Congressional Record, Volume 152 Issue 37 (Wednesday, March 29, 2006)

[Congressional Record Volume 152, Number 37 (Wednesday, March 29, 2006)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2511-S2526]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

SECURING AMERICA'S BORDERS ACT

Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, pursuant to the order of March 28, I ask
that the Senate now begin consideration of S. 2454. I further ask
unanimous consent that the time until 8 p.m. be equally divided between
the two leaders or their designees.
I further ask unanimous consent that when the Senate resumes
consideration of the bill tomorrow, the time until 12 noon be equally
divided in the same form for debate only, and that at noon the chairman
be recognized in order to offer an amendment; provided further that
there then be debate only until 5:30, with the time divided in a
similar fashion.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The clerk will report the bill by title.
The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

A bill (S. 2454) to amend the Immigration and Nationality
Act to provide for comprehensive reform and for other
purposes.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Who yields time?
The majority leader.
Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, to clarify, we are now on what will be
passionately discussed over the next several days, a very important
piece of legislation that addresses the range of border security issues
surrounding enforcement, interior enforcement, temporary worker
programs--a debate which I know and expect will be civil and held with
dignity, but what is a very difficult debate.
I will make a brief opening statement and then turn to the chairman
and ranking member, but also I would like to make a statement shortly
after they do.
Mr. President, this debate, when you boil it down to its essence, is
about the American dream and the home that this country offers for so
many hard-working people--a difficult debate, an important debate. But
it is also an issue about what it means to be a nation, and every
nation must keep its citizens safe and its borders secure.
That is why we are starting with the Securing America's Borders Act,
a bill I introduced prior to the March recess. This bill acknowledges
the overriding principle that we must protect our citizens by securing
our borders. A nation that cannot secure its borders cannot secure its
destiny or administer its laws.
The situation along our southern border now ranks as a serious
national security challenge, second only to the war on terror. Every
day we discover new facts that show how delay and inaction is making
America less safe and less secure.
In January, officials discovered a massive tunnel stretching nearly a
half mile from Tijuana to San Diego. We don't know how many more snuck
in. We do know that mixed in with the families seeking a better life
are drug dealers, human traffickers, terrorists, and common criminals
who cross our border into this country every day.
But the danger is not only to America. It is danger to those who try
to

[[Page S2512]]

cross our borders as well. Unofficial data collected along the Arizona
border shows that nearly 225 people died last year crossing that
border. About 10 percent perished under circumstances that suggest foul
play.
We all know the terrible stories of criminals who prey on vulnerable
migrants, who charge outrageous prices to smuggle them across the
border and then often abandon them at the moment trouble strikes. It is
wrong. It is time for us to act. And over the next week and a half on
this floor we will act.
The bill that I introduced includes a number of commonsense consensus
measures that improve security along our physical border, crack down on
human smugglers, simplify the process of deporting wrongdoers, and make
it easier for employers to confirm their employees' legal status.
First and foremost, we need better enforcement and we need more
manpower on the ground. Last year, the Senate led the charge to provide
funding for 1,000 additional officers, more equipment, and more
detention beds. That was a start but only a start.
My proposal adds nearly 15,000 more officers over the next few years
in a sustained and focused effort to buttress the nearly 20,000 already
deployed to work on border issues.
It also requires new investments in unmanned aerial vehicles,
cameras, and sensors, and a comprehensive national border security
strategy.
It establishes a long-term project of building a virtual barrier to
cover every mile of our 1,951-mile border with Mexico.
This will both make America safer, and it will reduce the number of
people endangering themselves trying to come into our country.
In addition to physically strengthening our border, the bill makes it
easier for the Department of Homeland Security to catch people who
violate our immigration laws.
It enhances the collection of biometric data about who enters the
country. And it allows the department to set up additional border
checkpoints. Moreover, the border security bill creates tough, new
penalties for human smugglers and document forgers.
Under this bill, terrorists, dangerous gang members, and others with
serious criminal connections face expedited removal from the United
States.
But this bill doesn't just draw on the common sense of the American
people for its provisions. It also looked to the 9/11 Commission Report
for guidance. This Commission recommended that we consolidate border
screening systems. The border security bill does just that.
It encourages the use of biometric data to keep track of who is
coming and going. Again, the border security bill does just that. It
identified the need of State and local officials to work with Federal
agencies to identify terrorist suspects. The border security bill does
just that.
Securing the border and enforcing our laws are crucial first steps to
making America safer. But much more remains to be done. And we will
address these other issues over the next week and a half.
There are over 11 million people in this country llegally. Congress
simply cannot turn a blind eye to this growing number. We need to act.
Our Nation is founded on the rule of law by generations upon
generations of immigrants. We should not have to choose between these
founding principles. Instead, we need to honor both traditions.
In my view, neither the House bill nor the bill reported by the
Judiciary Committee yet quite strikes that appropriate balance, and
both need to be improved. I believe the House bill is incomplete
because it fails to provide a comprehensive solution to our immigration
situation, one that allows for necessary and helpful legal immigration
and that welcomes those who play by the rules.
We should reward those who respect the rule of law, who made it here
the right way, and who are trying to make it here the right way. I
believe the committee bill by contrast goes too far in granting illegal
immigrants with what most Americans will see as amnesty.
I disagree with this approach not just as a matter of principle but
because granting amnesty now will only encourage future and further
disrespect for the law. It will undermine our efforts to secure our
homeland. There are better ways to address this issue.
Senator Kyl and Senator Cornyn have a proposal. Senator Specter had a
chairman's mark and a proposed compromise, and all of these approaches
created a temporary worker program without a grant of amnesty. We need
to find a legal way for employers to find the people they need to keep
their businesses running and continue to grow the economy. Creating
legal paths of immigration is a way to do this.

In the end, it is my hope we will have a bill which has both strong
enforcement mechanisms with additional border and interior security and
real employer accountability that addresses the humanitarian and
economic challenges we now face without amnesty.
America has always been the place where one can come to live out a
dream of improvement and renewal. But while we welcome those who
refresh and restore our American spirit, we have always done so within
a framework of the law. The full Senate should have a chance to
discuss, to deliberate, to debate, and to decide how we balance that
rule of law with the situation as we find it. We are here to solve
problems and not to stand by as problems get worse. Those problems are
getting worse. We need to work together so that all 100 Senators have
the opportunity to work within our rules to solve this problem.
The committee bill, while not perfect, makes real and significant
progress in many areas. I believe it can be improved upon. It has
formalized a new consensus in the Senate, one that did not exist a year
ago, on aggressive provisions to protect our borders, including new
detection technologies, significant new increases in Border Patrol
agents, tough provisions on alien smuggling and, for the first time, a
real employer verification enforcement title.
As is the right of the chairman, the Judiciary Committee product will
be offered as an amendment to the Border Patrol security bill that has
been introduced. Moreover, I expect a whole series of amendments which
will attempt to tighten the amnesty and temporary worker provisions in
the judicial bill. I intend to support those amendments.
I recognize we have important principled differences that will be
expressed in the Senate with conviction and with passion over the next
several days. I expect the debate to be contentious. I also expect it
will be civil and it will be respectful. I invite all who have ideas to
work with us. Together we can bring our best to bear on the problem of
illegal immigration so America is safer and is more secure.
As I said when I introduced my bill, I want this coming debate to
reflect our commitment to the rule of law and to our proud immigrant
inheritance. We are a nation of immigrants. We have all benefited from
America's uniquely inclusive ethos. But America is also a nation of
laws. Our laws bind us and protect us. They transform us from seekers
into citizens. They are the very foundation of our democracy.
I am glad many agree on the need to ensure our debate is in the best
keeping of the Senate's tradition. We ought to be honest about the
problems we face, face them directly, and be honest about the outcomes
we seek, within a framework of conversation that does credit to the
Senate and to the Nation. We will conduct this debate with respect and
seriousness.
I look forward to a thorough discussion over the coming days.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Pennsylvania.
Mr. SPECTER. Mr. President, the Senate has an opportunity to take
what could be a historic stand on reforming our immigration system,
where many problems exist, including border security, ports, people
coming into our country whom we cannot identify, posing a potential
security risk from terrorists entering the United States. There are
some 11 million undocumented aliens in the United States who are
unwilling to step forward because of their concern of being prosecuted
and deported. We have an economy which relies very heavily on immigrant
labor.
We have now come to the point where legislation has been introduced
which tackles these problems. The majority leader has said there will
be passionate

[[Page S2513]]

arguments. That is certainly true. Emotions run very high on these
issues.
Some say we are a nation defined by the rule of law and that has been
flagrantly violated by the 11 million people who have come to this
country without conforming to the U.S. law. Many others who have come
on visas have overstayed their leave. And, at the same time, we pride
ourselves on being a compassionate nation. No one can deny that the
United States of America is a nation built by immigrants. No one can
deny that.
In my own personal situation, my own family is Exhibit A. My father
came to this country in 1911 when he was 18 because the Czar wanted to
send him to Siberia. He preferred Pennsylvania. So he came to the
United States. My mother came at the age of 6 with her family and
settled in St. Joe, MO. My brother and my two sisters and I have
contributed to life in America. Our story is replicated by millions of
people who have come from foreign shores and who have created a life
for themselves, as the majority leader says, the American dream. And
people still clamor to come to the United States because of the quality
of life in this country, because of our democratic institutions,
because of freedom of speech, because of educational opportunities and
economic growth, and a chance to have a better livelihood and a
superior way of life.

