are allocated to defense
contractors. It is incumbent upon the Congress to be thorough in its
oversight and to be meticulous in its accounting.
The administration has submitted five emergency supplemental spending
bills for Iraq and Afghanistan. The size of these supplemental requests
is massive, exceeding $80 billion this year, $25 million last year, and
$160 billion the year before that. Most of these costs are being
considered outside the checks and oversight of the regular budget and
appropriations process. It is a confusing and, at times, a beguiling
process that results in enormous sums of money flowing to contractors
in Iraq, oftentimes without adequate oversight. Such a process invites
waste, abuse, and fraud.
I don't belittle the role of defense contractors in Iraq. I belittle
the circumstances that the administration has fostered. I belittle the
suspicion that this administration has created by veiling its
contractor negotiations in secrecy, and the whirlwind of allegations of
misconduct and fraud that the administration has invited by not sharing
information with the people of the United States, the American public.
The American people have good reason to question the costs emanating
from contractors in Iraqi oil fields and Iraqi communities.
Three separate Government auditors have criticized contractor waste
in Iraq. Government investigators point

[[Page S3795]]

to unsubstantiated costs and to sloppy accounting. Fortune magazine's
analysis of Government reports found $2 billion of unjustified or
undocumented charges. The Pentagon's Defense Contract Audit Agency has
cited inadequacies and deficiencies in contractor billing systems,
along with unreasonable and illogical cost justification. The Wall
Street Journal reports that Pentagon auditors are investigating whether
Halliburton overcharged taxpayers by $212 million for delivering fuel
to Iraq.
Questions have arisen in the House of Representatives about why these
costs had been concealed from international auditors. The Government
Accountability Office has cited the risks of inadequate cost controls
for contractors in Iraq. The Coalition Provisional Authority's
inspector general cited millions of dollars in overcharges from
Halliburton employees indulging themselves at the Kuwait Hilton.
Imagine U.S. soldiers in the field forced to survive on military
rations and suffering the unbearable heat of the desert while
Halliburton employees enjoy the breakfast buffet in an air-conditioned
Hilton.
The House Government Reform Committee reported hundreds of millions
of dollars in waste by some contractors. A glance at the committee Web
site reveals tens of millions of dollars in questionable charges--task
order after task order showing $86 million in unexplained charges, $34
million in unsupported costs, $36 million in unjustified expenditures,
and so on and so on. Incredibly, the Defense Department--your Defense
Department, my Defense Department--is paying these charges, even though
their own auditors are telling them that the charges are unjustified.
One example reported in the Wall Street Journal: Halliburton's
Kellogg, Brown & Root charged taxpayers for dining facility services in
Iraq and Kuwait. Pentagon auditors flagged $200 million of unsupported
costs--that is a lot of money--$200 million of unsupported costs, but
the Defense Department released $145 million in compensation to
Kellogg, Brown & Root despite auditors' reservations and despite
Halliburton's inability to justify the charge.
It is the taxpayers--you people out there watching through those
lenses, those electronic lenses, watching the Senate floor, I am
talking about you--it is the taxpayers, your constituents, Mr.
President, my constituents, who are being charged for this tripe. It is
they who must bear the costs of such rip-offs. It is your money.
Our constituents read in the newspapers how lucrative contracts are
awarded without competition, how enormous rewards are handed to
campaign donors. Mention the name Halliburton, and, as Fortune magazine
quips, an image flashes in the public's mind of ``a giant corporation
engaged in shameless war profiteering--charging outrageous prices to
provide fuel for Iraqis and meals for American troops.''
Our constituencies, the people who send us here, are crying out for
Congress to assume a stronger oversight role and to assure them, the
people, that their moneys are being spent wisely. The amendment I have
offered today does exactly that. My amendment requires the Defense
Secretary to provide the Committee on Appropriations and the Armed
Services Committee with a quarterly report that lists and describes
questionable and unsupported contractor charges identified by Pentagon
auditors for Iraq and Afghanistan. The amendment requires the Defense
Secretary to withhold 100 percent of the payment for these charges and
to assess a penalty by withholding an additional amount equal to 15
percent of the unsupported charge. If Pentagon auditors can verify the
charges assessed by the contractor, that they are justifiable, then the
Defense Secretary can release the payment.
My amendment is common sense. We ought not to be paying for services
that have not been rendered. The American people ought not be paying
for services that have not been rendered. The American people ought not
be paying more than a fair market price. The American people ought not
allow contractors to think they can hoodwink the American citizen and
get away with it.
The American public is being asked to sacrifice to pay for this war.
The President's budget cuts investments in education, in health care,
in domestic priorities that impact every State of the Union in order to
pay for these military and reconstruction activities. Congress ought to
ensure--that is us--we ought to ensure that sacrifice is not wasted. We
ought to slap the knuckles--and slap them hard--of any contractor,
whether because of sloppy accounting or because of outright fraud, that
results in the American taxpayer being bilked.
I urge my colleagues to support the amendment. I urge its adoption.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Virginia.
Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I ask my distinguished colleague from West
Virginia if it would be in order to lay the amendment aside so I can
send to the desk another amendment.
Mr. BYRD. I have no objection.

Amendment No. 499

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I send amendment No. 499 to the desk.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The legislative clerk read as follows:

The Senator from Virginia [Mr. Warner], for himself, Mr.
Nelson of Florida, Mr. Allen, Mr. Talent, Ms. Collins, and
Mr. Warner, proposes an amendment numbered 499.

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent further reading of
the amendment be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The amendment is as follows:

(Purpose: Relating to the aircraft carriers of the Navy)

On page 169, between lines 8 and 9, insert the following:

aircraft carriers of the navy

Sec. 1122. (a) Funding for Repair and Maintenance of U.S.S.
John F. Kennedy.--Of the amount appropriated to the
Department of the Navy by this Act, and by the Department of
Defense Appropriations Act, 2005 (Public Law 108-287; 118
Stat. 954), an aggregate of $288,000,000 may be available
only for repair and maintenance of the U.S.S. John F.
Kennedy, and available to conduct such repair and maintenance
of the U.S.S. John F. Kennedy as the Navy considers
appropriate to extend the life of U.S.S. John F. Kennedy.
(b) Limitation on Reduction in Number of Active Aircraft
Carriers.--No funds appropriated or otherwise made available
by this Act, or any other Act, may be obligated or expended
to reduce the number of active aircraft carriers of the Navy
below 12 active aircraft carriers until the later of the
following:
(1) The date that is 180 days after the date of the
submittal to Congress of the quadrennial defense review
required in 2005 under section 118 of title 10, United States
Code.
(2) The date on which the Secretary of Defense, in
consultation with the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff,
certifies to Congress that such agreements have been entered
into to provide port facilities for the permanent forward
deployment of such numbers of aircraft carriers as are
necessary in the Pacific Command Area of Responsibility to
fulfill the roles and missions of that Command, including
agreements for the forward deployment of a nuclear aircraft
carrier after the retirement of the current two conventional
aircraft carriers.
(c) Active Aircraft Carriers.--For purposes of this
section, an active aircraft carrier of the Navy includes an
aircraft carrier that is temporarily unavailable for
worldwide deployment due to routing or scheduled maintenance.
Mr. WARNER. I am joined by the distinguished Senator from Florida,
Mr. Nelson, Senator Allen, Senator Martinez, Senator Talent, and
Senator Collins. I am prepared to give my statement in support.
I see the Senator from Vermont.
Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, if the Senator will yield, the Senator from
California, Mrs. Boxer, and I are waiting to speak about the tragic
death of Marla Ruzicka over the weekend in the form of eulogies. I
don't want to interrupt the work of the distinguished senior Senator
from Virginia, but when he is finished I am going to seek the floor--
both Senator Boxer and I--to give the eulogies, which will not take a
great deal of time, but they are important.
Mr. WARNER. I think the Senator is asking that he be recognized at
the conclusion of the introduction of this amendment. Senator Nelson
and I will be brief to accommodate our colleagues.
Mr. President, this amendment ensures that all necessary repair and
maintenance be accomplished on the USS John F. Kennedy to keep that
ship in active status. The amendment also requires the Navy to keep 12
aircraft

[[Page S3796]]

carriers until the later of several situations comes to the attention
of the Senate and the Congress: 180 days after the next Quadrennial
Defense Review is delivered to Congress, or the Secretary of Defense
has certified to Congress the necessary agreements have been entered
into to provide the port facilities for the permanent forward deployed
aircraft carriers deemed necessary to carry out the mission in their
area of responsibility.
The ship, the USS Kennedy, was scheduled to start overhaul this
coming summer. There was $334.7 million authorized and appropriated in
the fiscal year 2005 for that purpose. So none of the funds in the
underlying bill in any way are garnered by this amendment.
In the last-minute budget cut in late December, the decision was made
by the Department of Defense to defer maintenance and to decommission
the Kennedy.
The Chief of Naval Operations testified before the Senate Armed
Services Committee on February 10 of this year that all 12 aircraft
carriers were in his original budget request. He stated, however, that
``this action was driven by guidance'' from the office of Management
and Budget that ``led to the reduction of our overall budget.''
That repair and maintenance should go forward, starting this summer
as originally planned. It is premature to decommission this ship, which
was until this past December scheduled to remain in the fleet until
2018.
The great ship, the John F. Kennedy, returned from deployment on
December 13, 2004. I understand the ship is in good shape. In fact, in
the words of the battle group commander, whose flagship was the
Kennedy, the ship returned from deployment in ``outstanding material
condition.''
The primary analytical document on military force structure is the
Quadrennial Defense Review, or QDR. The QDR is, in the end, a
compilation of detailed analyses of what the Nation requires to execute
the National Military Strategy.
I believe Congress should show restraint when it comes to making
force structure decisions, and only do so in the context of the reports
and the analyses produced by the Department of Defense and such other
reports that may be relevant. In this case, however, the analyses that
are available to us supports a force structure of 12 aircraft carriers,
not 11.
I also believe that, at some point, the number of aircraft carriers
matters. If the aircraft carrier is not where the President needs it to
be when a crisis erupts, its capabilities, however awesome, are not
very meaningful.
The deliberations on the next QDR have already begun, in accordance
with the law, and it should be delivered by this time next year. It may
show, with analytical rigor, that the number of aircraft carriers can
be reduced. It may not.
Nowhere is naval power more important to the National Military
Strategy than in the Pacific Command Area of Responsibility.
After retirement of the USS Kitty Hawk in fiscal year 2008, the
Kennedy, if retained, would be the last remaining conventional aircraft
carrier.
This amendment ensures we have the aircraft carriers necessary to
keep this area of the world covered until such time that the QDR, the
Global Posture Review, and other uncertainties have been resolved.
I ask my colleagues to support this amendment.
Mr. President, the CNO appeared before our committee here of recent.
Now I will yield to my distinguished colleague from Florida, who was
present during the course of that testimony, to insert that part which
was in open session, which I think we should share with our colleagues.
Mr. President, I see the distinguished Senator from Florida, my
principal cosponsor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Florida.
Mr. NELSON of Florida. Mr. President, because Senator Leahy is
waiting to speak, I will make very brief comments. The comments to
which the distinguished chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee
has referred is the Chief of Naval Operations saying it is absolutely
essential that he have a carrier home ported in Japan. The fact is, as
he projects his forces in the defense of our country in the Pacific
area of operations, he needs a carrier in that region so if it has to
respond to an emergency, say, off of the coast of Taiwan, it is within
a day and a half of sailing to respond to the emergency instead of a
week's sailing from a port on the west coast of the United States.
Now, how all this ties in to the John F. Kennedy is that we do not
know at this point that the Government of Japan--since so much of this
decision is influenced by the municipal government in the region of the
port--is going to receive a nuclear carrier. Therefore, when the
present, conventionally powered carrier, the Kitty Hawk, in Japan, is
ready to go out of service in 2008, if Japan's posture is they will not
accept a nuclear carrier, then we do not have another one that could
replace it.
So what the distinguished chairman of the Armed Services Committee is
suggesting in this amendment that many of us are sponsoring with him is
to keep alive the John F. Kennedy through its drydocking, with the
funds that have already been appropriated, the $335 million, of which
there are some $287 million left, to go on through the overhaul process
so we have it as a backup.
This, of course, also keeps us then with two major ports for carriers
on the east coast so that all of our east coast carrier assets are not
in one port. In this era of terrorism, that clearly is one of the
lessons we should have learned way back in December of 1941 in the
experience of Pearl Harbor: Keep your assets spread out.
I am very grateful to Senator Warner, who has offered this amendment
for the sake of the defense of our country. And for the sake of those
of us who have been working this problem, we are very grateful in order
to get this in front of the Senate so a policy decision can be made.
Mr. President, I yield the floor.
Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays on the
amendment.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
There appears to be a sufficient second.
The yeas and nays were ordered.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Vermont.
Mr. SESSIONS. Will the Senator from Vermont allow me the opportunity
to offer an amendment? I do not know how long he will be speaking.
Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, am I correct that the Senator from Alabama
only needs a minute or so?
Mr. SESSIONS. Less than that.
Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, I will withhold my recognition so he can do
that.
Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I thank the distinguished Senator.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Alabama is recognized to
offer an amendment.
Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the pending
amendments be set aside.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

Amendment No. 456

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I call up amendment No. 456.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The legislative clerk read as follows:

The Senator from Alabama [Mr. Sessions] proposes an
amendment numbered 456.

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of
the amendment be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The amendment is as follows:

(Purpose: To provide for accountability in the United Nations
Headquarters renovation project)

On page 183, after line 23, insert the following:

UNITED NATIONS HEADQUARTERS RENOVATION LOAN

Sec. 2105. (a) Notwithstanding any other provision of law,
and subject to subsection (b), no loan in excess of
$600,000,000 may be made available by the United States for
renovation of the United Nations headquarters building
located in New York, New York.
(b) No loan may be made available by the United States for
renovation of the United Nations headquarters building
located in New York, New York until after the date on which
the President certifies to Congress that the renovation
project has been fairly and competitively bid and that such
bid is a reasonable cost for the renovation project.
Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the
amendment be set aside.

[[Page S3797]]

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Vermont.
Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senator
from California, Mrs. Boxer, be recognized following me, and that the
two of us be recognized as in morning business to speak about the
tragic death this weekend of Marla Ruzicka.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Hearing no objection, it is so ordered.

