[Congressional Record Volume 153, Number 51 (Friday, March 23, 2007)]
[House]
[Pages H3002-H3003]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




              DEPORTING AFTER SIXTH OFFENSE FIVE TOO MANY

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Texas (Mr. Poe) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. POE. Mr. Speaker, according to a memo that was just released from 
the U.S. Justice Department from 2005 and reported in the Houston 
Chronicle today, it reveals procedure and criteria for arresting, 
detaining, prosecuting and deporting illegals that come into the United 
States.
  It is a very interesting memo. Apparently the Department of Justice 
did not want to make this memo public for some time. Now we understand 
why. According to this memo, Texas prosecutors along the Texas-Mexico 
border generally do not prosecute illegals until the sixth offense. In 
other words, they have to come over, get caught; come over, get caught; 
come over, get caught; come over, get caught; come over, get caught; 
come over, get caught, and the sixth time our Federal Government 
decides, okay, we get the message, we are going to prosecute you for 
your sixth illegal entry into the United States.
  So we don't prosecute them the first time like most Americans would 
want. And, of course, the illegals on the other side of the border from 
whatever country they come from know this is our procedure.
  According to this Department of Justice memo, it says because of a 
``lack of resources and bed space to detain and prosecute every illegal 
entry violator,'' we are not able to prosecute them the first time.
  Mr. Speaker, this ought not to be. This is bad American policy. 
According to the border agents who work on the Texas-Mexico border and 
throughout the South, they arrest 1 million illegals a year coming into 
the United States; and we are telling them you have to work six times 
harder because the first time just doesn't count.
  According to T.J. Bonner, the head of the Border Patrol Association, 
he said: ``It's devastating on morale. Our agents are risking their 
lives out there, and then they're told, Sorry, that doesn't meet the 
criteria,'' and they must be released.

[[Page H3003]]

  So what does this mean? This means that the Federal Government and 
the Justice Department and the Federal prosecutors along the Texas-
Mexico border and the entire border with Mexico need to get their act 
together and prosecute people that illegally come into the United 
States.
  They need to quit prosecuting the border protectors and spending all 
of the American money going down into Mexico and finding drug smugglers 
and giving them immunity for bringing drugs into the United States and 
prosecuting border agents like Ramos and Compean. They need to quit 
making deals with seven or eight illegals who came into Texas and were 
caught by Deputy Gilmer Hernandez, and then they were given a deal to 
stay in the country, given green cards, all to prosecute Deputy 
Hernandez because he fired his gun.
  We need to find the resources to protect our border. Whatever it 
takes, we have to protect the border. It is the duty of our government 
to protect the sovereignty of this Nation.
  Today this House just spent billions of dollars dumping money for 
spinach farmers and peanut farmers and for all kinds of little special 
pork projects in this country. Maybe that money would have been better 
spent to find more facilities to detain the illegals, to find more 
immigration judges to hear these cases, and to find more prosecutors 
who will do their job and prosecute the illegals in this country and 
deport them back where they came from no matter where they are.
  Mr. Speaker, it is the first duty of government to protect its 
people, and that includes the people that live in the United States. 
Part of that protection is to keep us protecting from the unlawful 
invasion of foreigners who come to this country without permission. 
Whether they come here just for illegal reasons, criminal intent, 
whether they are human smugglers or drug smugglers, or whether they are 
terrorists, they need to stay out. And when caught, they need to be 
deported the first time, not the sixth time. This six time rule, five 
get-out-of-jail-free cards by our Federal Government, and this absurd 
policy needs to be eliminated immediately.
  I yield back the remainder of my time saying that's just the way it 
is.

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