When the majority leader comments about the committee bill and says
it is amnesty, I disagree with him head on. It is not amnesty. It is
not amnesty because the lawbreakers are not being unconditionally
forgiven for their transgressions. The lawbreakers, in order to move
forward and stay in the United States and move toward a citizenship
path, have to pay a fine. They have to pay their back taxes. They have
to undergo a rigorous background examination. They have to work for 6
years. They have to earn the right to move toward a citizenship track.
If there is a better way to bring these 11 million people forward so
that we can identify them, we are open to any suggestions which anyone
may have. The Judiciary Committee has worked on this issue for months.
We have had hearings. We have had analysis in the committee on markups.
We faced the leader's requirement that the bill be finished before
yesterday, before Tuesday, or the Senate would proceed on the leader's
bill as opposed to the committee bill.
The Judiciary Committee prides itself on getting its work done. We
got our work done. It was not easy, but we did it. In an unusual
session, people returned early from the recess, came back on a Sunday.
It doesn't happen around here, unfortunately. It should, but it
doesn't. We ought to work more Mondays. We are going to work Friday of
this week on this bill. We started at 10 o'clock on Monday morning and
with a short recess break we worked through until past 6 o'clock in the
afternoon. People who are watching C-SPAN may not be too interested in
what a quorum is, but that is when 10 Senators are present out of 18.
That is hard to do, especially when some Senators are in Iraq.
With the cooperation of the distinguished ranking member, Senator
Leahy, and the committee members generally, we were able to complete
our task and complete and report out a bill on Monday of this week.
That bill will be the replacement bill on behalf of the leader's bill.
While the leader is still on the floor, I say in his presence, his
bill is up about noon tomorrow. The committee bill will be a
replacement bill which will form the substance of the Senate
deliberation.
I thank the committee members for their hard work. We have taken
thoughtful, constructive legislation introduced by Senator McCain and
Senator Kennedy, and thoughtful, construction legislation introduced by
Senator Kyl and Senator Cornyn, and suggestions made by other Senators,
and have molded them into what we call a chairman's mark. That is the
name for the amalgamated bill that was the basis for our consideration.
We have moved ahead. It was my hope that we might have structured
accommodation, a compromise among the competing ideas. After debating
it extensively on Monday afternoon, it was determined we could not
accomplish that, but we are still working on it. We yet may be able to
structure a bill which will have more of what Senator Kyl and Senator
Cornyn were looking for than the final committee product. But all of
that remains to be seen.
However, we have produced a bill and the majority leader
characterized it as ``while not perfect, significant progress,'' and I
would not disagree with the majority leader's characterization that it
is not perfect. I have been here a while and I haven't seen a perfect
bill yet. I hope to be here a while longer and I do not anticipate
seeing a perfect bill. This bill, however much it is improved, is not
going to be perfect, in any event.
We have provided for border security. We have what we call a virtual
fence. Unmanned drones will patrol the borders. There will be overhead
satellite control. We have very vastly increased the number of border
agents. We have provisions for employer verification, worked out with
the cooperation of Senator Grassley, who is not only a member of the
Committee on the Judiciary but also chairman of the Committee on
Finance. That is on a title which is yet to be added and will be added
on the floor. We have a little jurisdictional issue, but we have worked
out employer verification. Employer verification is a very major aspect
of securing our borders.
We are going to have people come to the United States because of
opportunity here, no matter what we do. We want to avoid the
circumstance President Bush described in a Saturday address last week
of having people come to the United States in 18-wheelers. What is an
18-wheeler? It is a big truck that has 18 wheels and people are stuffed
into it. Many have died trying to come into this country in that way.
We have the realistic prospect of having an identification card, much
like a credit card, which can go through an electronic process so that
prospective employers will know whether the applicant for a job is here
legally. If the employer hires the applicant knowing they are illegal,
there will be tough employer sanctions to try to stop that practice.
As long as there is opportunity in this country, and without a guest
worker program which will satisfy the needs of our economy, we are
going to have people who will be determined to come here legally or
illegally, any way they can get here.
We had a very important amendment offered by Senator Feinstein, who
had worked with Senator Craig, on agriculture. The statement was made
by Senator Craig, and I believe it to be accurate, that agriculture in
America would collapse--tough word--collapse without migrant labor.
This committee bill includes a worker program which has been the
cornerstone of what President Bush has urged.
I was pleased today to hear that Speaker Dennis Hastert commented he
favors a guest worker program, which would be a significant addition to
what the House of Representatives has passed, an enforcement program.
That is the recognition that it is necessary for the American economy
to have people come into this country to help us on the farms, in the
hotels, in the restaurants, in so many lines of American work.
It is a good sign that when we function in conference under our
bicameral system--the House has passed a bill; I am confident we will
pass a bill in the Senate on immigration; and it is subject to
modification and the will of the Senate--but with the recognition by
the Speaker of a guest worker program, that is a very positive sign.
We have improved the situation with respect to visas for highly
qualified people. William Gates was in Washington, lobbying--a pretty
high-priced lobbyist--to come talk about the needs of Microsoft--a
marvelous company, high tech, enormous advances for America--he wants
more people with Ph.D.s and wants a larger quota of visas for those
people to come in. We have accommodated that. And we have created more
opportunities for people to come in who are students. If we can bring
more brains to the United States, we are going to be anxious to do so.
I believe it is important to say, simultaneously, that we are making
strenuous efforts to avoid bringing people into this country where
there are Americans who can handle the jobs. If

[[Page S2514]]

Americans can handle the jobs, we are not going to be bringing in other
people. We will give those jobs to Americans first. And before
employers may seek guest workers, under our legislation, there has to
be a showing that the jobs could not be filled by Americans.
We have tackled, in the committee bill, the 11 million undocumented
aliens, candidly, as best we could. We pride ourselves on being a
nation of laws, and those who are here undocumented have come into the
United States in violation of our laws. And now the question is, what
do we do? We do not want to have a fugitive class in America. We do not
want to have an underclass in America.
To contemplate, to even theorize about going out and taking 11
million people into custody is an impossibility. And if you took them
into custody, they have to be detained before they have a deportation
proceeding. Where will you detain them? Where are there detention
facilities? Where are there beds? Where are there accommodations to
keep them for deportation proceedings?
So if we have a realistic expectation that these undocumented aliens
will have to come forward, there is going to have to be a program which
will encourage them to come forward. We are not going to go out and
arrest them and find them. And they have to know there is consideration
for their plight, even though they are here without complying with U.S.
law. And they do have to pay a fine. They do have to pay their back
taxes. They do have to work for 6 years. And they have to undergo a
background check. They have to comply with U.S. laws.
So it is not a free ticket. It is not amnesty. This word ``amnesty''
is a code word. It is a code word to try to smear good-faith
legislation to deal with this problem. If you move away from the label,
if you move away from the smear word and analyze what is going on, I
think it is fairly stated that we do not have amnesty.
One line which we have not yet finished is the issue of judicial
reform, judicial review. We need to have more in the way of immigration
judges--better trained, better qualified--to handle the tough jobs
which they have.
Then, we have an appellate line, the Board of Immigration Appeals,
where the number has been cut from 23 to 11, and they are filing one-
page opinions, which puts an enormous burden on judicial review in the
circuit courts. Our bill will return that number to 23. We will call
upon the Board of Immigration Appeals to write opinions so the circuit
court will know what their reasons are, to take a burden from the
circuit court of being required to start from ground zero to figure out
what is going on in a case.
The chairman's mark has a provision that will consolidate appeals in
the Federal circuit. We have had a good bit of objection to that from
the Judicial Conference and from very prominent judges. Before moving
ahead, we did not include that in the bill which we reported out of
committee. Instead, we are going to have a hearing next Monday. We may
even get in the habit in the Senate of working on Mondays. Who knows
what may come from this bill?
We are going to bring in experts in the field. We are going to bring
in the chief judge of the Federal circuit. We are going to bring in the
chief judge of the Second Circuit, which has a very heavy burden. The
chief judge of the Ninth Circuit is not available. We will have other
representation from the Ninth Circuit to analyze that issue, to know
more about the structure as to what we will be doing there.
But I believe we are off to a good start. I believe that when we
replace Senator Frist's bill with the committee bill, we will have a
comprehensive reform package on the table. Then we will work the will
of the Senate. We came close to striking a compromise, as I said, on
Monday afternoon, and it was not successful. But it is going to be
revisited. I think we may yet be able to take portions of the Kyl-
Cornyn bill and integrate them into the committee bill, which relies
very significantly on McCain-Kennedy, to present an even more balanced
approach.
May I say, in conclusion, that we ask Senators to file their
amendments. We have a difficult job. Instead of having 2 weeks, we are
going to have, starting on Thursday--and Friday is always subject to
some question as to how late in the day we can go, if at all--and then
we have next week. And the temper of the Senate is to try to finish on
Thursday when we look toward a recess, especially the Easter recess. I
am being very pragmatic here as to what we are doing, but I would not
be surprised if the leader was prepared to keep us in beyond Thursday
night, beyond even Friday.
So I urge--and I know my distinguished colleague, Senator Leahy,
joins me in this--Senators to come forward with their amendments and be
prepared to debate them and to start to think about time limits and to
be aware that we are going to hold the votes to 15 plus 5. We have many
votes which are held into the 30- to 40-minute category, which cuts
into the floor time to get this important work done.
And now, with another pat on the back to Senator Leahy for his
tireless efforts and support, and who had a lot of things he wanted to
do in Vermont--it is hard to get Senator Leahy out of Vermont any
earlier than absolutely necessary--he was back here on Sunday, and he
was there on Monday. And with the help of the committee--and we had
pretty good attendance--we reported out a bill. I accept the leader's
characterization: while not perfect, significant progress. Let's make
some more progress, and let's get some real immigration reform.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Vermont.
Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, I thank the senior Senator from
Pennsylvania for his kind words. I have told him privately, and I will
say it publicly, he has acted as a chairman should. I have been here 31
years, now going on my 32nd year. I have seen great chairmen in both
parties in this institution. I have seen others who were chairmen in
both parties.
Senator Specter is in the mold of the great chairmen. He took a very
difficult bill, by his own force of will--as he has with others--and
kept us together, made sure we had discussions. We went across the
political spectrum. We had people who feel very strongly, and rightly
so, who had differing views--all distinguished Members of the Senate.
He herded them together, kept us together, and kept us in, doing what
has been a rarity: the type of Monday session he had to make it work.
I can assure colleagues, both Republicans and Democrats, we would not
have this bill on the floor, in an ability where the Senate cannot only
work its will but do a fine piece of legislation, were it not for
Senator Specter. Senator Specter made it possible with his leadership.
Senator Kennedy, on our side, has worked on these issues since before
any of us presently on the floor were in the Senate. And with the work
of Senators from both sides of the aisle, we have a bill that provides
a realistic, a reasonable system for immigration.
We voted in a bipartisan majority. We have seen, over the years, the
Judiciary Committee become more polarized. We have seen, in the past
couple of years, more and more strongly bipartisan votes. In this case,
it was a bipartisan majority with a vote of 12 to 6, with two-thirds of
the members of the committee voting in favor of a bill that protects
America's borders, strengthens enforcement, and--and this is what is so
important--remains true to American values.
The Judiciary Committee has confronted the challenging problem of how
to fix our broken immigration system head on. It has sent to the Senate
a good product. The committee met six times to debate a proposal
offered by the chairman, meeting for long hours and considering dozens
of amendments. The debate was substantive. It was civil. It was
bipartisan. It was effective. And it was productive.
I might say, had it not been for superb staff on both sides of the
aisle, this would not have been possible. I think of the members of my
own staff. I would log on sometimes at midnight, when I would get home
from other things, and their e-mails were pouring in from the work they
had done. I would go back on the e-mails at 5 or 6 o'clock in the
morning, and there were new ones. They were working around the clock.
We were given a deadline of March 27 by the Senate Republican
leadership. I understood that the majority leader

[[Page S2515]]

had committed to turn to the committee bill if we were able to meet his
deadline and report a bill by Monday night. It was difficult. At times
it was a Herculean task that seemed almost the task of Sisyphus. It
seemed undoable and the deadline impossible, but under the steady
leadership of the chairman, with the hard work and dedication of so
many members of the committee--again, I compliment Senator Kennedy of
Massachusetts on our side who worked so hard on this--we worked through
the long hours and numerous amendments and accomplished what seemed to
be the impossible.
When I mention those two Senators, it is not to leave out other
Senators. We had so many who brought up amendment after amendment, who
worked hard on it, all trying to get a bipartisan bill.
The Judiciary Committee sent this resounding message, as I said, with
a bill with a bipartisan vote of 12 to 6, with strong bipartisan
support of every key amendment. These were not party-line amendments.
These were bipartisan amendments. It is a bill that is strong on
enforcement and in some ways stronger than the bill passed by the other
body.
It includes a provision added by Senator Feinstein, for example, to
make tunneling under our borders a Federal crime. It is tough on
employer enforcement. And it is tough on traffickers.
It is also comprehensive and balanced. It confronts the problem of 12
million undocumented immigrants who live in the shadows. It values
work. It respects human dignity. And it includes guest worker
provisions that have been supported by both business and labor. It
includes a way to pay fines and earn citizenship that has the support
of religious and leading Hispanic organizations.
These provisions are not amnesty. I spent enough years in law and
enough years as a prosecutor. I know what amnesty is. These are not
amnesty. Undocumented immigrants already in the country would not get
to cut to the front of the line, but, in accordance with the
committee's bipartisan plan, will need to pay fines, pay back taxes,
work hard, and wait in line for green cards. They have to pass
background checks and play by the rules. With fines and hard work and
going to the back of the line, after 11 years, by following a regular
path to legal status, the currently undocumented will join as full
participants in American society. Following this plan, we could create
an orderly system for immigration that is consistent with traditional
American values and our history.