Marla Ruzicka

Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, I join my good friend, the Senator from
California, in paying tribute to a remarkable young woman from
Lakeport, CA, Marla Ruzicka.
There are times when we are called upon to give speeches such as this
on the floor. They are never easy. Sometimes they are speeches given
about somebody at the end of a long and full life. Here we are speaking
about a young woman at the beginning of a life already full but with
promise for decades to come.
Marla was the founder of a humanitarian organization called Campaign
for Innocent Victims in Conflict which is devoted to helping the
families of Afghan and Iraqi citizens who have been killed or suffered
other losses, such as their homes destroyed, businesses destroyed, as a
result of U.S. military operations. We know such suffering occurs no
matter how careful the military may be.
But Saturday, Marla died in Baghdad. She died from a car bomb, a car
bomb not directed at her but directed at a convoy. She was doing the
work she loved and which so many people around the world admired her
for. She was on her way to help somebody else. It was the case of being
at the wrong place at the wrong time. But it was not unusual because
she had risked her life so many times in Afghanistan and Iraq.
I met Marla 3 years ago when she first came to Washington. She was
barely 26 years old. She had been in Afghanistan. She had seen the
effects of the U.S. bombing mistakes that destroyed the homes and lives
of innocent Afghan citizens. In one or two incidents, wedding parties
had been bombed. In others, the bombs missed their targets and instead
destroyed homes and neighborhoods.
I remember one incident she spoke of where every member of a family--
16 people--was killed except a young child and that child's
grandfather. These were the cases Marla spoke about. She spoke about
them passionately because she felt passionately that the United States
should help those families put their lives back together.
She met with me. She met in my office with Tim Rieser, who works on
appropriations for me in the Foreign Operations Subcommittee. It did
not take her long to convince either Tim or myself that she was so
obviously right. We knew we not only had a moral responsibility to
those people who had suffered because of the mistakes of the United
States, we also had an interest in mitigating the hatred, the
resentment toward Americans that those incidents had caused.
It was Marla's initiative--going to Afghanistan, meeting those
families, getting the media's attention, coming back here and meeting
with me and Tim and others--that led to the creation of a program that
has contributed more than $8 million for medical assistance, or to
rebuild homes, provide loans to start businesses, and provide other aid
to innocent Afghan victims of the military operations.
From Afghanistan, Marla went to Iraq. She arrived, as I recall, a day
or two after Saddam's statue fell. She and her Iraqi colleague, Faiez
Ali Salem, who died at the same time, the same place as Marla,
organized dozens of Iraqi volunteers to conduct surveys around the
country of civilian casualties. Then she returned to Washington and
again her efforts--I have to emphasize, her efforts, her personal
efforts, her pounding on doors, her going person to person with her
irrepressible energy--led to the creation of a program now known as the
Civilian Assistance Program which has provided $10 million to the
families and communities of Iraqi citizens killed by the U.S. and other
coalition forces--another $10 million was allocated for this program
last week--all by this happy, young woman you see depicted here,
sitting with the people she helped.
To my knowledge, this is the first time we have ever provided this
type of assistance to civilian victims of U.S. military operations. It
would never have happened without the initiative, the courage, the
incomparable force of character of Marla Ruzicka.
In my 31 years as a Senator, I have met a lot of interesting,
accomplished people from all over the world, as all of us do--Nobel
Prize recipients, heads of State, people who have achieved remarkable
and even heroic things in their lives. I have never met anyone like
Marla. She made sure we knew what she was doing and how we could help.
Tim Rieser received an e-mail from her within an hour of the time she
was killed. He sent it on to me during the middle of the night,
Saturday night, with the photographs of Marla and the little girl she
had helped.
I know how both my wife Marcelle and I felt, looking at those
pictures, knowing we would never see another. There are so many stories
about her, and some of them are being recounted now in the hundreds of
press articles that have appeared in just the past 48 hours.
One story I remember the day after Marla arrived in Washington from
Kabul. She had heard there was a hearing in the Senate where Secretary
Rumsfeld and General Franks were going to testify. Thinking, perhaps a
bit naively, that they might talk about the problem of civilian
casualties, she decided to go hear what they would say. After the
hearing was over, obviously disappointed that the issue she cared so
deeply about hadn't even been mentioned, Marla walked straight up to
Secretary Rumsfeld at the witness table and started talking to him.
He heads down the hallway; she heads down the hallway with him. I can
imagine what the security people felt. She followed him right outside
to his car, and she did not stop talking to him about the families of
civilians she had met who had been killed and injured and the need to
do something to help them.
Anybody who knew Marla can see that. Secretary of Defense? Secretary
of State, Senator, it didn't make any difference. She had a story to
tell and, by golly, you were going to hear that story. You could run
down the hall, you could go to the elevator, but you were going to hear
her story. She was not someone who was easy to say no to.
Not easy? It was almost impossible to say no to her. That was not
simply because she was insistent. We all have insistent people who come
to our offices. We have all developed ways to say no. But in her case,
she was not just insistent, she was credible. She had been there. She
knew what the war was about. She had seen the tragic results, and she
was not about blaming anyone. She wasn't there to blame others. She
just said: Look, there are people who need help. I want to help in
whatever way I can.
That is what made it different. She saw her work as part of the best
of what this country is about. It was the face of a compassionate
America she believed in. She wanted the people of Afghanistan and Iraq
to see the face of the America she believed in, a compassionate,
humanitarian face.
It took time for some of us to realize she was not just a blond
bundle of energy and charisma, which she was, but she was also a person
of great intellect and courage who realized she wanted to help more
victims. It wasn't enough to protest; that you can do easily. She
needed to work with people who could help her do it. Of course, that
meant the Congress, the U.S. military, the U.S. Embassy, the press,
everybody else involved. She understood that. So she put aside politics
and focused on the victims. But she made sure the Congress, the U.S.
military, the U.S. Embassy and the press and everybody else heard from
her. It didn't take long before the U.S. military saw the importance of
what she was doing and they started to help. There were several civil
affairs officers with whom Marla worked as a team. She would find the
cases. They would arrange for the plane to airlift a wounded child to a
hospital or some other type of assistance. She became one of our most
beloved ambassadors because she was doing what our ambassadors want to
do--put the good face, the humanitarian face, the loving and caring
face of America first and foremost.

[[Page S3798]]

I think one of the reasons so many people around the world feel
Marla's loss so deeply is because we saw how important her work was,
and that meant taking risks the rest of us are unwilling take. In a
way, she was not only helping the families of Iraqi war victims; she
was also helping us, until she finally became an innocent victim of war
herself. Yesterday, my phone rang so many times, people calling from
Baghdad, calling me at home. Every one of them had a different story of
something she had done, some way in which she had made somebody's life
different. She has been called many things: an angel of mercy, a ray of
sunshine in an often dangerous and dark world.

One person who knew her well described Marla as being as close to a
living saint as they come. I suspect that is how many of us feel. She
probably didn't feel that way herself. Many of us feel that way.
I don't think I have ever met, and I probably will never meet again,
someone so young who gave so much of herself to so many people and who
made such a difference doing it. Our hearts go out to her parents,
Cliff and Nancy. I talked to her father yesterday. I said: Think how
much she did in her short lifetime, more than most of us will get to do
in a lifetime. But I thanked them for having the courage to let her be
the person she wanted to be--not that I suspected anybody could have
stopped her from being what she wanted to be.
One of the articles talks about her going to a checkpoint and the
guard stopping her and she didn't have the proper papers. She stuck her
head forward and pulled back the scarf. They saw the blond hair. She
started talking to them about why she had to go here and there. Next
thing you know, she is being sent on her way.
So our job is really to carry on the work Marla started not just in
memory of a wonderful and heroic young woman, although that should be
enough reason, but because the work is so important. That is what I am
committed to. I know I will work with my friend from California to
honor Marla in that way. I think it would be safe to say to my friend
from California, I suspect there will be others in this Chamber who
will do the same.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from California.
Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I thank Senator Leahy, from the bottom of
my heart, for his words about this extraordinary young woman; more than
that, to him and his staff for believing in her. That took a leap of
faith, that a woman so young could come in and present as compelling a
case as she did.
Of course, she went right to the Senator, that is for sure, because
of the work he has done for human rights in the world. She knew what
she was doing. But you heard her and Tim and you rolled up your sleeves
and created a program that the entire Senate backed and the entire
Congress backed to help the innocent victims of war--those who are
unfortunately sometimes called ``collateral damage''; we have names for
that.
Clearly, what Marla did, by recognizing that these people needed
help, she was doing God's work. But she also, as the good Senator
pointed out, was helping the United States of America because we are in
the battle for the hearts and minds of the world. Marla understood
that.

Amendment No. 444

Mrs. BOXER. Before I make further remarks, I ask unanimous consent
that the pending amendment be temporarily laid aside so I can call up
amendment No. 444.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The clerk will report.
The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

The Senator from California [Mrs. Boxer], for herself, and
Mr. Bingaman, proposes an amendment numbered 444.

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that further
reading of the amendment be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The amendment is as follows:

(Purpose: To appropriate an additional $35,000,000 for Other
Procurement, Army, and make the amount available for the fielding of
Warlock systems and other field jamming systems)

At the appropriate place, insert the following:

deployment of warlock systems and other field jamming systems

Sec. 1122. (a) Additional Amount for Other Procurement,
Army.--The amount appropriated by this chapter under the
heading ``Other Procurement, Army'' is hereby increased by
$35,000,000, with the amount of such increase designated as
an emergency requirement pursuant to section 402 of the
conference report to accompany S. Con. Res. 95 (108th
Congress).
(b) Availability of Funds.--Of the amount appropriated or
otherwise made available by this chapter under the heading
``Other Procurement, Army'', as increased by subsection (a),
$60,000,000 shall be available under the Tactical
Intelligence and Related Activities (TIARA) program to
facilitate the rapid deployment of Warlock systems and other
field jamming systems.
Mrs. BOXER. My amendment would increase funding for jamming devices
that would deactivate roadside bombs. They are one of the leading
causes of the casualties in Iraq.
Mr. President, I will get back to the tribute I want to give to
Marla. I thank Laura Schiller, my staff member, who is sitting here
with me. She helped me put together these remarks. She was a friend of
Marla's, and it was very hard for her to get through writing these
remarks.
This morning, in northern California, where I was--I just got here--
the people woke up to the San Francisco Chronicle's front page. It is
this magnificent picture of Marla and a little girl she helped, along
with an Iraqi woman who had clearly also been working with this little
child.
It is interesting because on either side of this beautiful photograph
of Marla and this little girl are two very negative stories about the
world we live in--Medicare fraud and oil companies trying to lower
their taxes in light of their highest profits ever--and it just spoke
to me about Marla because there she was in the middle of all these
negative forces, the worst kinds of negative forces--war, hatred,
sectarian violence, all these things, there she was right in the
middle, something good for us to cling to.
My heart breaks for Marla's family and her friends. Some of them were
here, so many whose lives she touched. One of Marla's friends was my
daughter Nicole who called me with the news of Marla's death on
Saturday night. It was hard to understand her at first, so heavy were
her tears. Between sobs, she told me Marla had been killed along the
treacherous road leading to the Baghdad airport. It was a road so
dangerous that when Senators travel there--and I just got back from
there a couple weeks ago--they don't go on that road. Instead, they go
on a Blackhawk helicopter and speed through a city with machine guns on
either side looking down to the ground. It is a road so dangerous that
even limited protection costs thousands of dollars--tens of thousands
of dollars just to go one way on that road, if you were to hire people
to help protect you. That is how dangerous it is.
Who among us would have found the courage to travel on that road on
Saturday, or the road that Marla had traveled during her courageous,
committed, and very short life? Who among us can say we have spent so
much of our lives serving other people in the way that truly makes a
difference? How many 28-year-olds can say that?
Imagine, in this the most powerful and greatest country in the world,
it was this remarkable woman who went door to door counting Iraqi
civilian victims, when nobody else would. It was this young woman who
lobbied the Senate for assistance for these families, and we heard from
Senator Leahy about how incredible she was when she made the case. She
risked her own life to make sure they received the support they
deserved.
``Marla was something close to a saint,'' one friend wrote this
morning, ``but a very realistic saint.'' I personally met Marla for the
first time recently when she and her mother came to my home in
California to celebrate an occasion for my daughter. When Marla walked
through our front door with her mom, she had an infectious smile, and
my daughter's face lit up. ``This is the amazing woman I've been
telling you about, Mom,'' she said.
This is how it always was for the thousands around the world lucky
enough to call Marla a friend. It didn't matter if you lived in the
streets of Baghdad or the dusty villages of Afghanistan or the
corridors of power in

[[Page S3799]]

Washington, DC. It didn't matter whether you knew Marla. She would come
up to you and you would feel as if you had known her for a lifetime.
She treated every conversation as a chance to tell you about the
righteousness of her cause, and she treated everyone with the same
respect, openness, and unconditional love.
We so often hear:

And now three remain: faith, hope, and love. But the
greatest of these is love.

My office was flooded today with e-mails and phone calls from the
people whose lives were touched by Marla's faith, hope, and love.
Everyone has a story to tell, and I brought a few photos to share with
you because words are not enough.
In this photo she sent hours before her death, we see her holding
tightly an Iraqi child who was thrown from a vehicle just before it was
blown up in a rocket attack. The child's entire family was killed.
Marla saved that child.
Here we see one of the countless civilians brutally injured and now
beaming and healthy next to the person, Marla, who helped her heal.
We see Marla's trusted Iraqi colleague, Faiz, whom she wrote, ``was
sent to me by angels from the sky.'' He worked tirelessly beside her,
and he died bravely beside her.
And we see this beautiful, vibrant, young woman, red scarf around her
neck, surrounded by the soldiers she befriended and entreated in her
quest to help Iraqi civilians. Senator Leahy made the point that
everyone wanted to help Marla--everyone. The U.S. military wanted to
make up for the damage that was caused. They desperately wanted to do
that, but they needed someone who could give them accurate information,
and she did that.

Inside the green zone--

One friend wrote last night--

she would encourage military officers and U.S. officials to
hug each other--just to remember that they were still human,
and reward them with a big smile if they actually did it.

There are many other pictures that her friends wanted to share of a
woman who was a great friend to all and a beloved Ambassador for the
United States at a time when our actions may not be so popular.
There were images of the notes she sent, when their spirits were at
their lowest, telling them how beautiful they are, how much their work
mattered, how much she cared.
I think we are going to leave this picture up because it is
exquisite. There are other pictures of Marla sleeping on the floor for
nights on end so she could use her limited resources to help Iraqi
victims. Behind her happy-go-lucky demeanor, there was a picture of an
effective advocate cornering a Defense Secretary, a general, or, yes, a
U.S. Senator, and refusing to go away until our country helped care for
the innocent victims of war.
There was a picture of the room full of journalists waiting that last
night for their host to show up for another party she had planned to
buoy their spirits, and no doubt try to persuade them to write about
the victims she saw suffering terrible damage--not collateral damage
but critical damage.
A few days before she died, Marla wrote her own op-ed for the
Washington Post. She talked about her most recent discovery--that the
U.S. military was counting Iraqi civilian casualties in some places,
despite its claims to the contrary. She ended with these words:

. . . To me, each number is a story of someone whose hopes,
dreams, and potential will never be realized, and who left
behind a family.

The same can be said of Marla. Her hopes, her dreams, and her
potential will never be realized, and she left behind a family. In all
the years I have lived, I do not know too many people who have made an
impact the way she has in those 28 short years. But I guarantee you, if
Marla were here, she would not want us to weep, she would not want us
to hide our heads. She would want us to keep fighting for the people
and causes she had championed even before she was old enough to drive a
car. She would want us to remember the words of encouragement and
action she sent constantly to friends and colleagues. Once she wrote,
``Their tragedies are my responsibilities,'' and now her work must be
ours.
I hope a message goes out to the suicide bombers to stop what they
are doing, to stop it now, and to those who would put together these
roadside bombs to stop it now because everyone who is injured by this--
everyone--has hopes and dreams and families and potential.
So her work must be ours. She was the voice of these victims to whom
no one seems to pay much attention. We need to be her voice now.
``And now these three remain: Faith, hope and love: But the greatest
of these is love.''
Mr. President, may we join the grieving Ruzicka family and thousands
around the world in paying tribute to a young woman of great faith,
hope, and love by finishing the work she so courageously began and by
working to make sure this war will soon come to an end.
Mr. President, I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Arkansas.
Mrs. LINCOLN. First, I commend my colleagues from California and
Vermont for recognizing such a remarkable woman, someone who represents
everything that is good and peaceful about America and who set an
example in such a tumultuous time and place but clearly giving all of
the love she had to give at a time when it was needed the most. I thank
my colleagues for taking the time to recognize that.

Amendment No. 481

Mrs. LINCOLN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to lay aside the
pending amendment, and I call up amendment No. 481.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. The clerk
will report.
The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

The Senator from Arkansas [Mrs. Lincoln] proposes an
amendment numbered 481.

