[Congressional Record Volume 153, Number 162 (Wednesday, October 24, 2007)]
[Senate]
[Pages S13321-S13322]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                             THE DREAM ACT

  Mr. MENENDEZ. Madam President, I came to the floor to talk about the 
earlier vote on the DREAM Act. I have heard some of my colleagues 
define it in ways that make me believe the future of any other form of 
immigration reform is going to be incredibly difficult. We did not get 
to cloture and cannot move to have a full debate on the bill and a vote 
to move in a direction in which we could give young people in this 
country--who did not choose to come to this country themselves, as they 
were brought here by their parents at a young age, and who in many 
cases could achieve great success for the Nation--an opportunity to 
earn their way to a process of legalization. To see that those hopes 
have been snuffed out by the votes that were taken here leads me to 
believe the future of any other form of immigration reform is going to 
be incredibly difficult.
  It was not the decision of these children to come to the United 
States. It's hard to make a decision about where you are moving to when 
you are in a stroller. If we cannot give hope to children, if we are 
going to insist that the children be responsible for the sins of their 
parents, in making the decision they did to come in an undocumented 
fashion to the United States, then this is not the America I know.
  If, by no choice of your own, you came to this country and have now 
grown up--for many of those children I have met across the landscape of 
the country have grown up as Americans, and thought of themselves as 
Americans--and then came a point in time in which they wanted to go to 
college or enlist in the Armed Forces, they found their status was not 
that of an American. They wanted badly to either serve or to be able to 
fulfill their God-given abilities by achieving a college education. 
They had to earn all of this. All we need to do is give them a chance.
  I have colleagues who represent a lot of sectors, and they want 
people to come to this country and use their human capital to do some 
of the toughest jobs that exist in America, to bend their backs and be 
on their knees picking crops for Americans to be able to consume.
  There are some who suggest we are going to even change the nature of 
what AgJOBS is, so even though you come year after year, you bend your 
back, you give your sweat, you do some of the toughest jobs no one 
wants to do--we will not give you any pathway to earn legalization.
  I don't know how those who want to see the AgJOBS bill move think it 
can move when we turn down children who had no choice of their own. Our 
friends in industries that request H1-B visas say we need to bring 
people from other countries in the world to America because we don't 
have enough human capital here to meet our Nation's high-tech demands, 
but in that case it doesn't make much sense to refuse to take advantage 
of the proven capacity of so many children in this country, some of 
whom have graduated as valedictorians and salutatorians from high 
school. A vote against the DREAM Act says, we are not going to use that 
intellect; no, let's bring in somebody from outside the country to 
perform that service.
  Those in the service industries, such as the hotels and motels of our 
cities and highways, who want people to clean the toilets and the 
bathrooms, or those who want workers to pluck the chickens at poultry 
plants or work at seafood establishments and the list goes on and on--
let's give those people visas to come to this country and let's use 
their human capital. I am for any American who wants to do any of those 
jobs first and foremost. Whatever is necessary to create that 
opportunity, I am for. But in the absence of it, I wish to challenge 
some of our colleagues who talk about the big growers and their needs, 
who talk about the high-tech industry and their needs, who talk about 
the hotels and motels and poultry plants and seafood plants--and then 
vote against these children. I want to hear how they can justify the 
differences.
  What the DREAM Act said was if you had no choice, you made no choice 
in coming to this country--your parents brought you here, you grew up 
here and you have been a good citizen, you have lived the type of life 
we want all our young people to live in terms of being good citizens, 
being of exemplary character, being individuals who have the 
intellectual capacity on their own to get into college--we want to give 
them the opportunity to have the status to do that. I would rather have 
our kids going to school than hanging out on the streets, but I guess 
we would rather have them hanging out on the streets rather than having 
them get an education and serving our Nation.
  I don't understand how a military that is straining, in terms of the 
volunteer Armed Forces that we have, that has now downgraded whom they 
are willing to accept in the Armed Forces to include people who have 
criminal records and those who are high school dropouts, we will have 
those people serve, but we will not have young people who are 
incredibly talented, have no criminal record whatsoever, exemplary 
individuals, and some of them, some very smart ones, but who want to 
serve America because they believe themselves to be Americans--oh, no, 
let's not have them serve in the Armed forces of the United States. By 
virtue of that service, including the possibility that they could die 
on behalf of their adopted country, no, let's not give them that 
opportunity either. We would rather take people who have criminal 
records. We would rather take people who have not even finished high 
school.

  The first U.S. soldier who died in Iraq was someone who was not a 
U.S. citizen. Yet he died in Iraq in the service of the country he 
loved as his own.
  I believe there are going to be challenges going forward. As Members 
of the Senate who represent different parts of our economy come forth 
and say, ``I need to help the farmers because we need to get people in 
those fields, we can't get anybody to do the job;'' or, ``I need to 
have someone at that poultry plant and make sure that we are able to 
pluck chickens and go through the bone-breaking job, their hands are 
cut from the processing,'' I want to see how, in fact, that discussion 
is going to take place.
  We will certainly be here to challenge our colleagues to think about 
how can you promote those desires and yet snuff out the hopes and 
dreams and aspirations of a young person who did not do anything wrong. 
On the contrary, they want to do everything they can to serve this 
country, and we say no to them. Yet we will bring in people from other 
parts of the world to do these things. It is going to be very 
difficult. It is going to be very difficult, without reform of the 
process, to make sure we are not outsourcing jobs in the process, 
without labor protections. I think it is all going to be very 
difficult.
  I hope our colleagues will think about reconsidering their position 
on the DREAM Act because they say it is an ``amnesty.'' Everything is 
amnesty to them. I can't wait until the AgJOBS bill comes up. I am sure 
we will get cries of ``amnesty.'' I can't wait until the H-1B issue 
comes up. I can't wait until the H-2B issue comes up. I am sure it will 
be cries of ``amnesty.'' So those sectors of the American economy will 
be halted, and we will not get the productivity we need because I am 
sure they are not going to find a way to say that it is not 
``amnesty.''
  At end of the day, I am looking forward to those debates as we move 
forward. I believe we have set a precedent in today's vote that people 
will rue as they try to understand the essence of some of the economic 
sectors of our country that are going to need help, have needed help, 
and need help today.
  We should, hopefully, have a little introspection and figure out 
whether a process in which you have a journey to go through, in which 
you have to start with an exemplary record, in which you have to be 
willing to meet all types of challenges, in which you must give of 
yourself to the Nation or you must be able to create personal 
achievement that ultimately will be of value to the Nation--whether 
snuffing out that opportunity is in the national interests of the 
United States.
  I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.

[[Page S13322]]

  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the 
order for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to speak for 
12 to 15 minutes in morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Senator is recognized.

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