Opponents of a fair, comprehensive approach are quick to claim that
anything but the most punitive provisions are amnesty. They are wrong.
We had an amnesty bill. President Reagan signed an amnesty bill in
1986. This is not an amnesty bill. An editorial in the New York Times
entitled ``It Isn't Amnesty'' makes the point that painting the word
``deer'' on a cow and taking it into the woods does not make that cow a
deer. Frankly, in the State of Vermont, we deer hunters know the
difference between a cow and a deer. We better. Our committee bill
should not be falsely labeled. Our bill is more properly called what it
is--a smart, tough bill.
The committee also voted to add several constructive and practical
measures to the chairman's mark. We added a new version of the
Agricultural Job Opportunities, Benefits, and Security Act, or AgJOBS,
a bill I have long supported. I was joined in that bipartisan effort by
Senator Larry Craig. AgJOBS will reform the H-2A visa program for
temporary agricultural labor. This new version will help dairy farmers
in Vermont and many other States to legally hire foreign workers. The
bipartisan provision approved by the panel would make dairy workers
able to work under visas for up to 3 years, with the opportunity to
adjust to permanent residence and achieve their full potential to
become eligible for higher paying occupations.
The American people are engaging with us in this debate. The Nation's
newspapers reflect the public's growing interest in how these decisions
will be settled. In my home State, the Burlington Free Press and the
Rutland Daily Herald have offered thoughtful editorial observations
about these issues. I commend these editorials to the attention of my
colleagues, and I will at the end of my statement include them.
The committee also adopted an amendment to include the bipartisan
Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors Act, called the
DREAM Act. This provision will allow immigrant students to attend
college and become permanent residents if they follow the rules
established in the act. It will free eligible students from the
constant fear of deportation, while allowing them to work so they can
afford to pay for college. By our bipartisan committee vote, we hope to
extend Hispanic young people greater educational opportunities so they
may realize the American dream and achieve their potential.
The committee agreed--wisely, I believe--to drop several
controversial provisions. Early in the process, I led an effort to
remove a provision directing the Department of Homeland Security to
study building a barrier, a fence, a wall along our northern border
with Canada.
If I might just for a moment, I live less than an hour's drive from
Canada. I see people go back and forth across that border all the time,
families who live on both sides. My wife is a first-generation
American. She was born in Vermont literally a couple hundred yards from
the Canadian border. Her parents were naturalized citizens coming from
the Province of Quebec. When I come home and she is speaking French on
the phone, I know she is talking with some of her relatives in Canada.
But tens of thousands of families, probably far more than that, cross
the northern border.
There are also businesses. We even have a store in Vermont where
there is a line painted down the center of the store, a cash register
on one side of the store with Canadian money and a cash register on the
other side with U.S. money. Why? Because half the store is in Canada
and half in the United States. With the proposal that was before us of
this barrier, this fence, it was going to be Joe would get a passport
and bring me that box of Rice Krispies from the other side of the
store. I mean, it gets down to that. There are businesses up and down
the same way. When this proposal faced the light of day, we understood
it easily.
There were other controversial provisions that we wisely dropped,
provisions that would have exposed those who provide humanitarian
relief--medical care, shelter, counseling, and other basic services--to
undocumented aliens to possible prosecution under felony alien
smuggling provisions of the criminal law. If somebody is running a food
bank or a shelter for battered children and women and they give aid,
they help people, they feed the hungry, if you have an order of nuns
who feed the hungry, under those circumstances, they faced a chance of
being charged with a crime. For shame, for shame. Let's accept the
beatitudes as something that should go across all faiths, across all
laws. I thank so many in the relief and religious communities for
speaking out on this matter. Those criminal provisions should be
focused on the smugglers. Under the committee bill, that is what we
do--go after the real criminals, the smugglers, people who trade in
human lives.

The committee also voted down a measure that would have criminalized
mere presence in an undocumented status in the United States. Illegal
status is currently a civil offense with very serious consequences,
including deportation. But criminalizing that status was punitive and
wrong. Let's be realistic. Are you going to go out and lock up over 10
million people? It would have led to further harsh consequences. It
would have trapped people in permanent underclass status, unwilling to
move into the mainstream of society.
These policies, which were included in the House-passed bill and
supported there by congressional Republicans, understandably sparked
nationwide protests. They were viewed as anti-immigrant and
inconsistent with American values and history, American values that
attracted my grandparents to come here from Italy to settle in Vermont
or my great grandparents to come from Ireland and do the same.
The committee bill was tough on enforcement and very properly so
tough on the smugglers. It is smarter and fairer.
Finally, I thank the chairman for setting aside provisions in the
mark

[[Page S2516]]

that would have consolidated all immigration appeals from around the
Nation into the jurisdiction of the Federal circuit, the court of
appeals for the Federal circuit. That is a court we have wisely set up
in recent years in Washington because it has specialized jurisdiction.
It was created to hear patent appeals and cases involving technical
intellectual property issues, those issues which have so much to do
with the economy of our country. It was not set up to hear immigration
appeals. In fact, the Judicial Conference, chaired by now Chief Justice
John Roberts and Federal judges from across the country, expressed
serious concerns with these proposals. The chairman did the right thing
when he agreed to hold a hearing and further consider what provisions
will best correct the problems created by former Attorney General
Ashcroft's ill-conceived actions with respect to these matters in
cutting down the number of people who could handle such matters.
I ask everybody to look at the peaceful demonstrations around the
country over the last week. I will pick just one--in Los Angeles, half
a million people. I can't help but notice that. We have slightly over
600,000 people in my State. They had almost the population of my State
in a peaceful demonstration in Los Angeles. They were calling on us,
calling on the Congress, the U.S. Senate and our colleagues in the
other body, to recognize the human dignity of all. These aren't
numbers. These aren't numbers. These are human beings. Do the right
thing. We can do it in keeping with the longstanding American values.
Let's not take the attitude that we are here, so no one else should be
here. We are a nation of immigrants. We really are. In this case, if we
are going to truly have the American dream, we also need a
comprehensive solution to what has become a national problem. We need a
fair, realistic, and reasonable system that includes both tough
enforcement but immigration reform provisions. The bill reported by the
Judiciary Committee is that bill.
This could be a pivotal moment in helping to achieve that goal. The
Judiciary Committee's debate has produced a bill that I believe would
make my grandparents proud. But I think it would make the ancestors of
all of us proud. It is worthy of our support. We should stop and think
for a moment in this body, this exclusive body--there are only 100 of
us who get a chance at any given time to represent almost 290 million
Americans--should we not do something that makes the country proud,
makes those other 290 million Americans proud and makes us in this body
proud?
I thank the many individuals and organizations who were so helpful to
us during committee consideration of the bill. Included among those
supporting this measure are many labor unions, the U.S. Chamber of
Commerce and other business groups, leading Hispanic organizations such
as the Mexican-American Legal Defense and Education Fund, the National
Council of La Raza, many religious organizations, including the United
States Conference of Catholic Bishops.
I ask unanimous consent that editorials from the Rutland Daily
Herald, the Burlington Free Press, and the New York Times be printed in
the Record.
There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in
the Record, as follows:

[From the Rutland Daily Herald, Mar. 28, 2006]

One World

Vermont's economy is sending a mixed message. Unemployment
is low, and median family income is growing. But economic
growth is imperiled by a shortage of workers, and the costs
of housing and health care are becoming increasingly
burdensome.
The labor shortage is having several effects in the
economy. One of them is the appearance of large numbers of
illegal immigrants to work on the state's dairy farms. The
problem of illegal immigration will come before Congress this
week, and it is a contentious and complex issue. The
situation in Vermont is a microcosm.
It is often argued that workers from Mexico, legal or
illegal, are essential to the economy because they are
willing to do work that U.S. workers are unwilling to do. But
as Paul Krugman notes in the column below, workers shy away
from low-paying jobs because they are low-paying. If a farm
worker earned as much as a school teacher, there would be
more people willing to milk cows for a living. But farmers
are in a bind. If they had to pay that much for farm labor,
they would either have to raise the price of milk or they
would have to absorb a cost that few could afford. The price
of milk is out of their hands, and as long as illegal
immigrants are available to hire, they play a role providing
low-cost labor.
Thus, farmers who refuse to hire illegal immigrants find
themselves at a competitive disadvantage, forced to pay
higher wages for the same labor. That's why business
interests are among the chief proponents of allowing guest
workers into the country legally. Business reaps the benefit
of low-cost labor.
The result is that there is an underclass of workers, legal
or illegal, willing to work at wages below what is deemed by
many to be livable in the United States. It is a consequence
of our proximity to Mexico. Substandard wages in this country
are desirable to many Mexicans who, even earning low wages,
manage to send home money to support family members left
behind. The economic inequities between Mexico and the United
States cannot be abolished by passing a tough immigration
law, and the result is downward pressure on wages for
Americans.
That downward pressure exists in the industrial sector as
well. Many old companies have departed over the past 40
years, replaced by a new brand of high-tech company or by
service sector jobs that pay less than traditional factory
jobs. Vermont has regained its footing after the industrial
decline that hurt Springfield, Rutland and Bennington so
badly, but continued industrial growth remains hampered by
the labor shortage caused by an aging population.
On top of these pressures are the extra burdens of high
housing and health care costs, which hit low- and middle-
income workers the hardest. Market forces beyond Vermont are
driving up those costs, and efforts in Montpelier by the
Douglas administration and the Legislature to ease the burden
of those costs are essential to future economic growth in the
state.
Thus, it is impossible to talk about Vermont's economy
without talking about the economy of the nation and the
world. The influx of farm workers from Mexico makes that
clear, but the rest of the economy, too, remains enmeshed
with the broader, changing world.
____

[From the Burlington Free Press, Mar. 28, 2006]

Immigration Bill Should Help Farmers

Vermont needs immigrant labor to help on dairy farms. There
are currently more than 2,000 Mexicans filling relatively
low-paying farm jobs that Vermonters won't accept. Without
that immigrant work force, some dairy farms would go
bankrupt.
That's a reality.
As the U.S. Senate focuses this week on immigration reform
changes, Congress should recognize the needs of farms for
this critical labor source. The Senate should create a
program to allow hard-working immigrants to legally hold jobs
in this country.
That might be structured much like the current program that
allows immigrant labor--primarily from Jamaica--to work for
less than a full year in Vermont picking apples.
The Senate Judiciary Committee on Monday passed a good
version supported by Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., that suggests
a three-year work program that can be renewed.
The changes cannot create a permanent ``underclass,'' as
some have suggested. Instead, it should be based on ``common
sense, decency and reality,'' said Vermont Agriculture
Secretary Steve Kerr.
This is not a partisan issue. Vermont Sens. Jim Jeffords
and Leahy support such a change. President Bush has also
expressed a desire to enable immigrants to cross the border
and fill job vacancies, and Sen. Larry Craig, R-Idaho, has
sponsored an agricultural jobs package.
There is resistance, however, from some senators who worry
about security threats linked to opening the borders in such
a way, and those who don't want to reward immigrants who have
broken the law to enter this country.
While it is important to tighten border security, this does
not preclude taking responsible steps to allow carefully
screened immigrants to hold jobs in Vermont that provide
income for their families and help the state's struggling
dairy industry.
``This is a deciding issue,'' Kerr told the Free Press on
Monday, as the Senate Judiciary Committee in Washington began
serious work on immigration legislation. ``This is a litmus
test.''
Kerr said Vermont farmers would certainly prefer to hire
local labor for these jobs. But, he said, it is virtually
impossible to find people willing to take these low-paying,
physically demanding jobs. The Mexican workers are paid
roughly $8 an hour, and the farmer provides many of the
basics, including housing and heat.
Creating a program that documents the arrival of those
workers makes sense. Local law enforcement would know who is
living in their communities, and the workers would have the
security of moving freely off the farm and knowing they
aren't at risk of automatic deportation.
Most importantly, farmers would have a reliable, hard-
working group of people helping with the milking and other
demanding farm tasks. For some, that might be the difference
between staying In business or throwing In the towel.