Mrs. LINCOLN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading
of the amendment be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The amendment is as follows:

(Purpose: To modify the accumulation of leave by members of the
National Guard)

On page 169, between lines 8 and 9, insert the following:

accumulation of leave by members of the national guard

Sec. 1122. Section 701(a) of title 10, United States Code,
is amended by adding at the end the following new sentence:
``In the case of a member of the Army National Guard of the
United States or the Air National Guard of the United States
who serves on active duty for more than 179 consecutive days,
full-time training or other full-time duty performed by such
member during the 5-year period ending on the 180th day of
such service under a provision of law referred to in the
preceding sentence, while such member was in the status as a
member of the National Guard, and for which such member was
entitled to pay, is active service for the purposes of this
section.''.
Mrs. LINCOLN. Mr. President, I rise today to offer an amendment of
great importance to the returning guardsmen and reservists in my home
State and in many other States. I think many of my colleagues, in
understanding what I am trying to do, will agree that it is the right
approach and the right thing to do for the men and women from our
States who have done such an incredible job serving our Nation in Iraq
and on behalf of not just Americans but the Iraqi people.
When our soldiers return home, some of them are finding they might
only have a week or less before they are expected to reenter the
workforce and return to civilian life. It is confusing at best to know
with what they are going to be faced. The price of gasoline has gone up
tremendously since they deployed almost 2 years ago. They have seen a
lot of changes in their communities, perhaps changes in their work,
changes in their families, the loss of loved ones, certainly the
growing of their little biddies. But many of the soldiers of Arkansas's
39th Infantry Brigade found they had absolutely no leave left when they
returned to our home State of Arkansas. This left them with very few
options other than to return to work immediately or, in some cases, to
begin looking for work immediately, within a week of when they returned
to their home soil.
These soldiers had just spent nearly 18 months in Iraq, risking their
lives to defend the freedoms we cherish as Americans. They witnessed
scenes of tragedy and violence they never expected to encounter but
willingly accepted as part of their mission in service of this great
Nation. It is part of

[[Page S3800]]

our job as legislators to make sure they are taken care of when they
return home, that we honor their sacrifices, their duty, and their
courage. We are not doing our job if soldiers are forced to return to
civilian life within a week of returning home from theater.
I have been out to Walter Reed, as have many of my colleagues, and
seen our soldiers recovering from horrific wounds suffered in this
conflict. One of the soldiers from Arkansas had taken a rocket-
propelled grenade directly to his chest. You would not have known it,
though, from talking to him. He was proud of the work he and his fellow
soldiers had been doing in Iraq. He missed his unit and was ready to
return to them and finish the rebuilding process they had begun.
As I left his room, one of the nurses approached one of my staffers
and said that while many of the soldiers were doing very well, she was
very concerned for them once they got back to their homes, into their
communities, trying to readjust themselves to a way of life from which
they had been absent while they were in Iraq, while they were
experiencing events that oftentimes only they could think of in their
own hearts.
Many of them underwent daily therapy sessions where they discussed
these experiences with their fellow soldiers. Unfortunately for our
guardsmen and reservists, they do not come back to a base where they
are surrounded by people who have had a similar experience, people to
whom they can talk, people with whom they can empathize, those who can
understand the unbelievable circumstances and situations they
experienced in Iraq.
The nurse was also concerned that what they were receiving in the
hospital there would all end once they returned to their hometowns--the
therapy, the discussions, certainly the medical treatment.
Imagine you are a soldier who, thankfully, has made it home from Iraq
or Afghanistan without serious injury, the joyousness of coming home to
your home, to your family, to your community, and upon returning to a
pace of life 180 degrees from anything you have witnessed within the
last year and a half, you are expected to turn on a dime and adjust
immediately to the world you left behind. This is a great injustice and
one that cannot be ignored.
My amendment is very simple. It would allow a guardsman to accrue
bonus leave when he or she was placed on active duty for 6 months. This
would give guardsmen more leave by altering how training days for the
National Guard and Reserve are counted for the purposes of determining
their leave. Currently, any training less than 29 consecutive days does
not count toward accruement of leave.
This amendment would change current policy when a guardsman is placed
on active duty for a period of 180 consecutive days. Upon that 180th
consecutive day of active duty, all previous days spent training in the
past 5 years, no matter their duration, would be counted for the
purpose of determining how many days of leave the guardsmen would have.
This would effectively give the guardsmen and reservist a bonus period
of leave when they were deployed for longer than 6 months.
The look-back period for determining the new leave, as I mentioned,
would be capped at 5 years. This would prevent substantial disparities
in accrued leave from occurring between a guardsman with 20 years of
service and a guardsman with only 3, perhaps.
We must do all we can to ensure our guardsmen are given every
opportunity to readjust to life outside of the combat zone. When they
return to our arms, we must embrace them and give them the time and the
elements they need to readjust themselves. For some, it may be as
simple as getting their finances back in order or perhaps spending time
with their spouse or their children or their extended family. Maybe it
is getting re-equipped back in their household or in their community.
Maybe it is getting re-engaged, remembering those people who surround
them who can provide them the unconditional love and support they need
to put behind them the experiences they may have had, so they can look
forward and be proud of the service they have given and know their
country embraces them.
For others, it may be more difficult. Either way, they deserve an
opportunity to deal with these issues without having to worry about
returning to or finding work in order to put food on the table so soon
after giving so much in service to this great country.
Our guardsmen found themselves in two circumstances where they were
given passes, but were required to take leave when they have returned
now from that 180-plus days of service, of giving their heart and soul
to make sure the freedoms we enjoy are protected.
We should do all we can to make sure as they come back into our
American communities, they come back into their families, they can do
it with dignity and the support of this great country and the military
service they have served.
I urge the Senate to adopt my amendment. I ask my colleagues to take
a look at it. I think it is very simple and something we could do
without much folderol. We could get it done and make sure all these
soldiers are well taken care of.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Ohio.
Mr. VOINOVICH. Mr. President, I rise to talk a little bit regretfully
about the issue of immigration--regretfully, because the supplemental
Defense bill that came out of the House of Representatives included the
issue of immigration and therefore has opened it up for discussion here
in the Senate.
Tonight I rise in support of the Craig amendment which will enact
important reforms to the H-2A program that will help ensure Ohio's
agricultural industry remains strong and vibrant. That has a lot to do
with immigration.
Agribusiness is the largest industry in the State of Ohio,
contributing $73 billion to our economy each year. I would like to keep
it that way. My State ranks sixth nationally in the production of
nursery and greenhouse crops, with a value of over a half billion
dollars. We grow almost a quarter of a billion dollars worth of fruits
and vegetables each year.
I want to stress how important these businesses are to Ohio and how
vulnerable they are. These industries live and die in a very
competitive marketplace, and having a stable and sufficient workforce
is vital to their competitiveness in the global marketplace.
Unfortunately, right now they have a major labor crisis. Without the
guest workers who are essential to getting work done during peak
seasons, agribusiness in Ohio as well as the rest of the country simply
would not have the workforce necessary to do their work and their
customers would have to look elsewhere, very likely to overseas
businesses for agricultural products.
I am told in the early 1990s our Nation exported twice the value of
nursery and greenhouse crops to Canada than we imported. In the last
decade, Canada has overtaken us, and now the numbers have reversed,
adding to our Nation's trade deficit. I would like to note that our
neighbor, Ontario, has a very good guest worker program.
If we offshore our fruit, vegetable, nursery crops, and other
production to Mexico and Canada, think of what we lose. We lose control
of our food supply, and you know that is a national security issue. We
lose jobs, and not just farmworker jobs. Agricultural economists tell
us each farmworker job in these industries supports 3\1/2\ jobs in the
surrounding economy: processing, packaging, transportation, equipment,
supplies, lending, and insurance. They are good jobs, filled by
Americans. We lose them if we do not do this the right way.
Work in these industries in Ohio is seasonal, demanding, and out in
the weather. Many of our producers have tried to use the existing H-2A
program. This is especially true of our nursery, sod, and Christmas
tree growers. They represent 79 percent of the H-2A use in Ohio.
The program is expensive, bureaucratic, and a litigation nightmare--
that is the current program. The program is failing and it needs
fixing. Many agricultural employers would like to use the program but
do not because of the uncertainty associated with the program. Not
having access to legal, timely workers hurts these businesses. Crops
are lost because workers are not available for the harvest. I
understand from my colleague Senator Craig that out in California
lettuce is

[[Page S3801]]

rotting in the field because there are not workers there to pick it.
Many of my H-2A-user growers and producers have been closely involved
in the negotiations of AgJOBS, the amendment before us. They know
immigration and guest worker reform cannot be a partisan undertaking.
They have been creative and determined in finding common ground and
producing bipartisan legislation. Their survival depends on this Senate
passing AgJOBS.

The toughest issue is what to do about the trained and trusted farm
workforce, 70 percent or more working without proper documents. Their
labor is critical to Ohio and America. These farmworkers are hard-
working, law-abiding people. They are paying Federal and State taxes
and Social Security. They are part of the fabric of our society already
in so many ways.
AgJOBS allows them to come forward and rehabilitate their status over
time through the time-honored values of hard work and good behavior.
The failure of this country to create a practical agricultural guest
worker program has forced most of the country's agribusiness to live
between a rock and a hard place. It has been said our farmers have one
foot in jail and the other in the bankruptcy court. Every day, each
time my constituents open the door in the morning, they know this much,
if and when the Government decides to get serious about Social Security
mismatch letters, about enforcement, it is all over.
They tell me: We are following the law in our hiring. Yet we know if
Immigration enforcement came in tomorrow, our business would be
irreparably damaged. My constituents and yours could lose their
workforce tomorrow.
Some of my colleagues are critical of this legislation because they
claim it provides amnesty. I disagree. Amnesty is an unconditional
pardon to a group of people who have committed an illegal act, and
Webster's Dictionary agrees that is the definition. There is nothing
unconditional about the path to rehabilitation provided in AgJOBS. To
earn adjustment to legal status, a worker must have worked in U.S.
agriculture before January 1, 2005. Accordingly, this legislation
imposes conditions on obtaining adjustment to legal status, including,
more importantly, a work history.
These are people who have worked in the United States, many of them
for many years. A lot of them are not legal. What this legislation does
is it provides an opportunity for them to become legal, after
supporting certain conditions.
If you believe that any forgiveness at all constitutes amnesty, then
every serious proposal that comes forward to solve this problem will be
amnesty. But in the end, isn't the worst amnesty of all the status quo?
Ignoring and tacitly condoning this problem will not provide a
solution. It has been going on too long. Let us take a step forward now
toward reconciling our laws with reality.

This legislation will help illegal immigrants working in agriculture
to come clean and become part of our legal workforce, allowing this
country to focus its efforts on more serious immigration problems.
Furthermore, providing a means for such workers to obtain legal status
provides a real incentive for them to participate in this program.
I read a portion of a letter Senator Craig and Congressman Cannon
received from Grover Norquist, chairman of the Americans for Tax
Reform. He said:

I'd like to take this opportunity to commend for you the
introduction of S. 1645 and H.R. 3142. The AgJOBS bill is a
great step in bringing fundamental reform to our Nation's
broken immigration system. AgJOBS would make America more
secure. Fifty to seventy-five percent of the agriculture
workforce in this country is underground due to the highly
impractical worker quota restrictions. Up to 500,000 workers
would be given approved worker status screened by the
Department of Homeland Security and accounted for while they
are here. Any future workers coming into America looking for
agriculture work would be screened at the border where
malcontents can most easily be turned back. The current H2-A
agriculture worker program only supplies about 2 to 3 percent
of the farm workforce.

It goes on to say:

Workers that are here to work in jobs Native Americans are
not willing to do must stay if food production is to remain
adequate. However, those already here and new workers from
overseas should have a screening system that works, both for
our States' safety and for their human rights. Your bill does
just that.

Mr. President, I would also like to point out that AgJOBS is endorsed
by a historic bipartisan coalition of 500 and counting, national,
State, and local organizations, including 200 agricultural
organizations representing fruit and vegetable growers, dairy
producers, nursery and landscape, ranching and others, as well as the
National Association of the State Departments of Agriculture; that is,
the national association of all of the 50 States' agriculture
departments have come forward to support this. There is bipartisan
support of this legislation by elected and appointed State directors of
agriculture.
Yesterday I received a letter from Ambassador Clayton Yeutter.
Clayton Yeutter has been a tireless advocate for American agriculture.
You will remember that he served as Secretary of Agriculture under
Ronald Reagan and as U.S. Trade Representative under George H.W. Bush.
In his letter, he started out by saying:

History demonstrates that there are moments in time when
special opportunities arise for political action that
successfully addresses multiple challenges. Today is one of
those occasions.

I agree.
He went on to describe the substance and the partisanship of the
AgJOBS bill.
He ended as follows:

As President Bush has stated, we can and must do better to
match a willing and hardworking immigrant worker with
producers who are in desperate need of a lawful workforce. It
is in our country's best interest to enact these reforms and
reap the harvest of political action at a special moment in
time.

That is what our President had to say.
Again, I agree.
I stand ready to take a first and most important step on this
difficult issue that has plagued this Nation for too long.
As I stated, I would have preferred that immigration would not have
been a part of this legislation that is before us. But as I mentioned,
it came before us because of the fact that the House decided to make
immigration a part of the emergency supplemental bill.
Those of us who have been concerned about immigration are taking this
opportunity to clearly state what we think needs to be done. I am
hopeful that tomorrow 59 of my colleagues will vote for cloture so we
can get on and deal with this issue and bring the relief to thousands
of people, thousands of businesses, and agribusiness in this country.
I yield the floor.
Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, Edmundo Garcia said he had heard that the
new Bush immigration plan, which would grant work visas to millions of
illegal immigrants inside the United States and to others who can prove
they have a job, was `amnesty,' and he wondered why he was arrested.''

He said he would try to cross [the border from Mexico to
the U.S. through the Sonoran Desert] again in a few days.

This quote from the New York Times on May 23, 2004, shows just how
bad things have gotten since the administration's initial immigration
policy proposal was announced.
The New York Times article goes on to say:

Apprehensions of crossers in the desert south of Tucson
have jumped 60 percent over the previous year.

Nearly 300,000 people were caught trying to enter the U.S. through
the desert border since last October 1st (that's October 2003).''
It continues:

After a four-year drop, apprehensions which the Border
Patrol uses to measure human smuggling are up 30 percent over
last year along the entire southern border, with over 660,000
people detained from October 1st through the end of April.

There are an estimated 8 to 12 million illegal immigrants in this
country, with about 1 million new illegal aliens coming into this
country every year. Legal immigration is even at unprecedented levels
about five times the traditional levels. We now have about 1.2 million
legal immigrants coming into this country each year, as opposed to an
average of about 250,000 legal immigrants before 1976.
S. 359, the AgJOBS bill, could offer amnesty to at least 800,000 more
illegal

[[Page S3802]]

aliens, and if they all bring family members, which they would be
eligible to do, it could be up to 3 million more, according to Numbers
USA.
I greatly respect my friend and colleague, the Senator from Idaho,
Mr. Craig, and I understand he has many cosponsors for his bill, but I
firmly believe S. 359 has some major flaws and is not the way to remedy
our problem with illegal immigration.
Even though there are certain criteria these illegal aliens must meet
to qualify for temporary work status and eventual citizenship under
this bill, it still rewards them by allowing them to stay in this
country and work rather than penalizing them for breaking the law this
is amnesty.
I also agree with my colleague from Texas, Senator Cornyn, the
chairman of the Immigration Subcommittee, who said in Tuesday's
Congress Daily when asked about the supplemental bill H.R. 1268, said
that he did not want it to ``be a magnet for other unrelated
immigration proposals . . . regular order is the best way. . . .''
I agree with my colleague and think we should focus on the
supplemental and debate immigration reform separately.
Furthermore, in section 2, paragraph 7, the AgJOBS bill defines a
workday as ``any day in which the individual is employed one or more
hours in agriculture.''
In order for an alien to apply for temporary work status, section
101, subsection A, subparagraph A states that the aliens ``must
establish that they have performed agricultural employment in the
United States for at least 575 hours or 100 work days, whichever is
less, during any 12 consecutive months. . . .''
So if a workday is defined as working at least 1 hour and the alien
only has to work 100 work days in a year to qualify for temporary
status under the AgJOBS bill, then illegal aliens only have to find
some kind of agricultural work, and not necessarily be paid, for 100
hours, or merely 2 weeks, in a year in order to stay temporarily, while
robbing Americans of these jobs.
An article from May 18, 2004, by Frank Gaffney, Jr., from the
Washington Times entitled ``Stealth Amnesty'' states that once an
illegal alien has established lawful temporary residency, ``they can
stay in the U.S. indefinitely while applying for permanent resident
status.''
``From there it is a matter of time before they can become citizens,
so long as they work in the agricultural sector for 675 hours over the
next 6 years.''
Furthermore, in referring to the REAL ID Act, which was attached to
the supplemental in the House, and I believe is true reform, another
article from the week of April 6, appeared in the Washington Times
stating:

. . . REAL ID is a bill that will strengthen homeland
security, while Mr. Craig's AgJOBS bill will not.

