[Congressional Record Volume 153, Number 107 (Friday, June 29, 2007)]
[Senate]
[Page S8733]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              IMMIGRATION

  Mr. WEBB. Mr. President, I would like to address a few things this 
morning, some in retrospect of what has been for all of us a pretty 
emotional couple of weeks of debate, and also looking forward to what 
is going to occur when we return after the July 4 work period.
  The first thing I would like to point out is my admiration for our 
majority leader for how he handled the situation on the immigration 
bill. I think it was an extraordinarily difficult situation for our 
majority leader to have been in, and he did a great job with a very 
difficult assignment. I think we should back up and remember the bill 
that was put before us had not gone through debate. It was put together 
in a bipartisan way but removed from the committee process. In other 
words, people from both sides of the aisle, including some pretty 
strong members of the leadership on both sides of the aisle, got 
together and put together this extraordinarily complex bill, which the 
President himself wanted to see passed, and then it fell to our 
majority leader to attempt to get the provisions of the bill through 
the Senate. So we had a situation where there were members of the other 
party involved in putting together the components of the bill, we had a 
President who was urging that the bill be passed, and then our majority 
leader was the individual upon whom it fell to try to make this happen, 
with very little cooperation, quite frankly, from the other side.
  So I would just like to express my admiration and support for the 
majority leader for the way he handled himself during this process.
  Also with respect to the immigration bill, I think there has been a 
lot of rhetoric that has flown back and forth over the last 24 hours or 
so about motivations of individuals and what caused people to vote one 
way or the other. I think some of this is unfortunate. I think some of 
the people who have made some of the more extreme comments are going to 
be looking back at them 4 or 5 years from now and perhaps be a little 
bit embarrassed. This was an enormously complex piece of legislation. 
There were parts of the legislation which were very good, and hopefully 
we can find a way to bring them into law at another time. But there 
were parts in that legislation which needed to be fixed.
  I, personally, as the Presiding Officer knows, attempted to get an 
amendment through the Senate that, in my view, would have brought 
fairness to the issue of legalization and practicality--fairness in the 
sense that the proposed bill was going to legalize every individual, 
virtually, who had come to the United States in violation of American 
laws by the end of last year--and I felt strongly for a good bit of 
time that those who came during a period of lax immigration laws and 
who were able to put roots down into the community should be provided a 
path toward citizenship. I made this case during the campaign last 
year, and by saying that last year, I was viewed to be sort of on the 
forward edge of where this debate was going to go. But this bill, by 
reaching out and including virtually everyone who had been here by the 
end of last year, inflamed the passions of a lot of people in this 
country who otherwise would support fair immigration reform.
  At the same time, the amendment I offered also proposed to eliminate 
what is called the touchback provision, which would have eliminated--
for those people who had been here for 4 years and had put down roots--
the necessity for them to go back to their home country in order to 
apply for a green card.
  I think that approach was fair. I regret that the amendment didn't 
pass. At the same time, I and a number of other people found it 
impossible for us to vote for the bill as it was coming up with the 
provision that was so much broader.
  The bottom line on immigration now is there are laws on the books. We 
have seen a lot of talk over the past day or so that immigration reform 
is dead. These comprehensive immigration reform packages have a way of 
falling under their own weight because the issue itself is so complex. 
What we should be doing now, in the next year and a half or so, given 
that there is an election, is to do everything we can to enforce the 
laws that are on the books. One idea I like is the $4.4 billion 
recommendation that was put into title I of this immigration bill that 
just failed that would go toward border security, and employer 
certification could well be added to any appropriations bill, where the 
measure would be relevant and could help existing law.
  So for those who are attempting to say that all immigration reform 
has now skidded to a halt because a flawed bill was not passed by this 
body, I say let's enforce the existing laws. There are a lot of laws on 
the books. One of the greatest problems we have had is particularly in 
the area of workers being hired by employers on a large scale who know 
they are here without papers. In those sorts of areas, there are laws 
on the books we need to enforce.

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