[[Page S2517]]

____
[From the New York Times, Mar. 29, 2006]

It Isn't Amnesty

Here's one way to kill a cow: take it into the woods in
hunting season, paint the word ``deer'' on it and stand back.
Something like that is happening in the immigration debate
in Washington. Attackers of a smart, tough Senate bill have
smeared it with the most mealy-mouthed word in the
immigration glossary--amnesty--in hopes of rendering it
politically toxic. They claim that the bill would bestow an
official federal blessing of forgiveness on an estimated 12
million people who are living here illegally, rewarding their
brazen crimes and encouraging more of the same.
That isn't true. The bill, approved by the Senate Judiciary
Committee in a 12-to-6 vote on Monday, is one the country
should be proud of. Four Republicans, including the
committee's chairman, Arlen Specter, joined eight Democrats
in endorsing a balanced approach to immigration reform. The
bill does not ignore security and border enforcement. It
would nearly double the number of Border Patrol agents, add
resources for detaining illegal immigrants and deporting them
more quickly, and expand state and local enforcement of
immigration laws. It would create a system to verify workers'
identities and impose tougher punishments on employers who
defied it.
But unlike the bill's counterpart in the House, which makes
a virtue out of being tough but not smart, the Specter bill
would also take on the hard job of trying to sort out the
immigrants who want to stay and follow the rules from those
who don't. It would force them not into buses or jails but
into line, where they could become lawful residents and--if
they showed they deserved it--citizens. Instead of living off
the books, they'd come into the system.
The path to citizenship laid out by the Specter bill
wouldn't be easy. It would take 11 years, a clean record, a
steady job, payment of a $2,000 fine and back taxes, and
knowledge of English and civics. That's not ``amnesty,'' with
its suggestion of getting something for nothing. But the
false label has muddied the issue, playing to people's fear
and indignation, and stoking the opportunism of Bill Frist,
the Senate majority leader. Mr. Frist has his enforcement-
heavy bill in the wings, threatening to make a disgraceful
end run around the committee's work.
The alternatives to the Specter bill are senseless. The
enforcement-only approach--building a 700-mile wall and
engaging in a campaign of mass deportation and harassment to
rip 12 million people from the national fabric--would be an
impossible waste of time and resources. It would destroy
families and weaken the economy. An alternative favored by
many businesses--creating a temporary-worker underclass that
would do our dirtiest jobs and then have to go home, with no
new path to citizenship--is a recipe for indentured
servitude.
It is a weak country that feels it cannot secure its
borders and impose law and order on an unauthorized
population at the same time. And it is a foolish, insecure
country that does not seek to channel the energy of an
industrious, self-motivated population to its own ends, but
tries instead to wall out ``those people.''
It's time for President Bush, who talks a good game on
immigration, to use every means to clarify the issue and to
lead this country out of the ``amnesty'' semantic trap. He
dislikes amnesty. Mr. Frist dislikes amnesty. We dislike
amnesty, too.
The Specter bill isn't amnesty. It's a victory for
thoughtfulness and reason.

Mr. LEAHY. I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Who seeks time?
The Senator from New Mexico.
Mr. DOMENICI. Before the distinguished Senator leaves the Senate
floor, Mr. Leahy, might I say that I was present while you spoke this
afternoon. I was here when the distinguished chairman of the committee
spoke. I commend both of you for the diligent and obviously hard work
you put in on a very hard subject for the American people. I think we
got off to a good start today. Your hearings set the right pace for
Americans to begin to understand that immigration is a complicated
issue but that it can be solved. I am much more optimistic than I was a
couple of months ago that even with these timeframes which have been
tough on you all, these mandates by our leader that you get things done
by a time-certain, we have both been here long enough to know that
maybe that is how you get it done.
Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, I thank the distinguished senior Senator
from New Mexico. We have known each other for over 30 years. I
appreciate his words. I thank him.
Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I am going to speak today very
personally because I don't think very many people know, certainly
looking here at my good, new friend occupying the chair from the State
of Oklahoma, I am quite certain he doesn't know that this Senator was
born by a mother who unknowingly was an illegal alien. She happened to
be Italian. We are now talking more about Hispanics, although not
exclusively. But today in the Senate Hart Building, the Senator from
New Mexico had before him on the floor of his office, and in the chairs
that we had, about 30 Navajo young men and women--10th, 11th and 12th
graders--with a few adults, and about 5 or 6 students from a completely
different part of the State of New Mexico. They were sitting on the
floor asking me if I would talk to them about myself. ``Who are you?''
they asked.
I started off by telling them who I was. I gave a little bit of a
lesson on the Constitution, and about there being only two Senators
from each State, and how lucky we are, because we have just as many
Senators as New York has. Of course, they knew that. I told them that
might not seem fair, but the Constitution makes it fair because it is
the document of fairness.
Then we proceeded to talk about how I got here. I told them the story
of how I ran for office on a dare and got elected. Then I talked about
some dates in our State's history. I said, in 1912, New Mexico became a
State. Before that, in 1906, 2 boys arrived at Ellis Island with an
uncle. One of these boys with the last name Domenici had a strange
first name, Cherubino. People wondered what that was. In Italy, that
was a nice name that meant ``little angel.'' He was born the last child
of that Domenici family because his mother died in childbirth, so they
named him ``little angel.''
In 1906, Cherubino, who was my father, arrived at Ellis Island,
having left a little town called Lucca, Italy. He arrives in
Albuquerque, NM, I told these young Indian students. He went to work in
a grocery store that, believe it or not, was named the Montezuma
Mercantile Company, and it was owned by Italian immigrants. These
Navajo young people were wondering in awe, what are you talking about?
I said, well, that is the way America was then. They welcomed aliens.
There were no illegal aliens. If you came from Europe during those
times, they said, come, we want you. They didn't say you are
automatically a citizen, but they said come. These two boys were
brothers; my dad came with his brother. The reason why is something
that should not take the Senate's time tonight, other than to say they
planned to bring my father only, but he got scared to come without his
brother, so he cried and his brother said I will go, and then my dad
said I will go, too. He said if you go, I will go. So his father played
Solomon and sent them both. They went to France and got on a boat and
arrived in Albuquerque in 1906.
We became a State in 1912. If my math is right, that is 6 years
later. Guess what. By then, my father had bought the grocery store. He
never went to school, but you see, he was still able to buy the grocery
store. He was an alien. He worked hard and guess what happened. The war
came along. Don't get too far ahead of yourself. It was the First World
War. He got drafted as an alien. They put him in the Corps of
Engineers. He told me one day: They wanted to promote me, but I told
them I didn't want another bar because I spoke English too poorly and I
was embarrassed to drill the boys. He was a little older than some of
them, but he turned down the little button, or whatever you get,
because he didn't want to sound like an Italian instead of an American,
so he did not take the promotion.
But he still came home from the war a hero. And because of his
service, he was made a U.S. citizen. Guess what. He went to see the
best lawyer in Albuquerque, NM, before he married my wonderful mother.
He said: If I marry her, because she has not finished her paperwork for
citizenship, will she be a citizen? The lawyer said: Oh, yes, sure, she
will be a citizen. Now, you see, that was wrong legal advice. So here
my mother bears four children to a wonderful citizen whose grocery
store is growing. She becomes kind of everybody's leader, the Parent-
Teacher Association president, raising all the money for the Catholic
school, and guess what. She is an illegal alien.

My mother hadn't been back to Italy since she was 3 years old.
Remember, that is like some of our aliens in America. You know them,
Senator Martinez. They have been here 30 years, they have never been
back to their home countries, they live in the same neighborhood, they
have children and

[[Page S2518]]

they marry Americans, just like my mother. One afternoon when I am
about 9 or 10 years old, sitting in the backyard, guess who arrived? It
was during the Second World War, 2 years before the end, or a year and
a half. Who were we at war with? Italy. The immigration officers
arrived in their big black cars. They pulled up to the house, and there
was the Senator-to-be 45 years later--little Pete--with his sisters,
and here they come. Of course, we think what happened was there was a
flamboyant Italian man nearby that used to--excuse me--imbibe on
weekends. They think he had a little too much imbibing and he was
singing a song out the window of the third floor of a hotel, right on
top of the grocery store, the Montezuma Grocery Store. Of course,
singing Italian, he probably excited some American who was a
supercitizen, right? He was worried about these illegal aliens. So the
immigration officers set about to see who among us were illegal aliens,
and there she was, my mother, Alda Domenici. They decided she had to be
arrested because she was an illegal alien. So, sure enough, they came
to do that and a neighbor had to come over to take care of us kids. I
was about 9 or 10. I was pretty frightened. I remember that we had a
nice Zenith radio, a standup, and it had an aerial in it that would
permit you to get music and pick up noise from overseas. The agents
disconnected the radio so we could not communicate with the enemy. Then
my father arrived at home. But guess who else arrived. That lawyer who
advised my parents on my mother's immigration status came because my
father called him up. That great lawyer, whose son was later Governor
of New Mexico, got there to the house and said: What is the matter with
you guys? This is no lady to be arrested. She has been living here
since she was 3. Look at all her kids, and her husband has been running
this business. And the agents said: We have these orders that she has
to be arrested. To make it short, the lawyer answered: Why don't you
arrest me, too.
So they had to arrest the lawyer, too. They took him to wherever they
were going--to Federal court, I suppose, and they took my dad's gun. A
couple hours later they put up the bond and she came home. I don't know
when--probably about 6 months later--she filled out all the forms to
become a U.S. citizen.
Why do I tell you this story? I want everybody to know that I am a
Republican. I don't want anybody to think that in order to understand
what it is like to have things happen to you like what happened to me,
you have to be a Democrat or a Republican; you just have to live in
this country during these times, when things like this happen. They
happen and you know exactly how people feel. They are like everybody
else.
We talk about this whole issue of illegal aliens as if we are talking
about hooligans and people who are drug addicts. Of course, when you
have something as intricate as the border, which is where economics
come into confrontation--the economics of poverty come into
confrontation with the desire of adults to get ahead; that comes into
confrontation with those who want to make money by taking advantage of
that desire and charging people and becoming human smugglers--the
thieves of human bodies; and that comes into confrontation with lying
to and cheating Federal agents. You have this whole panorama of what is
going on along our borders. Then we keep waiting for it to get solved,
while all the time, day by day, thousands upon thousand of stories such
as I have described are occurring.
There is no way to sit back, whether you are a competent, powerful
radio announcer, newspaper article writer, editorial page writer, or
local neighborhood noisemaker--there is no way you can properly capture
the reality of what we have let happen to this country. I, for one,
want it to be known that I think this problem is solvable. I believe we
can tighten up our borders. I believe it will take time--I believe it
is impossible to pass a law and 6 months later have a border that is as
tight as a belt, as some people say. It is going to take a lot of
equipment and manpower and a lot of machinery and technology to do
that. It is also going to take the next 2 or 3 weeks in the Senate of
human willpower built around a spirit that is American, that recognizes
our country was built by people such as those I have described. And
there happen to be not as many named Domenici as there were back then;
more are named Martinez than Domenici today, and Salazar, and Chavez;
and many of their first names are not like mine, which was Pietro, but
they are Enrique and Carlos.
I think there is a willingness to work these issues of border
security and immigration reform out. I want to suggest a couple of
items. I believe the American people are going to understand before we
are finished that we are going to do our very best to make the border
such that it will not be penetrated every day by thousands of people
who will be violating this new law we pass. I believe that is going to
happen.
I do believe, however, one thing that has not been discussed enough
is that we are going to have to get much more cooperation from Mexico
to get that done, and I would like my friend Senator Martinez, who is
here, to talk about that when he makes his comments.
The Mexican government and our Government must enter into an
agreement, an accord, when this bill is finished that they are going to
jointly see that our border security provisions get enforced. I have a
provision requiring that in a bill that I introduced called the WISH
Act. It has provisions saying that before the bill comes into force as
far as benefits to Mexico, the Presidents of the two countries must
enter into an agreement regarding enforcing our drug laws, human
smuggling laws, and immigration laws; and also where Mexico will
encourage their residents who live here to come forward and be
recognized under the law. And, fellow Americans, what we put on paper
and make our law is going to have to be significantly enticing enough
for these millions of undocumented workers, some of whom have been
living here a long time, to risk putting up their hands and saying: I
will exchange the way I am living now for this new promise, this new
proposal.
It better be good enough or they will continue living the way they
are. So it has to have something in it that they want.
But it also has to say to the American people: We have this situation
under control; it is not going to continue on after we pass this bill.
And that gets back to the 10 million to 15 million undocumented workers
who live here. We have called them all kinds of things. Let's just say
the 10 million to 15 million aliens who live in the United States who
are not citizens of the United States, some of whom came here totally
illegally, some of whom came here under temporary permits--that group
of human beings has to be addressed by this legislation in a humane
way. They must be addressed in a way that recognizes that they are
currently contributing significantly to the United States, that they
probably are going to continue to contribute to our country, and that
what we have in our minds about who they are and what they are is
probably not what they really are. In our minds, we have pictures of
them being leeches, people who are living off us instead of producing
something we want or need.
I hope I get a chance to give another few comments later. I have some
very valuable information about the economic contribution of these
people. It is a very big contribution, in the billions of dollars in
commerce coming from these people living in our country. There are
billions of dollars in GDP contributions.
What kind of jobs are these people we are talking about currently
doing? Some of us speak about them as if the only jobs they have are
kind of trashy old jobs that nobody else wants. That is some
misinformation, too. They are taking some menial jobs. We constantly
say: Why don't we let them come here because they will take those jobs
that nobody else wants? But they are also engaged in some very good
jobs. There are carpenters and automobile mechanics in certain cities.
They have moved their skills upward beyond that temporary permit they
have, and they are in another category, but they can't move up into
that new category under current law, to represent the new kind of
lifestyle they live.
Also, about half of them have lived here a short period of time, and
about