One more article in the Washington Times, again by Frank Gaffney,
Jr., from April 5 refers to the REAL ID Act as well as AgJOBS says:

The REAL ID legislation is aimed at denying future
terrorists the ability exploited by the September 11, 2001,
hijackers namely, to hold numerous valid driver's licenses,
which they used to gain access to airports and their targeted
aircraft.
It is no small irony, therefore, that the presence of the
REAL ID provisions on the military's supplemental funding
bill is being cited by the Senate parliamentarian as grounds
for Senator Larry Craig, Idaho Republican, to try to attach
to it legislation that would help eviscerate what passes for
restrictions on illegal immigration.

The article continues:

The agriculture sector of the US economy needs cheap labor.

So let's legalize the presence in this country of anyone who can
claim to have once worked for a little more than three months in that
sector.
We must not reward lawbreakers especially while we have so many
people coming to this country legally.
Last summer, I had an intern in my office from Rwanda. She fled
during the genocide in 1994. She then came to this country as a refugee
and became a legal permanent resident. It took her a year to get all
her paperwork for becoming a legal resident and she will probably have
to wade through similar bureaucracy to become a citizen as well. It
frustrates me that people like her follow the rules and have to wait in
the lines and wait for all the paperwork to be processed, while the
illegal aliens can sneak into our country, and then, if they do apply
for legal status, they slow down the process for those who came here
legally. Not only does AgJOBS reward lawbreakers, it also robs many
Americans of jobs they are willing to do.
Roy Beck from Numbers USA in his testimony on March 24, 2004, before
the Subcommittee on Immigration, Border Security and Claims, quoted
Alan Greenspan from February of last year as saying that America has an
``oversupply of low-skilled, low-educated workers.'' In fact, according
to Mr. Beck's testimony, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that
the number of unemployed Americans includes a majority of workers
without a high school diploma.
Basically, we have a great supply of lower educated American workers
without jobs, while ironically, the main purpose of the AgJOBS bill is
to bring in low-educated, low-skilled foreign workers for jobs that
these Americans are able and willing to fill.
A recent article from March 31 of this year in the San Diego Union-
Tribune entitled ``Importing a Peasant Class'', written by Jerry
Kammer, emphasizes this point by saying:

Nearly two decades after a sweeping amnesty for illegal
immigrants [referring to the 1986 Amnesty] gave Gerardo
Jimenez a ticket out of a San Diego County avocado orchard,
he worries that the unyielding tide of low-wage workers from
Latin America might pull the economic rug out from under his
feet.

Jimenez, who is from Mexico and supervises a drywall crew that worked
all winter remodeling an office building three blocks from the White
House says, ``There are too many people coming.''
The article goes on to say:

Jimenez's concern reflects an ambivalence about immigration
among established immigrants in America.
It also challenges a key assumption of President Bush's
proposal for a massive new guest-worker program: that the
United States has a dearth of low-skill workers.

This is not true, we do not have a dearth of low-skill workers.
Not only does S. 359 keep able Americans from performing these jobs;
it also drives down wages and stifles innovation and technology for
these jobs.
The same San Diego Union-Tribune article I just quoted from continues
saying:

In Atlanta, house painter Moises Milano says competition
for jobs is so stiff among immigrants that house painters'
wages have been flat since he came to the United States in
the late 1980.
They're still $9 an hour, he said, which would mean they've
actually fallen significantly when adjusted for inflation.
And yet many more aspiring house painters arrive every day
from Latin America.

Similar concerns can be heard throughout low-wage industries that
Latino immigrants have come to dominate during recent decades,
including housekeeping, landscaping, janitorial, chicken processing,
meat packing, restaurants, hotels and fast food.
The article goes on to say:

Jimenez says his company competes for contracts against
subcontractors using illegal workers who are prepared to work
for less and who don't expect health insurance, overtime or
other employment benefits.

``It puts pressure on his employer to cut labor costs, he said.''
Jimenez explains why the migrants come and how it hurts current
immigrants: ``The migrants come because of hunger, because of necessity
. . . but I would benefit if someone imposed order,'' he says. ``My
work would be worth more.''
Jimenez says that he won't be able to compete with companies that
hire illegal workers so that they can pay lower wages.
Not only are workers like Jimenez facing tough competition from
companies who hire illegals, but a GAO study from 1988 found that other
fields, such as cleaning office buildings, were also experiencing lower
wages and more competition as a result of foreign workers.
Cleaning office buildings used to pay a decent wage, however as more
foreign workers entered the field, wages, benefits and working
conditions began to collapse.
Other labor-intensive fields, such as the construction and the
meatpacking industry, have also experienced a drop in pay after an
influx of foreign workers. By allowing employers to flood the

[[Page S3803]]

labor market with foreign workers in these sectors, wages and working
conditions have gone down drastically and made these jobs much less
attractive to American workers; while making them much more attractive
to alien workers.
As for stifling technological advances, according to a February 9,
2004, article appearing in National Review:

the huge supply of low-wage illegal aliens encourages
American farmers to lag technologically behind farmers in
other countries.

The article continues:

Raisin production in California still requires that grapes
be cut off by hand and manually turned on the drying tray.
In other countries, farmers use a labor-saving technique
called drying on the vine.
A cutoff of the illegal-alien flow would encourage American
farmers to adopt many of these technological innovations, and
come up with new ones.

Another, and possibly more important problem with S. 359, is the risk
it poses to our homeland security. It has some of the same loopholes
that the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act, IRCA, contained.
It also overwhelms the already burdened immigration system, not to
mention that there are no criminal or terrorist records for these
people. For example, an Egyptian illegal immigrant named Mahmud
Abouhalima came to America on a tourist visa in 1985. The visa expired
in 1986, but Abouhalima stayed here, working illegally as a cab driver.
Abouhalima received permanent residency, a green card, in 1988, after
winning amnesty under the 1986 IRCA law. Although he had never worked
in agriculture in the United States, Abouhalima acquired legal status
through the special agricultural workers program--which is essentially
what the AgJobs bill does. Once he had become legalized, Abouhalima was
able to travel freely to Afghanistan. He received combat training
during several trips there. Abouhalima used his amnesty/legalization
and his terrorist training as a lead organizer of the 1993 plot to bomb
the World Trade Center and other New York landmarks.
The special agricultural worker amnesty program enacted as part of
the 1986 Amnesty saw many ineligible illegal aliens fraudulently apply
for, and successfully receive, amnesty. Up to two-thirds of illegal
aliens receiving amnesty under that program had submitted fraudulent
applications, just like Abouhalima. We cannot afford to allow ourselves
to be vulnerable to terrorists by allowing these people to stay in our
country. I want to work with my colleague to address this problem of
illegal immigration.
Over the last century, several Presidential and congressionally
mandated Commissions including the 1907 Roosevelt Commission on Country
Life to the 1990 Barbara Jordan Commission on Immigration Reform have
been appointed to study immigration to the United States. These seven
Commissions each possessing different mandates, membership makeup,
studies and historical context in which their work was performed had
some similar findings including: U.S. policy should actively discourage
the dependence of any industry on foreign workers.
Dependence on a foreign agricultural labor force is especially
problematic because of the seasonal nature of the work, which leads to
high un- and under-employment and results in the inefficient use of
labor.
Strict enforcement of immigration and labor laws is the key to a
successful immigration policy that benefits the nation. Unfortunately,
AgJOBS violates each of these principles.
It ensures the dependence of the agricultural industry on foreign
workers by eliminating any possibility that wages and working
conditions in agriculture will improve sufficiently to attract U.S.
workers, whether citizens or lawful permanent residents.
AgJOBS actually reduces wages statutorily by freezing the required
wage rate for new foreign workers, known as H-2A nonimmigrants, at its
January 1, 2003, level for 3 years. In Oklahoma it is currently $7.89.
It also actually discourages agricultural employers from pursuing
innovations, such as mechanization, that would reduce their reliance on
seasonal labor.
AgJOBS guarantees employers an ``indentured'' labor force for at last
the first 6 years after enactment. Employers can pay as little as
minimum wage while the newly amnestied workers have no choice but to
accept whatever the employer offers them since they are required to
continue working in agriculture in order to get a green card.
Additionally, AgJOBS requires the American taxpayer to foot the bill
for maintaining this large, seasonal workforce by allowing: Illegal
aliens who apply for amnesty under AgJOBS to receive taxpayer-funded
counsel from Legal Services Corporation to assist them with filling out
their applications; the amnestied aliens to be eligible for
unemployment insurance benefits if they are unable to find other
unskilled work during the off-season, the amnestied aliens to use
publicly funded services like education and emergency health care this
is almost free since many of these aliens have artificially low wages
thus making their tax contributions extremely low.
Finally, AgJOBS does not contain any provisions to tighten
enforcement of U.S. immigration or labor laws. In fact, by rewarding
illegal aliens with amnesty, AgJOBS will encourage even more illegal
immigration.
By the time the amnestied aliens are released from ``indentured
servitude'' under AgJOBS, agricultural employers will have access to a
whole new population of illegal-alien workers and the cycle will be
well on its way to repeating itself, just as it did after the ``one-
time-only'' amnesty for agricultural workers in 1986.
I also believe both the REAL ID Act, sponsored by my colleague in the
House, Congressman Sensenbrenner, as well as a bill I supported in the
last Congress, are sound ways to strengthen our immigration system. The
REAL ID Act would make it more difficult for people who are violating
our laws by being in our country illegally, as well as engaging in
terrorist activities, to stay in the United States. Unfortunately, I
was forced to vote against the intelligence bill in December because
the provisions that are in the REAL ID Act were excluded from the
intelligence bill.
One such provision in the current REAL ID Act has to do with a 3.5-
mile gap in a border fence between San Diego and Tijuana. People are
able to come and go as they please. This is where many illegal
immigrants are coming through; some of them could even be terrorists.
Apparently, this gap has been left open because of a maritime
succulent shrub, which is the environment in which two pairs of
endangered birds live. These two pairs of birds, the vireo and the
flycatcher, might be harassed--not killed--but harassed if the fence is
completed.
I checked with the U.S. Geological Survey and found that there are an
estimated 2,000 vireos and 1,000 flycatchers in existence today, and at
the most, not building the fence prevents two pairs of birds from being
harassed. Is it better to harass two pairs of birds or leave this 3.5-
mile gap open for terrorists or other law-breakers to come through? I
assume that not building the fence, leaving it open for aliens to
trample on this environment, the home to these birds causes more
harassment than actually building a fence.
Another provision in the REAL ID Act is the requirement for proof of
lawful presence in the United States. This requirement applies to
immigration law provisions passed in 1996, which I supported.
The temporary license requirement, including a requirement that the
license term should expire on the same date as a visa or other
temporary lawful presence-authorizing document, is in the REAL ID Act.
This means if you are here on a document--such as a visa--and it
expires, your driver's license should expire at the same time. Under
current law, this is not the case
The REAL ID Act requires official identification to expire on the
same date as a person's visa or other presence-authorizing document.
Electronic confirmation by various State departments of motor vehicles
to validate other States' driver's licenses is another important item
in the REAL ID Act. Had Virginia officials referenced the Florida
records of Mohammed Atta, one of the hijackers and masterminds behind
9/11, when he was stopped in Virginia, it is likely they would have
discovered that his license was not current. The REAL ID Act will make
it difficult for instances such as this to take place.

[[Page S3804]]

While I strongly support the steps taken in the REAL ID Act to
strengthen our immigration laws, I remain vigilant, and look forward to
working with my colleagues to ensure that American citizens' individual
liberties are not infringed upon.
I also want to be aware of and oppose efforts to explicitly create a
national ID card which could contain all of a person's personal
information.
Finally, in the 108th Congress, I cosponsored S. 1906, the Homeland
Security Enhancement Act of 2003, which was introduced by my colleague
from Alabama, Senator Sessions, and my former colleague from Georgia,
Senator Miller, and was also cosponsored by my colleague from Idaho,
Senator Craig. S. 1906 would give our law enforcement and immigration
and border officers the tools and funding they need to do their jobs.
More specifically, S. 1906 would: clarify for law enforcement officers
that they have the legal authority to enforce immigration violations
while carrying out their routine duties; increase the amount of
information regarding deportable illegal aliens entered into the FBI's
National Crime Information Center database, making the information more
readily available to state and local officials; supply additional
facilities and beds to retain criminal aliens once they have been
apprehended, instead of releasing them, which occurs quite frequently;
require the Federal Government to either take illegal aliens into
custody or pay the locality or State to detain them, instead of telling
those officials to release the aliens because no one is available to
take custody; require that criminal aliens be retained until
deportation under the Institutional Removal Program, so that they are
not released back into the community; mandate that States only give
driver's licenses to legal immigrants and make the license expire the
same day the alien's permission to be in the country expires.
In conclusion, let's work to improve and enforce our laws and not
reward those who break them.
I ask unanimous consent that several pertinent articles be printed in
the Record.
There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in
the Record, as follows:

[From the New York Times, May 23, 2004]

Border Desert Proves Deadly for Mexicans

(By Timothy Egan)