[[Page S2519]]

half of them have lived here a long time. So I am just going to
describe what maybe is the way we get the issue of undocumented workers
solved. Let's consider drawing a line at those who have lived here
longer than 5 years. It seems to me that this is an important
consideration, an important issue to look at because if one lives here
for several years, that person certainly has a different relationship
with the community and probably a different relationship all the way
around than somebody who just arrived last week or even somebody who
works 3 months and goes home. If someone has lived here for 5 years and
has been working and maybe is just like that lady I described, my
mother, who is living with an American and has children and has been
here 10 years but is not a citizen, we have to figure out how we are
going to handle that.
I believe the President of the United States deserves enormous credit
for sticking with this issue for a long time. People have said: Where
is the plan? He was the only big voice in America for the last 3 or 4
years that has constantly said we have to do something about this
problem, and it is not just buttoning up the border. He said we have to
go beyond that and provide something for those who want to live and
work here--we must give them a chance to live here under humane
circumstances with the kind of grace and opportunity that is a
privilege of living in America. I think he is still saying that.
I am hopeful that before we finish this debate, the solution is going
to come from a White House-Senate-House melding of ideas along the
lines of giving some special treatment to those who have lived here for
a longer period of time--different and better treatment, easier access
to the U.S., perhaps easier access to a higher level of status than
what they had when they came here.
That is the essence of a proposal that I put in what I call the WISH
bill. Workers who are here less than 5 years under my proposal can
apply for and get a visa without leaving the United States. If they are
unemployed for no more than 30 consecutive days, they get a renewal of
that 3 year visa two more times. Then they have to leave America for at
least three years. That proposal is for people who have been here less
than 5 years.
One would say that is not so good. But what we are talking about is
giving these people 9 full years to do their best to arrange things and
have whatever successes they can make. So that is one approach to one
portion of these people who are undocumented workers.
I suggest we split this group of people so that those who have been
here for longer than 5 years--which they can prove that with workers'
affidavits and the like--start by obtaining the same visa I just
discussed, but after 5 years, they can apply for another visa or a
change of status, except permanent residency, without leaving the
United States. We would have no caps on the number of visas for these
change-of-status grants.

It would appear to this Senator that this could be the beginnings of
a compromise built around something that is understandable, realistic,
and should be given due consideration by this body.
Not having had the burden--or the luxury--of serving on the Judiciary
Committee, I have told Senator Kyl, who has worked very hard on this
issue, that I am willing to work with him, and to the best of my
staff's ability they will work with him, to see if we can't come up
with some kind of a better approach than has been forthcoming
heretofore.
I notice Senator Kennedy is present. Senator Martinez has asked if he
could speak next, and he has been waiting for quite a while. I assume
that is satisfactory.
In the absence of the Senator from Massachusetts, I spoke about the
fact that frequently we get legislation done when we are told we must
do it under a deadline. There is still a lot to do on this bill, but I
can tell the Senator, there are a lot of people pulling for a solution
and who want to be helpful.
This is, indeed, a true turning point in modern American domestic
policy history. It is a big opportunity. We solve it or we have some of
the worst problems confronting the American people that we can imagine.
It has almost gone beyond the solvable, but not quite because we are
pretty sanguine and willing to work.
Just as Senator Kennedy and his family have their roots in Ireland, I
had an opportunity to speak this afternoon about a very strange
incident of how this Senator happened to be born to a woman who thought
she was American but was not. So I lived in a family for quite a while
with a father who became a citizen only because he served in the First
World War. He married a woman who he was told would be an American if
he married her. He was told that erroneously by a lawyer, and she was
arrested during the Second World War--taken right out of our household.
So I understand this whole idea of a household with a father who is
American and a mother who is not, but they are living, working, and
getting ahead and driving their business. I understand that they are
just like every other family in America. There is nothing different.
They have the same love, same hope, same will, and same aspirations as
those of us who were born here have.
I am here to be helpful. I thank the Senate for listening, and I
thank the Senator from Massachusetts for listening to me again the last
5 minutes. My wife is going to give me a note saying that my face is
getting red, and it is time to sit down. I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Florida is recognized.
Mr. MARTINEZ. Mr. President, first, I thank the Senator from New
Mexico. I thank Senator Kennedy for indulging me for a couple of
moments. I know we are supposed to go back and forth, but I appreciate
the opportunity to be heard following Senator Domenici because I
believe my comments are germane to the comments he made. I thank the
Senator from Massachusetts for his courtesy. These will be very brief
comments.
Mr. President, I say to Senator Domenici, I love hearing his story
because it is the story of America. It is the fabric of America about
which he spoke. I was so touched by the way he told it.
Obviously, as the only immigrant in the Senate, I think it is
terribly appropriate that I speak at the outset of this very important
national debate on this issue in the Senate.
I am reminded as we talk about these issues that there are so many
interesting connections. When I came to the Senate as a Senator from
the State of Florida, it was such an incredibly proud moment for me
and, frankly, for many in the community from which I come--the Cuban-
American community--since I was the very first Cuban American to have
this distinction and this honor. I also am probably the first Florida
Senator to ever serve in the U.S. Senate who was not born in America.
But, Mr. President, the story of America is such that, as I started to
look at that history, I found out that the very first Senator from
Florida, when Florida became a State--I believe in 1854--was a fellow
by the name of Yulee Levy who was actually born in the Middle East. He
was a fellow who had come to America as an immigrant and who ended up
representing the State of Florida as the very first of two Senators who
came, and he, in fact, beat me by a good little margin as the first
foreign-born Senator from the State of Florida. But that is the sort of
history our country is made of.

This is such a timely and important debate. I am pleased that you
would mention our President, who has been very steadfast and very
strong on the issue of a comprehensive solution to our immigration
problem. I love so much that you began this debate in such a loving
way, in such a civil way, and in a way that allows us to think a little
bigger and a little higher than the combat of the day and the rhetoric,
frankly, which so often gets so heated, which so often gets so beyond
the pale of what ought to be. I am proud of the Senate as the Senator
begins this debate with such a note of civility.
I believe we recognize first and foremost that our immigration system
is broken, that we have to fix it, we have to set about fixing it. The
Senator is so right when he speaks about the fact that it is almost too
late to fix and we have to act and we must act now. It is important,
too, that we focus on a comprehensive solution.
It is obvious that we have to fix the border. All of us want to see
the border be secured and protected, to be something other than what we
have today.

[[Page S2520]]

The resources will be there, we will do it, and it will be a commitment
that we make first and foremost for border security. I think all of us,
no matter where we come from, appreciate the legality involved in
border security, but in addition to that, we have to be careful of the
rhetoric. I don't believe we should allow the loudest voices, not
necessarily the best voices, to make a definition of what amnesty is
and what amnesty should be. I believe we should look to solutions that
are rooted in what America is about and our American values.
We cannot ignore the millions who already are here.
We have to give the border its importance, but we have to look beyond
that to the fact that there are millions who have been living here and
contributing to this Nation, and we look forward to an opportunity to
figure a mechanism.
Senator Domenici has put forward a proposal--and there are many
others on the table, obviously. The bill out of the Judiciary Committee
makes an important contribution there. We need to find a way that we
can come to grips with what to do with the millions of people who are
living here and who are already here making a contribution.
The Latin community of America, the Hispanic community of America,
has been galvanized by this issue like no other. This is a historic
moment in our history, and it is a moment we have to treat with great
care and great importance how we set the tone of this debate. I am
hopeful that as we look to the future, we will come up with solutions.
I am very hopeful that we can come together as a Senate. I am very
hopeful that the Congress will come together, with the help of the
President and others interested in this debate, to come up with
solutions which will provide a way forward, which will provide a
historic opportunity for the people of America to be one Nation, to be,
as our model says, e pluribus unum--``For many, one''--because I do
know that the immigrants who come to this Nation do not come to change
America, they come to be changed by the miracle that is America.
I know that I, as an immigrant, was changed by America. When I came
here, much like Senator Domenici's father, I did not speak the
language. You learn the language. You make it your business to become
an American. I did not understand this culture. I had no idea as a 15-
year-old boy what the country was all about, but I made it my business
so that I could make a contribution to it.
So I am hopeful that we can come together to find solutions to these
issues. There is nothing easy about this problem, and I know people of
good will will come together so we can move forward in a positive way,
in an American way.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Massachusetts is recognized.
Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, for the last 15 minutes or so, we heard
the stories that have true meaning in terms of the whole American
experience. Senator Domenici talked about his parents and how they
worked through the process of becoming proud Americans, and the good
Senator from Florida told, as well, the story of an extraordinarily
successful immigrant who came here and is now serving with great
distinction, representing the people of Florida.
Last evening, just as the Senate was about to adjourn, Senator
McCain, who is the primary sponsor of this legislation, introduced me
to a wonderful young American, Fabian Nunez, and Fabian Nunez is the
speaker of the California Assembly. His father was a Bracero in the
1950s, and at the end of the Bracero Program, he went back to Mexico.
He came back here--the boy did--with his mother, who had been a maid
and was also undocumented. She had worked two jobs. And this young boy
came back to the United States--as a young boy, had gone back to Mexico
and came here at 8 years old. I also talked by telephone to the father,
who is 83 years old, and he said how proud he is that his son is now
the speaker of the California Legislature. That is the real story of
America.
At other times, we have seen where Democrats and Republicans have
come together and Presidents have come together with the Senate and the
House and have taken action that has moved this Nation. That was
certainly true during the civil rights legislation where we knocked
down the walls of discrimination, of race and religion, and also of
gender. We knocked down the walls of discrimination against the
disabled with the Americans With Disabilities Act. We came together as
well to pass the Medicare Act so that many of our elderly people would
not live in poverty and also would be able to get the health care they
needed. We came together to do that. We came together in terms of the
higher education legislation, and today millions of young people are
benefiting from that system. I certainly hope that we can, as we start
this debate, come together as Americans to deal with this issue.
It is a new civil rights issue, but it is one that is going to
continue to be an issue unless and until we address it. There are
different approaches, and they have been outlined earlier today, and
they will continue to be outlined tomorrow. But I think the stories we
heard this evening are the clearest and most compelling evidence of
what this country is when it is at its best and what it can be. It is
in that spirit that Senator Domenici spoke and that Senator Martinez
spoke and that others have spoken, Democrats and Republicans. It is
that spirit which we hope to capture when we address this issue and
finally vote on the legislation that is before us.
I look forward to having the chance to speak at greater length
tomorrow. I spoke earlier today about the history of the whole migrant
program and the steps that have been taken. There have been failures
and some successes, but the challenging opportunities are the ones we
face today. This is an issue which isn't going to go away. It is going
to take the best that is in all of us. I am very hopeful that when the
vote is finally cast, it will be for a meaningful, comprehensive
program that will recognize the national security issues which are
involved, will understand the economic issues involved, and finally,
and perhaps most importantly, understand the issues of values which are
involved. I will have more to say on that on the morrow.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Who seeks time? The Senator from Alabama is
recognized.
Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, we are a Nation of immigrants. There are
so many great stories of people who have come to this country and
enriched our Nation and benefited their families and had great life
experiences. There is no dispute about that. I don't think there is a
single Member here who would deny that.
But there is a suggestion that those who do not support the Kennedy
bill--or whatever you want to call the bill that came out of the
Judiciary committee, of which I am a Member and the Presiding Officer
is a Member--if you don't support that bill, you want to run everybody
out of the country and you want to lock them up and prosecute them. If
you don't support this bill, you have bias against them and you don't
believe in immigration. You don't believe in the great freedoms of our
country. Nothing could be further from the truth. That is not right.
What we are trying to do is to develop a system to deal with the
immigration crisis that we have that is consistent with our values as
Americans, that is consistent with the rule of law in this country,
that treats people who do the right thing better than it treats people
who do the wrong thing. That is what this debate is all about. We are
trying to set policy for the future about the people who are allowed
into our country, how many and under what circumstances. A Nation
surely has a right to decide how many people it allows to come in. We
are one of the most generous nations in the history of the world in
allowing people to come here. But we have a right to decide how it
should be done.
Under this bill, we have provisions that actually allow a virtually
unlimited number of unskilled workers to come in, but limits the amount
of skilled workers that come in. How weird is that?
This legislation came together in a most hasty way and violates a
number of principles. One thing I would mention, the Presiding Officer,
Senator Coburn, has been involved in these discussions. I know he and I
share a common view about it. I thought we all agreed we would not have
amnesty. The President, as much as he believes in bringing people into
this country, as