At the bottleneck of human smuggling here in the Sonoran
Desert, illegal immigrants are dying in record numbers as
they try to cross from Mexico into the United States in the
wake of a new Bush administration amnesty proposal that is
being perceived by some migrants as a magnet to cross.
``The season of death,'' as Robert C. Bonner, the
commissioner in charge of the Border Patrol, calls the hot
months, has only just begun, and already 61 people have died
in the Arizona border region since last Oct. 1, according to
the Mexican Interior Ministry--triple the pace of the
previous year.
The Border Patrol, which counts only bodies that it
processes, says 43 people have died near the Arizona border
since the start of its fiscal year on Oct. 1, more than in
any other year in the same period.
Leon Stroud, a Border Patrol agent who is part of a squad
that has the dual job of arresting illegal immigrants and
trying to save their lives, said he had seen 34 bodies in the
last year. In Border Patrol parlance, a dead car and a dead
migrant are the same thing--a ``10-7''--but Mr. Stroud said
he had never gotten used to the loss of life.
``The hardest thing was, I sat with this 15-year-old kid
next to the body of his dad,'' said Mr. Stroud, a Texan who
speaks fluent Spanish. ``His dad had been a cook. He was too
fat to be trying to cross this border. We built a fire and I
tried to console him. It was tough.''
If the pace keeps up, even with new initiatives to limit
border crossings by using unmanned drones and Blackhawk
helicopters in the air and beefed-up patrols on the ground,
this will be the deadliest year ever to cross the nation's
busiest smuggling corridor. The 154 deaths in the Border
Patrol's Tucson and Yuma sectors last year set a record.
``This is unprecedented,'' said the Rev. John Fife, a
Presbyterian minister in Tucson who is active in border
humanitarian efforts. ``Ten years ago there were almost no
deaths on the southern Arizona border. What they've done is
created this gauntlet of death. It's Darwinian--only the
strongest survive.''
For years, deaths of people trying to cross the border
usually occurred at night on highways near urban areas,
killed by cars. But now, because urban entries in places like
San Diego and El Paso have been nearly sealed by fences,
technology and agents, illegal immigrants have been forced to
try to cross here in southern Arizona, one of the most
inhospitable places on earth.
They die from the sun, baking on the prickled floor of the
Sonoran Desert, where ground temperatures reach 130 degrees
before the first day of summer. They die freezing, higher up
in the cold rocks of the Baboquivari Mountains on moonless
nights. They die from bandits who prey on them, in cars that
break down on them, and from hearts that give out on them at
a young age.
The mountainous Sonoran Desert, between Yuma in the west
and Nogales in the east, is the top smuggling entry point
along the entire 1,951-mile line with Mexico, the Border
Patrol says. Through the middle of May, apprehensions of
crossers in the desert south of Tucson had jumped 60 percent
over the previous year. Nearly 300,000 people were caught
trying to enter the United States through the desert border
since last Oct. 1.
After a four-year drop, apprehensions--which the Border
Patrol uses to measure human smuggling--are up 30 percent
over last year along the entire southern border, with 660,390
people detained from Oct. 1 through the end of April, federal
officials said.
The crossing here, over a simple barbed-wire fence, is
followed by a walk of two or three days, up to 50 miles on
ancient trails through a desert wilderness, to reach the
nearest road, on the Tohono O'odham Nation Indian
Reservation, a wedge of desert the size of Connecticut that
is overrun with illegal immigrants, or on adjacent federal
park or wildlife land. Most people start off with no more
than two gallons of water, weighing almost 17 pounds, in
plastic jugs. In recent days, with daytime temperatures over
100 degrees in the desert, a person needed a gallon of water
just to survive walking five miles.
The desert is littered with garbage--empty plastic jugs,
discarded clothes, toilet paper.
``My feet hurt and I'm thirsty, but I will try again after
a rest,'' said Edmundo Saenz Garcia, 28, who was apprehended
on the reservation one morning near the end of his journey.
His toes were swollen and blistered. He walked in cowboy
boots. After being fingerprinted for security, he will be
sent back to Mexico, agents said.
Mr. Garcia said he had heard that the new Bush immigration
plan, which would grant work visas to millions of illegal
immigrants inside the United States and to others who can
prove they have a job, was ``amnesty,'' and he wondered why
he was arrested. He said he would try to cross again in a few
days.
``It's like catch-and-release fishing,'' Mr. Stroud, the
Border Patrol agent, said with a shrug after helping Mr.
Garcia with his blisters. ``One week, I arrested the same guy
three times. If I dwell on it, it can be frustrating.''
Agents and groups opposed to open borders say the spike in
crossings and deaths are the fault of the Bush proposal,
which is stalled in Congress and unlikely to be acted on this
year. But it has created a stir in Mexico, they say.
``They've dangled this carrot, and as a result
apprehensions in Arizona are just spiking beyond belief,''
said T. J. Bonner, president of the National Border Patrol
Council, which represents about 9,000 agents. ``The average
field agent is just mystified by the administration's
throwing in the towel on this.''
Mr. Bonner, who is not related to the border commissioner,
said the people were crossing in huge numbers, even at the
high risk of dying in the desert, because ``they're trying to
get in line for the big lottery we've offered them.''
With an estimated 8 million to 12 million immigrants in
this country illegally--and only a handful of prosecutions of
employers who hire them--the southern border is more broken
now than at any time in recent history, said Mark Krikorian,
executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies, a
research group opposed to increased immigration.
``We've created an incentive to take foolish risks,'' Mr.
Krikorian said. ``In effect, we're saying if you run this
gauntlet and can get over here, you're home free.''
Bush administration officials say there is only anecdotal
evidence, from field agents, that their proposal has caused
the spike in crossings. They point to a new $10 million
border initiative and indications in recent weeks that
apprehensions have leveled off as evidence that they are
getting the upper hand on the Arizona border. It is the last
uncontrolled part of the line between Mexico and the United
States, they said.
``Unfortunately, there have always been deaths on the
border,'' said Mario Villareal, a spokesman for the Border
Patrol in Washington.
It was 3 years ago this month that 14 people died trying to
walk cross the desert near this small tribal hamlet, dying of
heat-related stress in what the poet Luis Alberto Urrea
called ``the largest death event in border history.'' Mr.
Urrea is the author of ``The Devil's Highway'' (Little, Brown
and Company), an account of the crossing and border policy.
He wrote that the Sonoran Desert here ``is known as the
most terrible place on earth,'' where people die ``of heat,
thirst and misadventure.''
To curb deaths, the American government has been running an
advertising campaign in Mexico, warning people of the
horrors.
``The message is, `No mas cruces en la frontera,' `no more
crosses on the border,' '' Commissioner Bonner said in
unveiling the

[[Page S3805]]

new plan earlier this month in Texas. He said 80 percent of
the deaths in a given year happen between May and August.
The government has also increased staffing of Border Patrol
Search Trauma and Rescue Units, called Borstar, which deploys
emergency medical technicians like Mr. Stroud, to assist
people found in desperate condition in the desert.
The publicity campaign seems to have had little effect, say
border agents and illegal immigrants.
Raminez Bermudez, 26, walked for four days in 100-degree
heat, and said he knew full well what he was getting into. He
had been caught four times before his apprehension this week,
he said.
Though he has a 25-acre farm in southern Mexico, Mr.
Bermudez said he could earn up to $200 a day picking cherries
in California. He was distressed, though, at getting caught
and at the failure to meet a coyote, or smuggler, who had
agreed to pick him up and members of his group for $1,200
each.
Mr. Stroud has developed a ritual to cope with the
increased number of bodies he has seen among the mesquite
bushes and barrel cactus of the Sonoran. He has seen children
as young as 10, their bodies bloated after decomposing in the
heat, and mothers wailing next to them.
``I say a little prayer for every body,'' he said. ``You
try not to let it get to you. But every one of these bodies
is somebody's son or daughter, somebody's mother or father.''
____

[From the Washington Times, May 18, 2004]

Stealth Amnesty

(By Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.)

The issue that has the potential to be the most volatile
politically in the 2004 election is not Iraq, the economy or
same-sex marriages. At this writing, it would appear to be
the wildly unpopular idea of granting illegal aliens what
amounts to amnesty--the opportunity to stay in this country,
work, secure social services, become citizens and, in some
jurisdictions, perhaps vote even prior to becoming citizens.
So radioactive is this idea across party, demographic,
class and geographic lines that President Bush has wisely
decided effectively to shelve the immigration reform plan he
announced with much fanfare earlier this year. With the
lowest job approval ratings of his presidency, the last thing
he needs is a legislative brawl that will at best fracture,
and at worst massively alienate his base.
It appears unlikely to help him much with Americans of
other stripes, either. Significant numbers of independents
and Democrats (although, to be sure, not John Kerry's left-
wing constituency)--even Hispanic ones--feel as conservative
Republicans do: Rewarding those who violate our immigration
statutes is corrosive to the rule of law, on net detrimental
to our economy and a serious national security vulnerability.
Unfortunately for Mr. Bush, one of his most loyal friends
in the U.S. Senate, Republican conservative Larry Craig of
Idaho, is poised to saddle the president's re-election bid
with just such a divisive initiative: S. 1645, the
Agricultural Job Opportunity, Benefits and Security Act of
2003 (better known as the AgJobs bill). AgJobs is, in some
ways, even worse than the president's plan for temporary
workers. While most experts disagree, at least Mr. Bush
insists that his initiative will not amount to amnesty for
illegal aliens.
No such demurral is possible about S. 1645. By the
legislation's own terms, an illegal alien will be turned into
``an alien lawfully admitted for temporary residence,''
provided they had managed to work unlawfully in an
agricultural job in the United States for a minimum of 100
hours--in other words, for just 2\1/2\ workweeks--during the
18 months prior to August 31, 2003.
Once so transformed, they can stay in the U.S. indefinitely
while applying for permanent resident status. From there, it
is a matter of time before they can become citizens, so long
as they work in the agricultural sector for 675 hours over
the next six years.
The Craig bill would confer this amnesty not only on
farmworking illegal aliens who are in this country--estimates
of those eligible run to more than 800,000. It would also
extend the opportunity to those who otherwise qualified but
had previously left the United States. No one knows how many
would fall in this category and want to return as legal
workers. But, a safe bet is that there are hundreds of
thousands of them.
If any were needed, S. 1645 offers a further incentive to
the illegals: Your family can stay, as well. Alternatively,
if they are not with you, you can bring them in, too--cutting
in line ahead of others who made the mistake of abiding by,
rather than ignoring, our laws. And just in case the illegal
aliens are daunted by the prospect of filling out such
paperwork as would be required to effect the changes in
status authorized by the AgJobs bill, S. 1645 offers still
more: free counsel from, ironically, the bane of
conservatives like Sen. Larry Craig and many of his
Republican co-sponsors--the highly controversial, leftist and
taxpayer-underwritten Legal Services Corp.
Needless to say, such provisions seem unlikely to be well-
received by the majority of law abiding Americans. Nor, for
that matter, do they appear to have much prospect of passage
in the less-self-destructive House of Representatives.
Yet, if Mr. Craig presses for action on his legislation,
the Senate leadership might be unable to spare either
President Bush or itself the predictable blow-back: As of
today, the Senate Web site indicates the Idahoan has 61
cosponsors, two more than are needed to cut off debate and
bring the legislation to a vote; 11 more than would be needed
for its passage.
In short, thanks to intense pressure from an unusual
coalition forged by the agricultural industry and illegal
alien advocacy groups, the Senate might endorse the sort of
election altering initiative that precipitates voter
response--like that made famous by the movie ``Network
News'': ``I am mad as hell and I am not going to take it
anymore.'' Some, perhaps including the normally shrewd Mr.
Craig, may calculate that such voters will have nowhere to go
if the alternative to Republican control of the White House
and Senate would be Democrats who are, if anything, even less
responsible when it comes to amnesty (and social services,
voting rights, etc.) for illegal aliens.
The truth of the matter, though--as President Bush's
political operatives apparently concluded after they trotted
out their amnesty-light initiative last January--is voters
don't have to vote Democratic to change Washington's
political line-up. They just have to stay home on Election
Day. And S. 1645 could give them powerful reason to do so.
____

[From the New York Times, March 22, 2004]

In Florida Groves, Cheap Labor Means Machines

(By Eduardo Porter)

Immokalee, Fla.--Chugging down a row of trees, the pair of
canopy shakers in Paul Meador's orange grove here seem like a
cross between a bulldozer and a hairbrush, their hungry steel
bristles working through the tree crowns as if untangling
colossal heads of hair.
In under 15 minutes, the machines shake loose 36,000 pounds
of oranges from 100 trees, catch the fruit and drop it into a
large storage car. ``This would have taken four pickers all
day long,'' Mr. Meador said.
Canopy shakers are still an unusual sight in Florida's
orange groves. Most of the crop is harvested by hand, mainly
by illegal Mexican immigrants. Nylon sacks slung across their
backs, perched atop 16-foot ladders, they pluck oranges at a
rate of 70 to 90 cents per 90-pound box, or less than $75 a
day.
But as globalization creeps into the groves, it is
threatening to displace the workers. Facing increased
competition from Brazil and a glut of oranges on world
markets, alarmed growers here have been turning to labor-
saving technology as their best hope for survival.
``The Florida industry has to reduce costs to stay in
business,'' said Everett Loukonen, agribusiness manager for
the Barron Collier Company, which uses shakers to harvest
about half of the 40.5 million pounds of oranges reaped
annually from its 10,000 acres in southwestern Florida.
``Mechanical harvesting is the only available way to do that
today.''
Global competition is pressing American farmers on many
fronts. American raisins are facing competition from Chile
and Turkey. For fresh tomatoes, the challenge comes from
Mexico. China, whose Fuji apples have displaced Washington's
Golden Delicious from most Asian markets--and whose apple
juice has swamped the United States--is cutting into American
farmers' markets for garlic, broccoli and a host of other
crops.
So even while President Bush advances a plan to invite
legal guest workers into American fields, farmers for the
first time in a generation are working to replace hand
laborers with machines.
``The rest of the world hand-picks everything, but their
wage rates are a fraction of ours,'' said Galen Brown, who
led the mechanical harvesting program at the Florida
Department of Citrus until his retirement last year. Lee
Simpson, a raisin grape grower in California's San Joaquin
Valley, is more blunt. ``The cheap labor,'' he said, ``isn't
cheap enough.''
Mr. Simpson and other growers have devised a system that
increases yields and cuts the demand for workers during the
peak harvest time by 90 percent; rather than cutting grapes
by hand and laying them out to dry, the farmers let the fruit
dry on the vine before it is harvested mechanically.
Some fruit-tree growers in Washington State have introduced
a machine that knocks cherries off the tree onto a conveyor
belt; they are trying to perfect a similar system for apples.
Strawberry growers in Ventura County, Calif., developed a
mobile conveyor belt to move full strawberry boxes from the
fields to storage bins, cutting demand for workers by a
third. And producers of leaf lettuce and spinach for bag
mixes have introduced mechanical cutters.
American farmers have been dragging machines into their
fields at least since the mid-19th century, when labor
shortages during the Civil War drove a first wave of
mechanical harvesting. Mechanization grew apace for the
following 100-plus years, taking over the harvesting of crops
including wheat, corn, cotton and sugar cane.
But not all crops were easily adaptable to machines. Whole
fruit and vegetables--the most lucrative and labor intensive
crops, employing four of every five seasonal field workers--
require delicate handling. Mechanization sometimes meant
rearranging the fields, planting new types of vines or trees
and retrofitting packing plants.
Rather than make such investments, farmers mostly focused
on lobbying government

[[Page S3806]]

for easier access to inexpensive labor. California growers,
the biggest fruit and vegetable producers in the nation,
persuaded the government to admit Mexican workers during
World War I. Later, from 1942 to 1964, 4.6 million Mexican
farm workers were admitted into the country under the bracero
guest-worker program.
Investment in technology generally happened when the
immigrant spigot was shut. After the bracero program ended
and some farm wages began to rise, scientists at the
University of California at Davis began work on both a
machine to harvest tomatoes mechanically and a tomato better
suited to mechanical harvesting.
By 1970, the number of tomato-harvest jobs had been cut by
two-thirds. But the tomato harvester's success proved to be a
kiss of death for mechanical harvesting. In 1979, the farm
worker advocacy group California Rural Legal Assistance, with
support from the United Farm Workers union of Cesar Chavez,
sued U.C. Davis, charging that it was using public money for
research that displaced workers and helped only big growers.
The lawsuit was eventually settled. But even before that,
in 1980, President Jimmy Carter's agriculture secretary, Bob
Bergland, declared that the government would no longer
finance research projects intended to replace ``an adequate
and willing work force with machines.'' Today, the
Agricultural Research Service employs just one agricultural
engineer: Donald Peterson, a longtime researcher at the
Appalachian Fruit Research Station in Kearneysville, W. Va.
``At one time I was told to keep a low profile and not to
publicize what I was doing,'' Mr. Peterson said.
As the government pulled out, growers lost interest as
well, refocusing on Congress instead. In 1986, farmers were
instrumental in winning passage of the Immigration Reform and
Control Act, which legalized nearly three million illegal
immigrants--more than a third under a special program for
agriculture.
Farmers' investments in labor-saving technology all but
froze, and gains in labor productivity slowed. From 1986 to
1999, farm labor inputs fell 2.4 percent, after a drop of 35
percent in the preceding 14 years. Meanwhile, farmers'
capital investments fell 46.7 percent from their peak in 1980
through 1999.
About 45 vegetable and fruit crops planted over 3.6 million
acres of land, and worth about $13 billion at the farm gate,
are still harvested by hand, by a labor force made up mostly
of illegal immigrants. On average, farm workers earned $6.18
an hour, less than half the average wage for private, nonfarm
workers, in 1998, the year of the Labor Department's most
recent survey of agricultural workers.
Florida's orange groves have reflected the broader trends.
In the 1980's, a 20-year research effort into mechanical
harvesting ground to a halt. With frosts upstate taking
200,000 acres out of production, orange prices soared and the
demand for labor fell.
But as is often the case in agriculture, farmers
overreacted to the market's strength, flocking to plant
groves among the vegetable patches, pastures and swamps in
the southwestern part of the state. By the early 1990's, the
market looked poised for a glut. With the prospect of bumper
crops in Brazil, where harvesting costs are about one-third
as high as in Florida, a crisis loomed--driving orange
growers back into technology's embrace.
In 1995, the growers decided to plow $1 million to $1.5
million a year into research in mechanical harvesting. By the
1999-2000 harvest, the growers had achieved their
technological breakthrough, with four different harvesting
machines working commercially. Last year, machines harvested
17,000 acres of the state's 600,000 acres planted in juice
oranges, said Fritz M. Roka, an agricultural economist at the
University of Florida.
``Mechanical harvesting is the biggest change in the
Florida citrus industry since we switched to aluminum
ladders,'' said Will Elliott, general manager of Coe-Collier
Citrus Harvesting, one of seven commercial contractors that
are shaking trunks and brushing canopies around the state.
Mr. Brown, the retired Department of Citrus official,
estimates that in five years, machines will harvest 100,000
acres of oranges here. But there are obstacles. Machines work
best on the big, regularly spaced, groomed young groves in
the southwest, and some do not work at all on the smaller,
older, more irregular acreage in central Florida. Machines
are hard to use on Valencia orange trees, because shaking
them risks prematurely dislodging much of the following
year's harvest.
Still, the economics are in mechanization's favor. A tariff
of 29 cents per pound on imports of frozen concentrated
orange juice lets Florida growers resist the Brazilian
onslaught--but not by much. According to Ronald Muraro and
Thomas Spreen, researchers at the University of Florida,
Brazil could deliver a pound of frozen concentrate in the
United States for under 75 cents, versus 99 cents for a
Florida grower.
Mechanical harvesting can help cut the gap. Mr. Loukonen of
Barron Collier estimates that machine harvesting shaves costs
by 8 to 10 cents a pound of frozen concentrate.
The spread of mechanization could redraw the profile of
Immokalee, which today is a rather typical American farming
town. Seventy-one percent of the population of 20,000 is
Latino--with much of the balance coming from Haiti--and 46
percent of the residents are foreign born, according to the
2000 census. About 40 percent of the residents live under the
poverty line, and the median family income is below $23,000--
less than half that of the United States as a whole.
Philip Martin, an economist at U.C. Davis, points to the
poverty as an argument in favor of labor-saving technology.
He estimates that about 10 percent of immigrant farm workers
leave the fields every year to seek better jobs. Rather than
push more farmhands out of work, he contends, introducing
machines will simply reduce the demand for new workers to
replenish the labor pool.
And there are some beneficiaries among workers: those lucky
enough to operate the new gear. Perched in the air-
conditioned booth of Mr. Meador's canopy shaker, a jumpy
ranchera tune crackling from the radio, Felix Real, a former
picker, said he can make up to $120 a day driving the
contraption down the rows, about twice as much as he used to
make.
Yet many Immokalee workers are nervous. ``They are using
the machines on the good groves and leaving us with the
scraggly ones,'' said Venancio Torres, an immigrant from
Mexico's coastal state of Veracruz who has been picking
oranges in Florida for three years.
Mr. Loukonen, the Barron Collier manager, said the farm
workers were right to be anxious. ``If there's no demand for
labor, supply will end,'' he said. ``They will have to find
another place to work, or stay in their country.''

Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, our Federal Government has got to do
better, faster, in improving our border security and meeting the
growing problem of illegal immigration.
That is why Congress has been beefing up the border patrol and buying
high-tech verification systems for the Department of Homeland Security.
That is why, whether you agree on the specific methods or not, the
House of Representatives attached national drivers' license standards
and asylum changes, in the so-called REAL ID provisions, to the Iraq
supplemental appropriations bill.
That is why I have supported Senator Byrd on an amendment to this
bill to increase border security, hire more investigators and
enforcement agents, and boost resources for detention.
That is why I am cosponsoring a bill to help States deal with
undocumented criminal aliens.
And that is why I have worked to bring the AgJOBS--bill the
Agricultural Job Opportunities, Benefits, and Security Act--to the
Senate floor.
I truly wish we did not have to have this debate on this bill on the
Senate floor.
However, the House of Representatives has forced this opportunity
upon us. By putting border, identification, and asylum provisions in
the supplemental, the House has turned this bill into an immigration
bill.
I am committed to making this debate as brief as possible, and as
full and fair as necessary. As far as I am concerned, a thorough debate
on AgJOBS does not need to take more than a couple hours, if we can get
agreement from Senators who oppose the amendment.
The Senate has enough time for this amendment. If anyone is going to
unduly delay this bill, it is not this Senator. As a member of the
Appropriations Committee and on this floor, I fully support prompt
appropriations for our men and women in uniform and for operations
necessary in the war on terrorism.
AgJOBS is only an installment toward an overall solution to our
nation's growing problem of illegal immigration. However, it is a
significant installment, a logical installment, and one that is fully
matured and ready to go forward.
I have worked with my colleagues and numerous communities of interest
on AgJOBS issues for several years. The amendment I bring forward this
week has been, in all its major essentials, well-known and much
discussed in the Senate and the House for more than a year and a half.
This bipartisan effort builds upon years of discussion and
suggestions among growers, farm worker advocates, Latino and
immigration issue advocates, Members of both parties in both Houses of
Congress, and others.
We have now built the largest bipartisan coalition ever for a single
immigration bill. This letter was just delivered this week to Senate
offices. There are about 100 more signatures on this letter than a
similar letter delivered a year ago. Support for AgJOBS is growing.
That support reflects the fact that, in agriculture as in other
sectors, the current immigration and labor market system is profoundly
broken.

[[Page S3807]]

An enforcement-only policy is not the answer and doesn't work.
The United States has 7,458 miles of land borders and 88,600 miles of
tidal shoreline. We can secure those frontiers well but not perfectly.
As we have stepped up border enforcement, we have locked undocumented
immigrants in this country at least as effectively as we have locked
any out.
With an estimated 10 million undocumented persons in the United
States, to find them and flush them out of homes, schools, churches,
and work places would mean an intrusion on the civil liberties of
Americans that they will not tolerate. We fought our revolution, in
part, over troops at our doors and in our homes.
History has shown us what does work: A coupling of more secure
borders, better internal enforcement, and a guest worker program that
faces up to economic reality.
The only experience our country has had with a legal farm guest
worker program--used widely in the 1950s but repealed in the 1960s--
taught us conclusive lessons. While it was criticized on other grounds,
that program dramatically reduced illegal immigration from high levels
to almost nothing, while meeting labor market needs.
AgJOBS is a groundbreaking, necessary part of this balanced,
realistic approach. American agriculture has boldly stepped forward and
admitted the problem. AgJOBS is a critical part of the solution.
Agriculture is the sector of the economy for which the problem is the
worst. Fifty to 75 percent of farm workers are undocumented. As
internal enforcement has stepped up, family farms are going out of
business because they cannot find legal workers.
This mighty machine we call American agriculture is on a dangerous
precipice--perhaps the most dangerous in our history. This year, for
the first time since records have been kept, the United States is on
the verge of becoming a net importer of agricultural products.
To keep American-grown food on our families' tables, we need a
stable, legal, labor supply. To keep suppliers, processors, and other
rural jobs alive, American agriculture needs a stable, legal, labor
supply. It has been said, foreign workers are going to harvest our
food; the only question is whether they do it here or in another
country.
Whatever the case is in other industries, in agriculture, we really
are talking about jobs that Americans can't or won't take. This
physically demanding labor is seasonal and migrant in nature. Few
Americans can or will leave home and family behind, to travel from
State to State, crop to crop, for only part of the year, living in
temporary structures. The planting, growing, and harvesting seasons
occur at different times in different States--usually when students are
not available.
AgJOBS is also part of a humane solution. Legal workers can demand a
living wage and assert legal rights that undocumented workers--smuggled
into the country and kept ``underground''--cannot. Every year, more
than 300 persons die in the desert, the boxcar, or the back of a truck
trailer. For a civilized, humane country, that is intolerable.
For the long term, AgJOBS reforms and streamlines the profoundly
broken H-2A program that is supposed to provide legal, farm guest
workers. It is now so bureaucratic and burdensome, it admits only about
40,000 workers a year--2 to 3 percent of farm workers.
However, we cannot expand the H-2A program overnight. A system of
consulate system, a Homeland Security bureaucracy, and a Department of
Labor bureaucracy that, today, chokes on processing 40,000 workers a
year will need several years to ramp up to several times that amount.
Growers, almost all of which do not use H-2A today, will need time to
get into the system. Also, growers will need time to build housing and
prepare for the other labor standards that H-2A has always required to
prevent foreign workers from taking jobs from Americans.
As a bridge to stabilize the workforce while H-2A reforms are being
implemented, AgJOBS includes a one-time-only earned adjustment program,
to let about 500,000 trusted farm workers, with a proven, substantial
work history here, continue working here, legally. The permanent H-2A
reforms would make future farm worker adjustments unnecessary.
AgJOBS is not amnesty or a reward for illegal behavior.
Requiring several years of demanding, physical labor in the fields is
an opportunity to rehabilitate to legal status--to earn the adjustment
to legal status.
Adjusting AgJOBS workers would have to meet a higher standard of good
behavior than other, legal immigrants, in the future. Once a worker is
in the adjustment program, he or she has to obey all the laws that
other, legal immigrants have to. In addition, an adjusting worker would
be deported for conviction of one felony; or three misdemeanors,
however minor; or, in the amendment before, a single serious
misdemeanor, defined as an offense that results in 6 months of jail
time.
Part of earning adjustment involves the immigrant surrendering to
some limits on his or her legal rights--including a substantial
prospective work requirement in agriculture and meeting a higher legal
standard of good behavior than other, legal immigrants.
The adjusting worker can apply for permanent residence--a green
card--at the end of the adjustment process. As a practical matter,
obtaining a green card would take about 6 to 9 years after the worker
enters the adjustment process. For the work involved, the economic
contributions made, and the diligence required over a long period of
time, this is fair. Sharing the American dream with persons who want to
be--and will be--law-abiding members of the community, is fair.
AgJOBS workers, both adjusting and H-2A, would be free to leave the
country at the end of the work season and not be ``locked in'' the
country, between jobs.
Finally, AgJOBS is good for our homeland security.
With background checks, AgJOBS would let American families know who
is putting the food on our tables. That means ensuring a safe and
stable food supply for American families.
When we stop sending investigators and enforcement agents into the
potato fields and apple orchards, we will be able to devote critical
resources where they belong--hunting down real criminals and stopping
terrorists.
AgJOBS is a win-win-win, for growers, workers, taxpayers, and
homeland security. I urge my colleagues to support this amendment.
I also ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record several
documents setting out facts about AgJOBS, the need for AgJOBS,
frequently asked questions, and letters of endorsement from the New
England Apple Council, Americans for Tax Reform, and from former U.S.
Trade Representative and Secretary of Agriculture, Clayton Yeutter.
There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in
the Record, as follows:

Facts About AgJOBS

the Agricultural Job Opportunity, Benefits, and Security Act of 2005--
S. 359/H.R. 884

The Problem: Some 50 to 75 percent of America's farm work
force is undocumented. As border and internal enforcement
improves, work force disruptions are increasing and some
operations are simply shutting down because growers cannot
find a reliable, legal labor supply. This comes at a time
when American agriculture is in perhaps its most precarious
condition in our history, and we are on the verge of
importing more food than we grow, for the first time since
records have been kept.
Long-Term Solution: A permanently reformed H-2A program
would be streamlined, easier to use, and more economical,
providing a legal work force for farm jobs Americans won't
take. Legal guest workers would go back to their home
countries when the work season is over. The current H-2A
system is profoundly broken and supplies only 2 to 3 percent
of farm workers (30,000 to 40,000 a year out of a work force
of 1.6 million).
Short-Term ``Bridge'': A one-time-only earned adjustment
program would allow growers to retain trusted, tax-paying
employees with a proven work history, to stabilize the ag
work force as the industry (and the government bureaucracy)
transitions to greater use of a reformed H-2A program. Based
on DOL statistics, about 500,000 workers would be eligible to
apply.
Rehabilitation, not ``amnesty'': A significant prospective
work requirement (at least 360 days over 3 to 6 years,
including at least 240 days in the first 3 years) in
agriculture--among the most physically demanding work in the
country--means adjusting workers could earn the right to stay
and work toward legal status. Adjusting workers would have to
meet a higher standard of good behavior than other, legal
immigrants, being subject to deportation for any 3
misdemeanors, regardless how minor.

[[Page S3808]]

Good for homeland security: Hundreds of thousands of
undocumented workers would be brought out of the shadows and
given background checks. DHS could re-focus more resources on
fighting more dangerous threats.
Good for American consumers: American families would be
more certain of a safe, stable, food supply grown in America,
and we would know who is growing our food.
Not a ``magnet'' for new illegal immigration: Only workers
with a substantial, proven work history (at least 100 days)
in agriculture in the USA before January 1, 2005, would be
eligible to apply for the earned adjustment program.
Not ``taking jobs away'' from American workers: H-2A labor
standards (including wages, housing, and transportation)
ensure that American workers are not ``underbid'' for H-2A
jobs. Whatever arguments some may make about other
industries, most of the work in labor-intensive agriculture
is seasonal and migrant in nature. Most American workers
cannot and will not leave their families and homes behind, to
move from farm to farm, living in temporary quarters,
following temporary work.
Humane, good for workers: It is intolerable that, every
year, hundreds of workers die packed in boxcars or truck
trailers or crossing the desert. Many thousands are preyed
upon by human smugglers. Stepped-up border enforcement has
locked in as many as it has locked out, as returning home at
the end of the work season becomes as treacherous and deadly
as entering the country. Workers with legal status can assert
legal rights against exploitation and safely leave the
country when the work is done.

The Need for AgJOBS Legislation--Now

Americans need and expect a stable predictable, legal work
force in American agriculture. Willing American workers
deserve a system that puts them first in line for available
jobs with fair, market wages. All workers deserve decent
treatment and protection of basic rights under the law.
Consumers deserve a safe, stable, domestic food supply.
American citizens and taxpayers deserve secure borders, a
safe homeland, and a government that works. Yet we are being
threatened on all these fronts, because of a growing shortage
of legal workers in agriculture.
To address these challenges, a bipartisan group of Members
of Congress, including Senators Larry Craig (ID) and Ted
Kennedy (MA) and Representative Chris Cannon (UT) and Howard
Berman (CA), is introducing the Agricultural Job Opportunity,
Benefits, and Security (AgJOBS) Act of 2005. This bipartisan
effort builds upon years of discussion and suggestions among
growers, farm worker advocates, Latino and immigration issue
advocates, Members of both parties in both Houses of
Congress, and others. In all substantive essentials, this
bill is the same as S. 1645/H.R. 3142 in the 108th Congress.

THE PROBLEMS

Of the USA's 1.6 million agricultural work force, more than
half is made up of workers not legally authorized to work
here--according to a conservative estimate by the Department
of Labor, based, astoundingly, on self-disclosure in worker
surveys. Reasonable private sector estimates run to 75
percent or more.
With stepped up documentation enforcement by the Social
Security Administration and the Bureau of Immigration and
Customs Enforcement (the successor to the old INS), persons
working here without legal documentation are not leaving the
country, but just being scattered. The work force is being
constantly and increasingly disrupted. Ag employers want a
legal work force and must have a stable work force to
survive--but federal law actually punishes ``too much
diligence'' in checking worker documentation. Some growers
already have gone out of business, lacking workers to work
their crops at critical times.
Undocumented workers are among the most vulnerable persons
in our country, and know they must live in hiding, not
attract attention at work, and move furtively. They cannot
claim the most basic legal rights and protections. They are
vulnerable to predation and exploitation. Many have paid
``coyotes''--labor smugglers--thousands of dollars to be
transported into and around this country, often under
inhumane and perilous conditions. Reports continue to mount
of horrible deaths suffered by workers smuggled in enclosed
truck trailers.
Meanwhile, the only program currently in place to respond
to such needs, the H-2A legal guest worker program, is
profoundly broken. The H-2A status quo is slow, bureaucratic,
and inflexible. The program is complicated and legalistic.
DOL's compliance manual alone is over 300 pages. The current
H-2A process is so expensive and hard to use, it places only
about 30,000-50,000 legal guest workers a year--2 percent to
3 percent of the total ag work force. A General Accounting
Office study found DOL missing statutory deadlines for
processing employer applications to participate in H-2A more
than 40% percent of the time. Worker advocates have expressed
concerns that enforcement is inadequate.