[[Page S2521]]

much as he believes in allowing workers to come here who want to work,
has said: No amnesty. Our Democratic colleagues have said: No amnesty.
This morning I said: The truth is, this bill is amnesty. It is exactly
like the 1986 bill, and everybody said that was amnesty. They didn't
even dispute it.
I have the definition from ``Black's Law Dictionary,'' the one law
students use to get legal definitions, and it uses the 1986 bill as an
example of ``amnesty.'' Of course it was. And the bill that came out of
the Judiciary Committee is the same thing.
I have to tell you, Senator Specter's bill that we started with in
the Judiciary Committee was not amnesty. Senator Frist's bill is not
amnesty. But the bill that we came out with was. That is just a fact. I
am going to go into some detail about that because Senator Kennedy has
said it is false for me to say this is amnesty. We are going to talk
about it. Senator Leahy said it is not amnesty. Why are they saying
this now? I'll tell you what is going on.
They are over there talking with the President and they are trying to
get a compromise. They are trying to come up with something so they can
come back and say it is not amnesty. They will claim that they moved in
this direction and now they want to pass it.
We are going to have to read this bill, and we are going to have to
think about it because it is a major issue facing our country today. It
really is. We need to do the right thing, and we can do the right
thing. I am actually optimistic about our options and our capabilities
of coming up with something that will work. But this bill is not it. It
is absolutely not it.
I want to say a couple of things first. We are going to pass
legislation dealing with the entry of people into our Nation. We are
going to pass legislation, and I will favor properly drafted
legislation that will increase the number of people who come to our
country lawfully. We want to pass legislation that treats fairly and
decently and humanely the 11 to 20 million people who are here
illegally. But I hope and trust we won't pass amnesty which gives the
full benefits of legal entry into our country to those who come
illegally.
That is really what we are talking about, because what we learned in
1986 was that when you do that, before the ink is dry on the bill,
other people come in illegally because they expect we will be right
back here again in this Congress giving them amnesty again. So we need
to reestablish the principle of law. That is all I am saying. We can
treat people in a good way. We will not have to remove all of these
people from America. They would not have to be prosecuted and put in
jail. How silly is that? That can't be done. Nobody is proposing that.
What we are working on is legislation that can bring law, bring
principle, and bring integrity to our immigration system, and I believe
it is within our grasp to do so. But I am not going to support the
legislation that is before us now. It is just not good.
The question about amnesty and where we are arises from the nature of
the provisions in the bill that passed the Judiciary Committee. I don't
know what to call it. I guess it is the Kennedy-Specter bill. Senator
Specter's bill, though, that he offered and we began with, did not do
the unprincipled things that this compromised bill does.
Senator Frist, the majority leader, has offered legislation that does
not create a direct path to citizenship for the entire illegal alien
population. His bill didn't do that. The original Specter bill did not
create a new or direct path to citizenship for illegal aliens. Before
the committee markup, the Specter bill would have given illegal aliens
working in the United States a temporary work permit, renewable every 2
years as long as the individual was working.

We still don't have the language that passed out of the Judiciary
Committee. I know Senator Coburn has been around Congress for some
time, and he serves on the Judiciary Committee with me. We still don't
have the language we voted on Monday. I don't know for sure exactly
what it is, but we sure should not be passing a piece of legislation
when we haven't even had a chance to read it.
But in the committee, a complete amnesty program was adopted for the
illegal alien population and large, new permanent immigration programs
were created for low-skilled workers. The committee bill, as reported,
creates a direct pathway to citizenship for aliens who have broken our
laws.
You will hear claims that this bill is earned adjustment, earned
citizenship. Those are descriptions, but they are misnomers. This bill
really is--in the sense that we have been talking about it for several
years now as a part of an American dialog, in every sense of what
people mean by amnesty--it is amnesty. If it is not amnesty, it is the
same thing as amnesty. That is what it is.
There are four different amnesty provisions in the bill. These four
amnesty programs are what you are voting for or against when you vote
on the Judiciary Committee bill. Let me clearly describe to you the
breathtaking enormity of the four programs that I believe clearly
constitute amnesty in the Judiciary Committee bill.
Element No. 1, the committee bill takes every illegal alien in the
United States who pays $1,000 and was employed before January 7, 2004--
whether full time, part time, seasonally or self-employed--and puts
that person on a direct path to citizenship. The family of the illegal
aliens, their spouse and children, would also be given amnesty, even if
they are not already in the United States. They would now be able to
come and come legally.
How will it be given out? How do you get on this direct path to
citizenship? What is required of the person who seeks it? The truth is
that other than illegal presence in the United States, very little is
required.
We have been following very carefully the draft of the bill that we
were provided and that we had as we voted on this legislation in
Committee. The final passed version, however, is still being cobbled
together, but I am confident that what I'm saying is accurate with
regard to these issues.
All illegal aliens present in the United States before January of
2004, who have worked illegally here since then for any amount of time,
will first be given an H-5B nonimmigrant status, good for 6 years. They
are made legal for 6 years. Their spouses and children will be given
the same status. After 6 years and another $1,000 fine, the aliens and
their families will get green cards if the alien has been ``employed in
the United States, either full time, part time, seasonally, or self-
employed, or has met educational requirements.''
The education requirement is as broad as being in a 1-year vocational
work program at ``an institution of higher education.''
These requirements are very broad.
A self-employed person could be someone who worked 1 day a year, and
there is no limit on that definition. A person who meets the work
requirement through education has to prove that they had full-time
attendance in as little as a 1-year educational program, not that they
completed any educational program.
Additionally, the work requirement and education requirement for the
green card are completely waived if the alien is under 21. After
getting the green card, illegal aliens will be able to apply for
citizenship like any other lawful permanent resident. They are put in
the same status as the people who came here legally.
To satisfy the work requirement of being employed in the United
States, either part time, seasonally, or self-employed, the bill states
that an alien can conclusively establish his work history in the United
States either by, one, presenting records maintained by one of the
following: Social Security Administration, IRS or any Federal, State or
local government agency or employer, a labor union, a day labor center,
and ``organizations that assist workers in matters related to
employment,'' or presenting two of the following: bank records,
business records, sworn affidavits from nonrelatives or remittal
records.
However, the documents listed that conclusively establish work
history are not even really required.
Later on, the bill states that the burden of proof that the alien
must meet to qualify is even lower than that. It says: ``The alien has
a burden of proving by a preponderance of the evidence that the alien
has satisfied the requirements. An alien must meet such burden of proof
by producing sufficient

[[Page S2522]]

evidence to demonstrate such employment as a matter of reasonable
inference.''
Reasonable inference? That is not a proof standard. It is a situation
that allows everyone to qualify.
Why would we want to do that?
The bill then states: ``It is the intent of the Congress that the
work requirement be interpreted and implemented in a manner that
recognizes and takes into account the difficulties encountered by
aliens in obtaining evidence of employment due to the undocumented
status of the alien.''
It is not that hard to prove you have worked. If you work for an
employer, you can get the employer to provide a statement that you
worked for them even if you don't have pay stubs. It is not that hard.
This basically obviates any requirement of proof and allows anybody
to qualify.
I am just telling you that is what is in the bill. I wish it were not
so. I am not making this up. I am reading to you what is in the bill.
The work standard is not a work standard at all. In fact, the bill
basically says that Congress is telling the Department of Homeland
Security to accept pretty much anything as proof of work.
This is an open invitation to fraud and will prevent Department of
Homeland Security from vetting out fraudulent applications.
It is a perfect example of why our immigration laws are so messed up.
We have placed so many difficult obstacles in front of agencies that
are required to enforce them that they have become utterly
unenforceable.
We say that we have a work requirement, and then we say it can be
seasonal, it can be part time, and it can be self-employed. Then we say
just about any records you can produce, or that you conjure up will be
sufficient. But if you do not have records and you have a reasonable
inference that you worked, they must let you qualify.
Basically, that is what the Department of Homeland Security office is
going to do. They are going to accept anybody's application. There is
no way you could object to it. This standard appears to be a standard
but is not one at all.
What about waiver of the work requirement? What if you have not
worked since January of 2004 and did not work before then. Does this
bill leave you out? Does it mean you can't be a citizen now? Can you
qualify for this type of amnesty? The answer is still yes.
Even if you are an illegal alien who has never worked in the United
States and cannot produce any evidence to reasonably infer that you
have worked illegally in the United States, you and your family can get
on the bill's direct path to citizenship. You get automatic amnesty, no
requirement to prove work.
If you have full-time attendance at an institution of higher
education--graduation is not required--full-time attendance at any
secondary school, as defined by State law, or you are a minor under the
age of 21, what does qualifying for amnesty get you?
The mere filing of an application for amnesty triggers the following
things: Employment authorization for the alien, the alien's spouse and
children, permission to travel abroad and return to the United States,
protection from being detained, determined inadmissible or deportable
or removed pending final adjudication of the alien's application for
adjustment of status.
Only future conduct or a criminal conviction removes these
protections.
Additionally, if you have already been ordered removed from the
United States or if you are subject to mandatory detention for a
criminal conviction, the Department of Homeland Security has to give
you the opportunity to show you are eligible for amnesty before you can
be removed.
This will simply freeze the entire detention and removal operation of
the Department of Homeland Security.
If you are legally here in January of 2004 because you got a work
visa before you came to the United States, you will not get the benefit
of this amnesty.
Repeat that: If you are legally here because you got a valid work
visa or permit before January of 2004, you do not get the benefit of
this amnesty. This amnesty benefits you only if you came here
illegally.
So we are only giving you a direct path to citizenship if you first
broke our laws. If you came here the right way and did not break the
law, you are out of luck. No new path to citizenship for you.
They say this is a guest worker program.
The second major part of Specter-Kennedy substitute amendment--that
was an amendment that was substituted for the original Specter bill in
the past--is a new program for bringing low-skilled workers into the
United States, in addition to illegal aliens already doing these jobs.
The program puts them on a direct path to citizenship. It is a new
program.
The new program would bring 400,000 low-skilled workers per year into
the United States on a 3-year work visa. This visa is renewable for 3
years. It is essentially a guaranteed entry for 6 years to work in the
United States.
This 400,000-per-year cap is supposed to be limited, they say to
400,000. This is several times what the cap is today. I am mistaken--
several times this 400,000 is how many will be allowed to come in under
an illegal system. But the cap that purports to be is completely
artificial. If the cap is reached and actually 400,000 come in that
year and an additional 80,000 visas can be given out that year, the cap
will go up automatically the next year as much as 20 percent. By the
sixth year this program will immigrate 2.4 million new low-skilled
workers, at a minimum, into the United States.