THE SOLUTION--AGJOBS REFOrms

AgJOBS legislation provides a two-step approach to a
stable, legal, safe, ag work force: (1) Streamlining and
expanding the H-2A legal, temporary, guest worker program,
and making it more affordable and used more--the long-term
solution, which will take time to implement; (2) Outside the
H-2A program, a one-time adjustment to legal status for
experienced farm workers already working here, who currently
lack legal documentation--the bridge to allow American
agriculture to adjust to a changing economy.
H-2A Reforms: Currently, when enough domestic farm workers
are not available for upcoming work, growers are required to
go through a lengthy, complicated, expensive, and uncertain
process of demonstrating that fact to the satisfaction of the
federal government. They are then allowed to arrange for the
hiring of legal, temporary, nonimmigrant guest workers. These
guest workers are registered with the U.S. Government to work
with specific employers and return to their home countries
when the work is done. Needed reforms would:
Replace the current quagmire for qualifying employers and
prospective workers with a streamlined ``attestation''
process like the one now used for H-1B high-tech workers,
speeding up certification of H-2A employers and the hiring of
legal guest workers.
Participating employers would continue to provide for the
housing and transportation needs of H-2A workers. New
adjustments to the Adverse Effect Wage Rate would be
suspended during a 3-year period pending extensive study of
its impact and alternatives. Other current H-2A labor
protections for both H-2A and domestic workers would be
continued. H-2A workers would have new rights to seek redress
through mediation and federal court enforcement of specific
rights. Growers would be protected from frivolous claims,
exorbitant damages, and duplicative contract claims in state
courts.
The only experience our country has had with a broadly-used
farm guest worker program (used widely in the 1950s but
repealed in the 1960s) demonstrated conclusive, and
instructive, results. While it was criticized on other
grounds, it dramatically reduced illegal immigration while
meeting labor market needs.
Adjustment of workers to legal status
To provide a ``bridge'' to stabilize the ag work force
while H-2A reforms are being implemented, AgJOBS would create
a new earned adjustment program, in which farm workers
already here, but working without legal authorization, could
earn adjustment to legal status. To qualify, an incumbent
worker must have worked in the United States in agriculture,
before January 1, 2005, for at least 100 days in a 12-month
period over the last 18 months prior to the bill's
introduction. (The average migrant farm worker works 120 days
a year.)
This would not spur new immigration, because adjustment
would be limited to incumbent, trusted farm workers with a
significant work history in U.S. agriculture. The adjusting
worker would have non-immigrant, but legal, status.
Adjustment would not be complete until a worker completes a
substantial work requirement in agriculture (at least 360
days over the next 3-6 years, including 240 days in the first
3 years).
Approximately 500,000 workers would be eligible to apply
(based on current workforce estimates). Their spouses and
minor children would be given limited rights to stay in the
U.S., protected from deportation. The worker would have to
verify compliance with the law and continue to report his or
her work history to the government. Upon completion of
adjustment, the worker would be eligible for legal permanent
resident status. Considering the time elapsed from when a
worker first applies to enter the adjustment process, this
gives adjusting workers no advantage over regular immigrants
beginning the legal immigration process at the same time.
AgJOBS would not create an amnestv program. Neither would
it require anything unduly onerous of workers. Eligible
workers who are already in the United States could continue
to work in agriculture, but now could do so legally, and
prospectively earn adjustment to legal status. Adjusting
workers may also work in another industry, as long as the
agriculture work requirement is satisfied.

agjobs is a win-win-win approach

Workers would be better off than under the status quo.
Legal guest workers in the H-2A program need the assurance
that government red tape won't eliminate their jobs. For
workers not now in the H-2A program, every farmworker who
gains legal status finally will be able to assert legal
protection--which leads to higher wages, better working
conditions, and safer travel. Growers and workers would get a
stable, legal work force. Consumers would get better
assurance of a safe, stable, American-grown, food supply--not
an increased dependence on imported food. Law-abiding
Americans want to make sure the legal right to stay in our
country is earned, and that illegal behavior is not rewarded
now or encouraged in the future. Border and homeland security
would be improved by bringing workers out of the underground
economy and registering them with the AgJOBS adjustment
program. Overall, AgJOBS takes a balanced approach, and would
work to benefit everyone.

Frequently Asked Questions on Agjobs and Earned Adjustment

Q. Amnesty doesn't work. Why try it again?
A. Amnesty doesn't work. That's why I never have supported
it. The country has tried amnesty in the past and it's
failed. Our current immigration law is flawed and enforcement
has been a miserable failure. The government has pretended to
control the borders while the country has looked the

[[Page S3809]]

other way and ignored the problem. That's precisely why we
need to try a new, innovative approach like AgJOBS.
Q. How can you justify rewarding people who came here
illegally by allowing them to become legal?
A. The only workers who apply for the adjustment program
will be those who want to become law-abiding in every
respect. They will have to register with the government and
verify their continued employment. Their adjustment to legal
status will be complete only after they earn it with
continued, demanding labor in agriculture for the next 3-6
years. If an adjusting worker breaks other laws, he or she is
out. The Adjustment Program would be there to benefit hard-
working, known, trusted farm workers who did and will obey
our laws in every other way. This is not a reward, but
rehabilitation.
Q. Won't the promise of status adjustment encourage more
illegal immigration?
A. Not in our AgJOBS bill. If someone wants to enter the
United States to take advantage of our bill, they are already
too late. To begin applying for adjustment, the worker must
have been here before January 1, 2005--3 weeks before the
bill was introduced--with a substantial record of work in
agriculture. We are talking about stabilizing the current
farm work force--working with persons who already are here.
Q. Why should agriculture get this special treatment?
A. That's the sector of our economy most impacted by
illegal immigration. The crisis in agriculture must be
addressed immediately--and it took us years just to get
agreement between growers and labor, between key Republicans
and Democrats, on this new approach. If AgJOBS works--and I
believe it will--it will help us figure out how to solve the
much bigger problem of an estimated million illegal aliens in
this country.
Q. Illegal aliens have broken the law. Why not just round
them up and deport them?
A. (1) We can't, as a practical matter. The official 2000
Census estimated that there are more than 8.7 million illegal
aliens in the U.S. There are more today. That's the
consequence of looking the other way for decades. Finding and
forcibly removing all of them would make the War on Terrorism
look cheap and would disrupt communities and work places to
an extent most Americans simply wouldn't tolerate. If a law
has failed, you can ignore it or fix it. Looking the other
way only encourages more disrespect for the law. We need a
new, innovative solution. AgJOBS is the pilot program.
(2) Up to 85 percent of all farm workers are here
illegally. If we could round up and deport every illegal farm
worker, that would be pretty much the end of American
agriculture--the end of our safe, secure, home-grown food
supply. That's how I first got involved in this issue,
because agriculture is critical to the economy of Idaho--and
the nation. We need to bring these workers out of the
shadows, out of the underground economy, and turn them into
law-abiding workers.
Q. Won't more illegals to sneak across the border, claim
they were already here as farm workers, and abuse this new
program?
A. Unlike the 1986 program--which was amnesty and was very
different--our bill requires workers to provide documentary
proof that they already were established here as farm
workers--for example, tax records or employers' records.
Q. Once this wave of ``adjusting workers'' settle in,
what's to prevent the demand for ANOTHER amnesty program in a
few years?
A. Our bill would help stabilize the farm work force in the
short term so that American farmers can adjust to the economy
of the 21st Century for the long term. The Adjustment Program
would give us the time we need to reform and significantly
grow the other program in the bill, the H-2A Program, which
employs legal, temporary ``guest workers'' who enter the U.S.
only under government supervision and leave when the work is
done. Because the H-2A Program has been broken for decades,
there's been no effective vehicle for workers to come here
legally to work in agriculture when domestic workers aren't
available.
Q. Aren't these illegals stealing jobs from Americans?
A. I hear about that in other industries. I don't know that
I've ever received one complaint from an American citizen who
wanted to do the physically demanding labor of a migrant farm
worker and felt an illegal alien had kept him or her out of
that job. But I have heard from farmers who have gone out of
business because they couldn't find a legal work force. This
is why many of our legal visa programs are industry-
specific--because the economy and labor markets are different
for different industries. This is precisely the reason to try
the AgJOBS solution in agriculture.
Q. How will this bill help us control our borders?
A. We can't possibly seal off thousands of miles of borders
and coastlines. But we can control them better and improve
our homeland security. Thousands of AgJOBS workers would be
registered with, and in a job program supervised by, the
Federal Government. This would be a major step forward toward
a longer-term, more comprehensive solution.
Q. Who's going to pay for the medical bills and social
services for adjusting workers?
A. Remember, in the AgJOBS Adjustment Program, we are
talking only about workers who already are here, with
substantial jobs in agriculture. So, AgJOBS does not add one
bit to this burden. In fact, if anything, it starts helping
to provide relief. When these workers gain legal status, they
will be in a better position to earn more and do more to
provide for themselves than they can today.

New England Apple Council Inc.,

April 18, 2005.
Hon. Senator Craig,
U.S. Senate,
Washington, DC.
Dear Senator Craig: The New England Apple Council was
formed more than 35 years ago, at the end of the Bracero
program. Our 185 growers, me included, have used H2A workers
or workers under previous programs for more than 50 years.
The first foreign workers to come to New England to harvest
crops were in 1943. Over the last decade we have been
struggling to keep the H2A program working. I don't need to
tell you the program is broken and in order for our growers
to keep a legal workforce the program needs fixing.
I listened to Senators Sessions and Byrd speaking against
Ag-Jobs on Friday and was extremely disturbed by what they
were saying. They read from letters sent by a few
associations and agents who are opposed to Ag-Jobs. The
growers using the H2A program ARE IN FAVOR OF AG-JOBS!! Some
associations and agents are not. Why? Because if we reform
H2A so that it really works many growers will be able to use
it without an association or agent. That's what H2A reform is
all about, and we are in favor of it!! Workers who have held
H2A jobs and meet the required days of employment will be
rewarded for playing by the rules. Senator Sessions stated
Friday that ``only people who break the law will be
rewarded'', that is not true!! We have many workers who for
many years, some since before 1986, have been coming yearly
and going home at the end of their contract. Nationwide
between 7 and 10% of the adjusting workers will be those H2A
workers who have obeyed the law, and they will finally be
rewarded. Some agents and some associations see that as a bad
move, which will cause disruption in the workforce, most
growers say it's time to reward those workers who have obeyed
the law.
As a longtime user of H2A workers and Executive Director of
New England Apple Council and past President of the National
Council of Agricultural employers I believe I have the feel
of most agricultural employers in the United States. They are
overwhelmingly in favor of Ag-Jobs. The Jamaica Central
Labour Organization, which supplies most of the H2A workers
to employers in the Northeast, is in favor of Ag-Jobs. The
Association of Employers of Jamaican Workers, which I am
Chairman of, supports Ag-Jobs. And lastly the 520
Organizations who signed the letter to congress sent on April
11th. Support Ag-Jobs. Please tell the Senate that an
overwhelming number of the U.S. employers of H2A labor
support Ag-Jobs.
Thank you for your support on this very difficult issue.
Sincerely,
John Young.
____

Americans for Tax Reform,

Washington, DC, April 12, 2005.
Hon. Larry Craig,
U.S. Senate,
Washington, DC.
Hon. Chris Cannon,
House of Representatives,
Washington, DC.
Dear Senator Craig and Congressman Cannon: I would like to
take this opportunity to commend you for the introduction of
S. 1645 and H.R. 3142, ``The Agricultural Job Opportunity,
Benefits, and Security Act of 2005.'' The ``AgJobs'' bill is
a great first step in bringing fundamental reform to our
nation's broken immigration system.
AgJobs would make America more secure. 50 to 75 percent of
the agricultural workforce in this country is underground due
to highly-impractical worker quota restrictions. Up to
500,000 workers would be given approved worker status,
screened by the Department of Homeland Security, and
accounted for while they are here. Any future workers coming
into America looking for agricultural work would be screened
at the border, where malcontents can most easily be turned
back.
The current H-2A agricultural worker program only supplies
about 2-3 percent of the farm workforce. That means that the
great majority of workers who pick our fruit and vegetables
have never been through security screening. In a post-9/ll
world, this is simply intolerable. Workers that are here to
work in jobs native-born Americans are not willing to do must
stay if food production is to remain adequate. However, those
already here and new workers from overseas should have a
screening system that works, both for our safety and for
their human rights. Your bill does just that.
Sincerely,
Grover G. Norquist,
President.
____

Potomac, MD, April 13, 2005.
Hon. Larry Craig,
U.S. Senate,
Washington, DC.
Dear Senator Craig: History demonstrates that there are
moments in time when special opportunities arise for
political action that successfully addresses multiple
challenges. Today is one of those occasions. The opportunity
is Senator Larry Craig's AgJobs bill, S. 359.
News headlines are alerting American voters of concerns
about our trade deficit,

[[Page S3810]]

American jobs lost to off-shore competition, long-term
funding of the Social Security system, and a seemingly
irreversible pattern of increasing illegal immigration. A
significant opportunity for political action that begins to
address all of these challenges is within reach.
That opportunity, if taken, will strengthen American labor-
intensive agriculture and ensure its future role as a major
U.S. export industry. A growing agriculture sector will keep
jobs in America, because studies show that every laborer in
production agriculture generates 3.5 additional jobs in
related businesses. The workers in all these jobs will be
participants in the Social Security system that is dependent
upon a large workforce. Perhaps most significantly, reputable
studies confirm that the best solution for stemming the tide
of illegal immigration is guest worker programs that
function.
Government statistics and other evidence suggest that at
least 50 percent and perhaps 70 percent of the current
agricultural workforce is not in this country legally. The
immediate reaction of some is to say that these workers have
broken the law and should be deported, and that U.S. farmers
would not have a labor problem if wages were increased.
That ``easy'' answer ignores the reality that few Americans
are drawn to highly seasonal and physically demanding work in
agriculture. At chaotic harvest times, a stable, dependable
workforce is essential. My experience over many years tells
me that agricultural employers do not want to hire illegal
immigrants. What they want is a stable, viable program with
integrity that will meet their labor force needs in a timely,
effective way. What they do not want is a program with major
shortcomings, for which they will inevitably be blamed.
Unfortunately, that is what our laws have imposed upon them.
As a Nation, we can and must do better--for agricultural
employers, for immigrant workers, and as insurance to secure
a strong agriculture business sector. Many of these workers
have come to the U.S. on a regular basis. Many have lived
here for years doing our toughest jobs, and some would like
to earn the privilege of living here permanently. Why not
permit them to do so, over a specified timeframe, thereby
keeping the best workers here? That has the additional
advantage of permitting our government to better focus its
limited monitoring/enforcement resources, particularly where
security may be a concern. Let's use entry/exit tracking,
tamper proof documentation, biometric identification, etc.
where it will truly pay security dividends, and let's stop
painting all immigrants with the same brush.
A limited, earned legalization for agriculture is nothing
like an amnesty program. It would apply only to immigrants
who are at work, paying taxes, and are willing to earn their
way to citizenship so that they too can share in the American
dream. These workers form the foundation of much of our
Nation's agricultural workforce. We need them!
Agricultural employers need an updated guest work program
to replace the antiquated ``H2A'' temporary worker system,
which is too expensive and too bureaucratic to be of
practical use. Necessary reforms include fair and stronger
security and identification measures, market-based wage
rates, and comprehensive application procedures.
The reform program I have outlined already has broad
bipartisan support, thanks to the good work and leadership of
Senators Larry Craig and Ted Kennedy, among others, and a
bipartisan group of House colleagues. Their approach deserves
immediate and serious consideration by the Senate. The status
quo is simply unacceptable. The reforms now being proposed
are a practical solution to a serious problem that is a
genuine threat to the future of American agriculture.
As President Bush has stated, we can and must do better to
match a willing and hardworking immigrant worker with
producers who are in desperate need of a lawful workforce. It
is in our great country's interest to enact these reforms and
reap the harvest of political action at a special moment in
time.
Sincerely,

Clayton Yeutter,

Former Secretary of Agriculture and
Former U.S. Trade Representative.
____

April 11, 2005.
Dear Member of Congress: The undersigned organizations and
individuals, representing a broad cross-section of America,
join together to ask you to support enactment of S. 359 and
H.R. 884, the Agricultural Job Opportunities, Benefits and
Security Act of 2005 (AgJOBS). This landmark bipartisan
legislation would achieve historic reforms to our nation's
labor and immigration laws as they pertain to agriculture.
The legislation reflects years of negotiations on complex and
contentious issues among employer and worker representatives
and leaders in Congress.
A growing number of our leaders in Congress, as well as the
President, recognize that our nation's immigration policy is
flawed and that, from virtually every perspective, the status
quo is untenable. America needs reforms that are
compassionate, realistic and economically sensible--reforms
that also enhance the rule of law and contribute to national
security. AgJOBS represents the coming together of historic
adversaries in a rare opportunity to achieve reforms
supportive of these goals, as well as our nation's
agricultural productivity and food security.
AgJOBS represents a balanced solution for American
agriculture, a critical element of a comprehensive solution,
and one that can be enacted now with broad bipartisan
support. For these reasons, we join together to encourage the
Congress to enact promptly S. 359 and H.R. 884, the
Agricultural Job Opportunities, Benefits, and Security Act of
2005.
Thank you.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Mississippi.

Amendment No. 496

Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I have requests to make in behalf of the
managers of the bill with respect to amendments that have been cleared
on both sides of the aisle.
I call up amendment No. 496 on behalf of Mr. Reid of Nevada which is
technical in nature.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

The Senator from Mississippi [Mr. Cochran] for Mr. Reid,
proposes an amendment numbered 496.

Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of
the amendment be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The amendment is as follows:

(Purpose: To amend title XVIII of the Social Security Act to make a
technical correction regarding the entities eligible to participate in
the Health Care Infrastructure Improvement Program, and for other
purposes)

At the appropriate place, insert the following:

SEC. __. TECHNICAL CORRECTION TO THE MEDICARE HEALTH CARE
INFRASTRUCTURE IMPROVEMENT PROGRAM.

(a) In General.--Section 1897(c) of the Social Security Act
(42 U.S.C. 1395hhh(c)) is amended--
(1) in paragraph (2)--
(A) in the matter preceding subparagraph (A), by inserting
``or an entity described in paragraph (3)'' after ``means a
hospital''; and
(B) in subparagraph (B)--
(i) by inserting ``legislature'' after ``State'' the first
place it appears; and
(ii) by inserting ``and such designation by the State
legislature occurred prior to December 8, 2003'' before the
period at the end; and
(2) by adding at the end the following new paragraph:
``(3) Entity described.--An entity described in this
paragraph is an entity that--
``(A) is described in section 501(c)(3) of the Internal
Revenue Code of 1986 and exempt from tax under section 501(a)
of such Code;
``(B) has at least 1 existing memorandum of understanding
or affiliation agreement with a hospital located in the State
in which the entity is located; and
``(C) retains clinical outpatient treatment for cancer on
site as well as lab research and education and outreach for
cancer in the same facility.''.
(b) Limitation on Review.--Section 1897 of the Social
Security Act (42 U.S.C. 1395hhh(c)) is amended by adding at
the end the following new subsection:
``(i) Limitation on Review.--There shall be no
administrative or judicial review of any determination made
by the Secretary under this section.''.
(c) Effective Date.--The amendments made by this section
shall take effect as if included in the enactment of section
1016 of the Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement, and
Modernization Act of 2003 (Public Law 108-173; 117 Stat.
2447).
Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I think we can have a voice vote on this
amendment.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the amendment.
The amendment (No. 496) was agreed to.
Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote, and I move
to lay that motion on the table.
The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Amendment No. 473

Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I call up amendment No. 473 on my own
behalf regarding the business and industry loan program.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

The Senator from Mississippi [Mr. Cochran] proposes an
amendment numbered 473.

Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of
the amendment be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The amendment is as follows:

(Purpose: To limit the use of funds to deny the provision of certain
business and industry direct and guaranteed loans)

On page 231, between lines 3 and 4, insert the following:
Sec. 6047. None of the funds made available by this or any
other Act may be used to deny

[[Page S3811]]

the provision of assistance under section 310B(a)(1) of the
Consolidated Farm and Rural Development Act (7 U.S.C.
1932(a)(1)) solely due to the failure of the Secretary of
Labor to respond to a request to certify assistance within
the time period specified in section 310B(d)(4) of that Act.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the amendment.
The amendment (No. 473) was agreed to.
Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote, and I move
to lay that motion on the table.
The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Amendment No. 536

Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I send to the desk an amendment on behalf
of Mr. Bond regarding insurance fee requirements.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

The Senator from Mississippi [Mr. Cochran], for Mr. Bond,
proposes an amendment numbered 536.

Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of
the amendment be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The amendment is as follows:

(Purpose: Make technical correction to mortgage insurance fee
requirements contained in the FY 2005 Omnibus Appropriations bill)

Insert the following (and renumber if appropriate) on page
231, after line 3:
``Sec. 6047. (a) Section 222 of title II of Division I of
Public Law 108-447 is deleted; and
(b) Section 203(c)(1) of the National Housing Act (12
U.S.C. 1709(c)) is amended by--
(1) striking ``subsections'' and inserting ``subsection'',
and
(2) striking ``or (k)'' each place that it appears.''.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the amendment.
The amendment (No. 536) was agreed to.
Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.
Mr. REID. I move to lay that motion on the table.
The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Amendment No. 491

Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I call up amendment No. 491 on behalf of
Mr. McConnell regarding debt relief in tsunami-affected countries.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

The Senator from Mississippi [Mr. Cochran], for Mr.
McConnell, proposes an amendment numbered 491.

Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of
the amendment be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The amendment is as follows:

(Purpose: To provide deferral and rescheduling of debt to tsunami
affected countries)

On page 194, line 19 after the colon insert the following:
Provided further, That the President is hereby authorized
to defer and reschedule for such period as he may deem
appropriate any amounts owed to the United States or any
agency of the United States by those countries significantly
affected by the tsunami and earthquakes of December 2004,
including the Republic of Indonesia, the Republic of Maldives
and the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka; Provided
further, That of the funds appropriated under this heading,
up to $45,000,000 may be made available for the modification
costs, as defined in section 502 of the Congressional Budget
Act of 1974, if any, associated with any deferral and
rescheduling authorized under this heading: Provided further,
That such amounts shall not be considered ``assistance'' for
the purposes of provisions of law limiting assistance to any
such affected country:

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the amendment.
The amendment (No. 491) was agreed to.
Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.
Mr. REID. I move to lay that motion on the table.
The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Amendment No. 492

Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I call up amendment No. 492 on behalf of
Mr. Leahy regarding Nepal.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

The Senator from Mississippi [Mr. Cochran], for Mr. Leahy,
proposes an amendment numbered 492.

Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of
the amendment be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The amendment is as follows:

(Purpose: To express the Sense of the Senate in support of the
immediate release from detention of political detainees and the
restoration of constitutional liberties and democracy in Nepal)

At the appropriate place in the bill, insert the following:

NEPAL

Sec. (a) Findings.--The Senate makes the following
findings--
Whereas, on February 1, 2005, Nepal's King Gyanendra
dissolved the multi-party government, suspended
constitutional liberties, and arrested political party
leaders, human rights activists and representatives of civil
society organizations.
Whereas, despite condemnation of the King's actions and the
suspension of military aid to Nepal by India and Great
Britain, and similar steps by the United States, the King has
refused to restore constitutional liberties and democracy.
Whereas, there are concerns that the King's actions will
strengthen Nepal's Maoist insurgency.
Whereas, while some political leaders have been released
from custody, there have been new arrests of human rights
activists and representatives of other civil society
organizations.
Whereas, the King has thwarted efforts of member of the
National Human Rights Commission to conduct monitoring
activities, but recently agreed to permit the United Nations
High Commissioners for Human Rights to open an office in
Katmandu to monitor and investigate violations.
Whereas, the Maoists have committed atrocities against
civilians and poses a threat to democracy in Nepal.
Whereas, the Nepalese Army has also committed gross
violations of human rights.
Whereas, King Gyanendra has said that he intends to pursue
a military strategy against the Maoists.
Whereas, Nepal needs an effective military strategy to
counter the Maoists and pressure them to negotiate an end to
the conflict, but such a strategy must include the Nepalese
Army's respect for the human rights and dignity of the
Nepalese people.
Whereas, an effective strategy to counter the Maoists also
requires a political process that is inclusive and democratic
in which constitutional rights are protected, and government
policies that improve the lives of the Nepalese people.
(b) Whereas, now therefore, be it
Resolved, That it is the Sense of the Senate that King
Gyanendra should immediately release all political detainees,
restore constitutional liberties, and undertake good faith
negotiations with the leaders of Nepal's political parties to
restore democracy.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the amendment.
The amendment (No. 492) was agreed to.
Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.
Mr. REID. I move to lay that motion on the table.
The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
Mr. REID. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the pending
amendment be set aside, and I ask unanimous consent that it be in order
that three amendments en bloc be called up.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection? Without objection, it is
so ordered.

Amendments Nos. 388, 443, 459, and 537

Mr. REID. Mr. President, I send to the desk amendments on behalf of
Mr. Durbin, No. 443; Mr. Bayh, No. 338; Mr. Biden, No. 537; and Mr.
Feingold, No. 459; and I ask unanimous consent that they be set aside.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection? Without objection, it is
so ordered.
The amendments en bloc are as follows:

Amendment No. 388

(Purpose: To appropriate an additional $742,000,000 for Other
Procurement, Army, for the procurement of up to 3,300 Up Armored High
Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicles (UAHMMVs))

On page 169, between lines 8 and 9, insert the following:

up armored high mobility multipurpose wheeled vehicles

Sec. 1122. (a) Additional Amount for Other Procurement,
Army.--The amount appropriated by this chapter under the
heading ``Other Procurement, Army'' is hereby increased by
$742,000,000, with the amount of such increase designated as
an emergency requirement pursuant to section 402 of the
conference report to accompany S. Con. Res. 95 (108th
Congress).

[[Page S3812]]

(b) Availability of Funds.--Of the amount appropriated or
otherwise made available by this chapter under the heading
``Other Procurement, Army'', as increased by subsection (a),
$742,000,000 shall be available for the procurement of up to
3,300 Up Armored High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicles
(UAHMMVs).
(c) Reports.--(1) Not later 60 days after the date of the
enactment of this Act, and every 60 days thereafter until the
termination of Operation Iraqi Freedom, the Secretary of
Defense shall submit to the congressional defense committees
a report setting forth the current requirements of the Armed
Forces for armored security vehicles.
(2) Not later than 90 days after the date of the enactment
of this Act, the Secretary shall submit to the congressional
defense committees a report setting forth the most effective
and efficient options available to the Department of Defense
for transporting Up Armored High Mobility Multipurpose
Wheeled Vehicles to Iraq and Afghanistan.

Amendment No. 443

Purpose: To affirm that the United States may not engage in torture or
cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment under any circumstances)

On page 231, after line 3, insert the following:

AFFIRMING THE PROHIBITION ON TORTURE AND CRUEL, INHUMAN, OR DEGRADING
TREATMENT

Sec. 6047. (a)(1) None of the funds appropriated or
otherwise made available by this Act shall be obligated or
expended to subject any person in the custody or under the
physical control of the United States to torture or cruel,
inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment that is
prohibited by the Constitution, laws, or treaties of the
United States.
(2) Nothing in this section shall affect the status of any
person under the Geneva Conventions or whether any person is
entitled to the protections of the Geneva Conventions.
(b) As used in this section--
(1) the term ``torture'' has the meaning given that term in
section 2340(1) of title 18, United States Code; and
(2) the term ``cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or
punishment'' means the cruel, unusual, and inhumane treatment
or punishment prohibited by the fifth amendment, eighth
amendment, or fourteenth amendment to the Constitution of the
United States.

amendment no. 459

(Purpose: To extend the termination date of Office of the Special
Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction, expand the duties of the
Inspector General, and provide additional funds for the Office)

On page 169, between lines 8 and 9, insert the following:

Office of the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction

Sec. 1122. (a) Subsection (o) of section 3001 of the
Emergency Supplemental Appropriations Act for Defense and for
the Reconstruction of Iraq and Afghanistan, 2004 (Public Law
108-106; 117 Stat. 1234; 5 U.S.C. App. 3 section 8G note), as
amended by section 1203(j) of the Ronald W. Reagan National
Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2005 (Public Law
108-375; 118 Stat. 2081) is amended by striking ``obligated''
and inserting ``expended''.
(b) Subsection (f)(1) of such section is amended in the
matter preceding subparagraph (A) by inserting ``appropriated
funds by the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq during
the period from May 1, 2003 through June 28, 2004 and'' after
``expenditure of''.
(c) Notwithstanding any other provision of law, of the
amount appropriated in chapter 2 of title II of the Emergency
Supplemental Appropriations Act for Defense and for the
Reconstruction of Iraq and Afghanistan, 2004 (Public Law 108-
106; 117 Stat. 1224) under the heading ``OTHER BILATERAL
ECONOMIC ASSISTANCE'' and under the subheading ``iraq relief
and reconstruction fund'', $50,000,000 shall be available to
carry out section 3001 of the Emergency Supplemental
Appropriations Act for Defense and for the Reconstruction of
Iraq and Afghanistan, 2004 (Public Law 108-106; 117 Stat.
1234). Such amount shall be in addition to any other amount
available for such purpose and available until the date of
the termination of the Office of the Special Inspector
General for Iraq Reconstruction.

amendment no. 537

(Purpose: To provide funds for the security and stabilization of Iraq
and Afghanistan and for other defense-related activities by suspending
a portion of the reduction in the highest income tax rate for
individual taxpayers)

At the appropriate place, insert the following:
Sec. __. (a) Provision of Funds for Security and
Stabilization of Iraq and Afghanistan and for Other Defense-
Related Activities Through Partial Suspension of Reduction in
Highest Income Tax Rate for Individual Taxpayers.--The table
contained in paragraph (2) of section 1(i) of the Internal
Revenue Code of 1986 (relating to (relating to reductions in
rates after June 30, 2001) is amended to read as follows:

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The corresponding percentages shall be substituted for the following percentages:
``In the case of taxable years beginning ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
during calendar year: 28% 31% 36% 39.6%
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2001...................................... 27.5% 30.5% 35.5% 39.1%
2002...................................... 27.0% 30.0% 35.0% 38.6%
2003, 2004, and 2005...................... 25.0% 28.0% 33.0% 35.0%
2006 and thereafter....................... 25.0% 28.0% 33.0% 38.6%''.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

(b) Effective Date.--The amendment made by this section
shall apply to taxable years beginning after December 31,
2005.
(c) Application of EGTRRA Sunset to This Section.--The
amendment made by this section shall be subject to title IX
of the Economic Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of
2001 to the same extent and in the same manner as the
provision of such Act to which such amendment relates.

Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for
the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

____________________