On day one, when the worker arrives in the United States, the
employer can sponsor the alien for a green card. It gives them legal
permanent status. Normally the employers or family members sponsor the
alien before they have the right to permanent entry and a green card.
But this is a major change. The person can sponsor himself and make his
own application. So after 4 years of work, the new immigrants can self-
petition for a green card and then be eligible for citizenship.
Normal grounds for inadmissibility, except for the most serious
crimes on national security grounds, can be waived for a fee of $1,500.
All legal permanent residents are eligible for citizenship after 5
years. All legal permanent residents, green card holders, after 5
years, are eligible for citizenship. If they have not been convicted of
a felony, if they have basic English skills, they can become a citizen
automatically. People all over this country and all over the world are
waiting and hoping to be able to be selected to be able to come to the
United States following the laws and rules.
To be eligible to come to the United States under this low-skilled
immigrant worker category, the alien is merely required to pay a $500
application fee, undergo a medical examination, and show they are
capable of performing the labor or services required, and have evidence
of employment from ``employers, employer associations or labor
representatives.'' Those are probably some of the people who have been
leading these protests the last few days.
Under the bill language, you can qualify for this new program and
come to the United States as a low-skilled immigrant even if you were
in removal proceedings and signed a voluntary departure agreement but
never left, or you were already removed from the United States and
illegally reentered. If you had been removed and illegally reentered,
you are eligible.
One might ask, why does this program cover these people? I thought
the program was for people who wanted to come to the United States to
work in the future, not for those who are already here. This provision
is specifically designed to make sure that illegal aliens who are not
covered by the bill's amnesty provisions because they did not work in
the United States prior to January of 2004, or because they were not
legally present in the United States on that day, are not left without
a direct path to citizenship also.
This bill covers everybody. It should be called ``no illegal alien
left behind.'' I am not exaggerating. It is fixed so that if they are
not covered under this ``magic'' date, January 7, 2004, they are
covered under the new exemptions of the 400,000 people per year.
Element three, the Dream Act. That was brought up several times. It
never moved in the Senate. But boom, in 2 minutes, Senator Durbin
offered the

[[Page S2523]]

Dream Act and we voted on it in committee Monday afternoon as an
amendment to the bill. It took him less than 2 minutes to get it in the
bill as an amendment.
The Dream Act does two things. It grants amnesty to an unlimited
number of illegal alien minors who graduate from a high school and
enroll in college or the military for at least 2 years, or who perform
hours of volunteer work, or who can show ``compelling circumstances for
the inability to do any of those three,'' and, two, eliminates United
States Code section 1623 which I will describe below, thus allowing all
illegal aliens enrolled in college to receive in-State tuition rates.
This means that while American citizens from Tennessee, Georgia,
South Carolina, Massachusetts, have to pay out-of-state tuition rates
if they send their kids to the University of Virginia or the University
of Alabama, people who have illegally immigrated into this country do
not.
How much sense does that make, to have people here illegally and they
have more benefits than those who are here legally? Instead, they
receive educational benefits paid by the taxpayers of Virginia and
Alabama for in-State residents. I do not mean to suggest in any way
there are not good kids out there. We need to figure out a way to
accommodate them and work with those who have come here illegally.
Maybe they came here a long time ago. Maybe they came here illegally as
a junior or senior in high school. They came across the border and now
they want to be on a direct path to citizenship.
I am not saying we should not wrestle with how to treat them in a
generous way, but should we give them more rights than we give to
American citizens? When you do too much of this and you work at it too
hard, pretty soon you end up with a mockery of law, an unprincipled
bill that cannot be defended, and we are in the situation of wondering
why would you want to bother to try to come into the country legally.
Why not come illegally?
So the Dream Act establishes a seamless process to take illegal
aliens directly from illegal status to conditional permanent resident
status, to legal permanent resident status, to citizenship.
First, the illegal aliens who came here before age 16 and have been
here for 5 years will be given conditional permanent residence through
cancellation of removal if they have been admitted to college or have a
GED or a high school diploma. So if you get your high school diploma or
get yourself into college somewhere, whether you are passing or not,
then you qualify for cancellation of removal.
Step two, after 6 years, the alien will then be eligible to apply for
a green card if they have attended 2 years of higher education, served
2 years in the military, performed 910 hours of community service for
an organization that receives funds under the Combined Federal
Campaign, or prove an extreme and unusual hardship, and you have good
moral character and do not have a deportable offense. It is a
guaranteed step forward if you do not do something wrong and get
yourself convicted of a felony.
After 5 years, those green card holders can apply for citizenship and
cannot be denied if they meet the basic standards of English and have
no criminal history. Current law provides ``that an alien who is not
physically present in the United States shall not be eligible on the
basis of residence within a State or a political subdivision for any
postsecondary educational benefit unless a citizen or national of the
United States is eligible for such benefit in no less amount, duration
and scope, without regard to whether the citizen or national is such a
resident.''
That is basically the law we passed several years ago, I think before
I came to Congress. It said if you are here illegally, you do not get
in-State tuition.
We are going to reverse that. Congress just passed it 8 or 10 years
ago. The DREAM Act would eliminate this provision and allow illegal
alien college and university students to be eligible for in-State
tuition without affording out-of-State students the same opportunity.
Thus, the University of Alabama could offer in-State tuition to illegal
alien students while requiring citizens residing in Mississippi to pay
a much higher tuition rate. In fact, that is being done probably in
violation of law in some areas right now.
Allowing all the illegal aliens enrolled in college to receive in-
State tuition rates means that while American citizens from the 49
other States have to pay out-of-State tuition rates to send their kids
to the University of Alabama or Virginia, people who have illegally
immigrated into this country might not. Out-of-State tuition rates
range from 2 to 3\1/2\ times what in-State tuition rates are. It has
always struck me that one of the things you do to encourage people to
come here legally and abide by the law, is not give benefits to those
who come illegally. It is one thing not to prosecute them; it is one
thing not to take them out of the country; but to give them benefits
that people who do the right thing get? We should not do that. It is
bad policy.
So what about loans in the DREAM Act? I think this is still in the
bill. We have not had a chance to see all of language. This was in the
DREAM Act originally. I do not know if it is still in there under the
Judiciary bill, but I assume it is. Under title IV of the Higher
Education Act of 1965, as amended, legal permanent residents and
certain other eligible noncitizens receive Federal student financial
aid, including Pell grants and Stafford student loans. That is part of
the 1965 act.
The committee bill will add illegal students, illegal alien
volunteers, and illegal alien military members to the list of people
eligible, by changing their immigration status to that of a legal
permanent resident. This change in status would make them eligible for
Federal financial aid. Pell grants and Stafford loans currently
comprise 85 percent of postsecondary student aid available to citizens
and eligible noncitizens. In fiscal year 2002, 8.8 percent of the
individuals receiving Pell grants were eligible noncitizens over
380,000 people.
We want to help people and be generous. But if you are in an illegal
status, I do not see why there is an obligation to give the same extra
benefits that you do to those who are lawfully here.
Pell grants. The Federal Pell Grant Program is the single largest
source of grant aid for postsecondary education funded by the Federal
Government. There is already a current fiscal year Pell grant shortfall
of over $2.5 billion. We have done a lot of different things to try to
get money as high as we can get it this year. The fiscal year 2003
estimated program costs are approximately $12.5 billion. The annual
appropriations is $11.4 billion. Now we want to open up Pell grants to
illegal aliens?
Although Pell grants are a discretionary program, the cost of
increasing the number of eligible recipients in an award year is
considered direct spending, when the appropriations and maximum grant
award for that year are already set in law and a payment schedule is
published. Thus, we could be facing a budget point of order with this
bill. In other words, since in a number of these instances the right to
have a Pell grant for qualifying persons is an entitlement, making more
people eligible for this entitlement could subject this bill to a
budget point of order.
The Congressional Budget Office estimates that 58,500 additional Pell
grants would have been given within 1 year if last year's DREAM Act had
passed, with an average grant being $2,420. How many people do not get
a dime who try to send their kids to college, out of State maybe,
people who have worked hard all their life, middle-class Americans?
They do not get a dime. But somebody who is here illegally gets $2,400?
I do not think that is fair. I do not think that is being insensitive
to legitimate interests of people who want to come to America, who want
to participate in the American dream, or is inhumane in any way.
What about Stafford loans? The Congressional Budget Office estimated
under last year's DREAM Act--the one that was offered last year but did
not pass--65,000 would enroll during the first year and meet all other
criteria. Because 1 in 10 students borrow student loans, the student
loan costs would increase by $22 million per year over the 2003-to-2012
period.
While we were going about our business in committee, the AgJOBS bill
was offered as an amendment. Well, we had a big fight on the AgJOBS
bill last year. It was offered on the floor of the Senate. Senator
Saxby Chambliss of

[[Page S2524]]

Georgia, chairman of the Agriculture Committee, opposed the bill,
offered a number of important amendments that I thought made it far
more sane, far more appropriate, and the bill did not pass, after a
great deal of debate.
Well, in about 15 minutes, in the committee, Senator Feinstein
offered the AgJOBS bill to the Specter bill, the committee bill. It was
a 106-page amendment. It put 1.5 million illegal alien agriculture
workers on a direct path to citizenship--just like that.
How does it do it? After the Feinstein amendment, 1.5 million illegal
alien workers who pay a $500 fine and demonstrate they worked in
agriculture for 150 workdays in the last 2 years will be given blue
cards and will be allowed to stay in the United States. Because a
workday is defined as 1 hour of work per day, an alien who worked in
agriculture for only 150 hours--there are 168 hours in a week--over 2
years will qualify. So if you work 150 hours over 2 years, you qualify.
Spouses and children of illegal alien agriculture workers also get
legal status and work permits, and they are not limited to working in
agriculture either.
The blue card holder is eligible for a green card in two ways: after
3 years of 150 additional workdays--1 hour per day is all that is
required--per year or after 5 years of 100 additional workdays per
year.
Then, what about citizenship? For these who come here illegally, and
they work 150 hours, what happens as to their citizenship? Even though
they came here illegally, are they put on the path to citizenship? Yes.
All legal permanent residents become eligible for citizenship after 5
years.
On May 18, 2004, the Washington Times published a column by Frank
Gaffney, president of the Center for Security Policy, titled ``Stealth
Amnesty'' dealing with the AgJOBS bill when it came up back in 2004.
The article correctly summarized the AgJOBS bill when it said this:

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. . . .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. . . .
If any were needed, [the AgJOBS bill] offers a further
incentive to 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.
What about the safe harbor provisions? Under the AgJOBS bill, which
was added to this committee proposal without much debate, an illegal
alien is undeportable as soon as the amnesty paperwork is merely filed.
So if you file your amnesty paperwork and you are otherwise deportable,
it automatically stops. No adjudication of the application is necessary
to kick start the legal status of the illegal alien.
Once an alien receives a temporary work visa, it never expires unless
the worker is otherwise deemed deportable or applies for permanent
residence and is denied. There is nothing temporary about a single
temporary work visa lasting indefinitely. It is not temporary. The
alien's blue card status can only be revoked if the alien is determined
to be deportable, the blue card was acquired through fraud, the alien
is convicted of a felony, three or more misdemeanors, or an offense
which involves serious bodily injury or damage to more than $500 of
property.
What about all the legal stuff that gets involved with this? How do
you prove all this stuff? The AgJOBS amendment even goes so far as to
provide free legal counsel to illegal aliens who want to receive this
amnesty. The AgJOBS amendment specifically states that recipients of
``funds under the Legal Services Corporation Act'' shall not be
prevented ``from providing legal assistance directly related to an
application for adjustment of status under this section.''
Not only will the AgJOBS bill give amnesty to 1.5 million illegal
aliens, it would have the American taxpayer pay the legal bill of those
1 million illegal aliens.
We are going to work on something here. We are going to pass some
legislation--if not this year, soon--that will work through all these
difficult human issues and treat people in a fair and just way. Nobody
is proposing that we do not. I mean that. There is a consensus in this
Congress that it is time for us to fix this problem, to deal with the
11 million people here illegally, to allow more people to come legally,
and to shut down the border and stop people from coming illegally. But
this legislation does not do that.
People say: I want to vote for something. I want to fix it.
Don't vote for this bill. It will not fix it. Not only does it give
amnesty to 1.5 million illegals, it would have the American taxpayer
pay the legal bills of the 1 million illegal aliens.
What about the H2A farm workers? The sponsors of the AgJOBS bill will
have you believe that farmers want the AgJOBS bill. They say: This is
for agriculture. It has to be done. If you don't do this, the country
is going to collapse. Maybe that is the case in the District of
Columbia where the national groups get to write the letters and speak
for their farmers and come in and tell us what farmers want, regardless
of what the individual farmers have to say. One of those people talked
to me about it.
I said: That may be your opinion, Mr. Farm Leader, but if you took a
poll of the farmers I know in my home State or the Presiding Officer
knows in his home State, I will bet you 80 percent of them would agree
with me that this is not a principled way to do business. This is not
the right way to do business. We are not here to serve agribusiness. We
are here to promote the national interests of the United States, to
create an immigration system consistent with our generous values, and a
legal system that will work, not to reward those who violate the law
but provide the benefits to those who follow the law.
Last year when we debated this bill, I received an open letter from
the Southern Farmers Coalition. The letter is signed by a list of
organizations and individuals who participate in the H2A program. The
letter says: Overwhelmingly, the majority of H2A program users in this
country--the list of signatories is expansive, including the North
Carolina Growers Association, the MidAtlantic Solution, Georgia Peach
Council, Ag Works, the Georgia Fruit and Vegetable Growers Association,
the Virginia Agricultural Growers Association, the Vidalia Onion
Business Council--I like Vidalia onions--and the Kentucky-Tennessee
Growers Association. They all signed this letter. The cover page of the
letter, contrary to what some national agricultural experts say, says
this:

Farmers in the southern United States are opposed to S.
1645--

the same bill being offered as an amendment today, as part of this
bill--

introduced by Ted Kennedy and Larry Craig. It is an amnesty
for illegal farm workers. It does not reform the H2A program.
Please oppose this legislation.

These are the farmers who are supposed to be helped by it. That is
what they say about it: ``Please oppose this legislation.''
The text of the letter, which asked me to stand up and fight against
this legislation, states:

Ag JOBS is nothing more than a veiled amnesty.

I am reading this letter from the farmers themselves.

Ag JOBS is nothing more than a veiled amnesty. While
everyone, it seems, agrees that the H2A program desperately
needs reform, this legislation does not fix the two most
onerous problems with the program--the adverse effect wage
rate and the overwhelming litigation brought by legal
services groups against the farmers using the H2A program.

That is what the farmers told us. The letter goes on to say:

The Craig-Kennedy-Berman reform package provides a private
right of action provision that goes far beyond legitimate
worker protections and expands legal services attorneys
ability to sue growers in several critical areas. These
lawyers, who have harassed program users with meritless
lawsuits for years, will continue to attack small farmers
under the new statute. Supporters of the Craig-Berman
legislation have endorsed this alleged reform, believing, in
a misguided fashion, that it will bring stability to the
agricultural labor market. It will not. It will create
greater instability. As the illegal farm workers earn
amnesty, they will abandon their farm jobs for work in other
industries. Many of the attached signatories have been
actively involved in negotiations surrounding this
legislation. The following groups have broken ranks with the
American Farm Bureau, the National Council of Agricultural
Employers, the Agricultural Coalition for Immigration Reform,
and the American

[[Page S2525]]

Nursery and Landscape Association to oppose the legislation
because those groups have decided an amnesty is more
important than legitimate H2A reform. You are likely to hear
that the majority of agriculture supports this bill. The
industry, in fact, is split. History has demonstrated that
the amnesty granted under the Immigration Reform and Control
Act of 1986 was a dismal failure for agriculture employers.
Farm workers abandoned agricultural employment shortly after
gaining amnesty and secured jobs in other industries.

Of course, they did. So why should we pass this Judiciary bill, what
I guess we can call the Specter-Kennedy package?
Who supports the amendment? I know who supports the amendment. The
national lobbying groups are really out of touch with the desires of
the American people and the desires of farmers and the desires of those
who want to see a good and decent system created.
I don't believe I am out of touch on this issue. I believe I know
what average American citizens and farmers want. They want real
immigration reform that guarantees the laws we pass will be enforced
and that people who do not honor our immigration laws will be punished,
not rewarded with worker visas and green cards. So I strongly oppose
the Specter-Kennedy bill that came out of committee, and I hope my
colleagues will join in that.
Now, earlier, Senator Leahy said that the 1986 bill Congress passed
was amnesty. He said it was amnesty, and he admitted it was. ``Blacks
Law Dictionary'' says that the 1986 bill was amnesty. It is the very
definition of amnesty.
By the way, when we passed that bill, it was supposed to fix the
immigration problem. As I explained and talked about this morning, that
is a very important concept. So the deal in 1986 was that we were going
to give amnesty to 1 million people who we thought were here illegally.
We now think there are 11 million here illegally. We are going to give
amnesty to those, and we are going to create a legal system that
encourages people to come legally and we won't have this problem again.
Those who were dubious about it said: No, this amnesty would encourage
more people to come illegally, but the pro-amnesty crowd won out and
they passed the legislation and it became law.
Well, what happened immediately afterward? It wasn't 1 million people
who showed up to claim amnesty; it was 3 million--three times as many.
I don't know how many will show up this time. Will it be 11 million or
33 million? Probably not 33 million, but I would not be surprised at
all, based on our history, if we would have a good many more show up
and claim amnesty.
Six years after the bill passed, the Congress, in a very unusual
action, voted to form a commission to review the legislation to see if
it worked. The commission, a bipartisan professional commission, did a
study and said it was a failure. It did not work, did not do what it
was supposed to do.
Well, the Citizenship and Immigration Services tried to say that 1986
was not amnesty. But everybody has agreed it was. CIS later explained
what the 1986 bill did. I would like to go over it with you because
this current bill does the very same things. It is just not disputable.
So if we have any understanding of what an amnesty program is, we have
the 1986 act to give us a guide. It says:

The legalization program was not amnesty, but a targeted
program that balanced the offer of legalization with
stringent requirements.

This is how they defended this problem.

Legalization of applicants had to: prove to INS
adjudicators that they had resided in the U.S. since January
1, 1982--

I went over with you how this bill said you had to be here since
January 2004. If you came after 2004, you could still get in. That is a
real stringent standard. You had to prove you resided there before that
day--

pay a $185 fee--

We upped it to $1,000--

for principal applicants, $50 for each child, with a $420
family cap; accept ineligibility for most public benefits for
5 years after application--

We don't even do that in this bill. It says you could not go on
welfare for at least 5 years. We did that in 1986. That is not in this
bill today--

and complete an 18-month period of temporary residency. After
that, and only after successfully completing an English
language and civics requirement within a year-long one-time
window--

Which is a very low-grade test for the most part--

and the payment of an $80 fee per applicant (with a $240
family cap) they were eligible to apply for permanent
residency. In exchange, the applicant would be authorized to
work, travel, and after becoming a permanent resident,
petition for the immigration of certain family members.

They could bring family members in from out of the country to join
them. Then, of course, once you become a permanent resident, it is a
matter of 5 years to become a citizen, if you have not been convicted
of a felony and you can speak English. I don't want to be demagogic and
say this is amnesty, amnesty, amnesty, and vote against the bill. I am
saying that everybody agreed that 1986 was amnesty, and it did not
work.
Everybody I hear publicly talking about this bill says it is not
amnesty. Senator Kennedy, I think, used the word ``lie'' after I said
it was amnesty this morning. I think I have demonstrated that it is
precisely the same scheme that was used in 1986, which we proved didn't
work. If that is not amnesty, what is? Senator Leahy defended the bill
and said it is not amnesty. President Bush said he doesn't believe in
amnesty. All he believes in is immigration, and he wants us to do
better and be as generous as we can possibly be. But he doesn't believe
in amnesty.
Scott McClellan, yesterday at the press briefing he does for the
President, said that the President believes that a direct path to
citizenship is amnesty, and he opposes that.
This bill provides a direct path to citizenship for people who came
to this country illegally. That is just the fact. If we want to have
people say it is not so, we will keep talking about it every day this
week. That is all I am saying. I wish it weren't so. It is not
necessary that we do that. We can provide a humane and decent way to
give people full opportunities to live and progress in our society
without giving the people who come here illegally benefits over those
who wait in line and come legally. That is what it is all about.
So I will just say that, in this rush to move a bill through and to
prove that we care, we have not thought it through. We spent 5 days in
markup in the Judiciary Committee, and about 4 of those days we really
spent some time dealing with enforcement and border issues. We talked
about them in some depth. We went over the wording of the statutes with
some care. We debated single words. Senator Durbin, who is here, is a
great lawyer. He made some points, being the skilled lawyer he is. We
changed words and did all kinds of things.
But when we got to the last day, Monday, they offered an AgJOBS bill,
with over 100 pages, in about 15 minutes, and it passed. We still had
not seen the draft of it. During the debate in our committee on how to
handle the 11 million people in a decent, fair, and just way, to not
remove them or make them all leave this country in a permanent way or
to abuse them or prosecute them, but how to handle this in a logical,
sane way--we spent almost no time on it.
I urged the committee to stay with the enforcement matters like the
House did. Let's start hearings immediately and get the best minds in
America. Let's find out who these 11 million people are, their desires
and wishes; what would be a good and principled way to deal with them;
who we should let into our country in the future; what standards should
we use; should we have unlimited numbers come in for low-wage jobs and
have limits on the high-wage people? Is that logical, what we want to
do?
How many more people do we want to allow into our country legally?
This bill will allow every year, annually, at least 400,000, and that
number can increase every year, forever.
I wish to make one more point, and this is where the American people
have to watch this Congress. If we pass this amnesty legislation, if we
pass the legislation that makes all these status changes and makes them
into law and they become law, that becomes a permanent decision of this
U.S. Congress.

[[Page S2526]]

But what about the promises that we are going to have enforcement? I
offered an amendment in committee that was accepted to add 10,000
detention beds. That probably is not nearly enough, but it would make a
big difference. That was accepted. I offered an amendment to increase
the number of Border Patrol agents. It probably is not a large enough
number, but it would ramp it up faster than the plan was, and that was
accepted.
Then it hit me. I have been in the Senate long enough, and I should
have been more alert. This is an authorizing committee. The Judiciary
Committee is an authorizing committee. We know what happened in 1986.
They granted amnesty, they gave everybody amnesty, and they promised in
the future they were going to fund an enforcement mechanism, but they
didn't do it. It was the bait and switch.
So what did we get? We got an authorization to step up enforcement on
our borders, but we didn't get the money to do it. We don't have it
yet. Who is to say we won't have a slowdown in the economy next year,
and they will cut the money, we will never get the enforcement, and we
will still have large numbers coming into the country illegally. That
is a big concern to us.
We need to tie this issue down so that we know and the American
people can have confidence that the enforcement mechanisms will work
and will be funded. That is why the House took the approach they did.
I again say it is not true that those of us who oppose this bill
oppose immigration. It is not true. We actually, at least as far as I
am concerned, need to increase the numbers that come here legally. It
is not true that we want to prosecute people.
What is true is that it is important for our Nation to create a
humane, fair, and just way to deal with the people who are here
illegally and to make positive and thoughtful decisions about how we
want to handle immigration in the future. I do not believe this bill
does that job. It is not something I can support. I hope the Senate
will not support it. We will see a number of amendments that can make
it better. I hope our Senate colleagues will study the legislation and
inform themselves of the great issues at stake so we can fix it.
I yield the floor.

____________________