Congressional Record, Volume 156 Issue 62 (Thursday, April 29, 2010)

[Congressional Record Volume 156, Number 62 (Thursday, April 29, 2010)]
[House]
[Pages H3069-H3076]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION

The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mrs. Dahlkemper). Under the Speaker's
announced policy of January 6, 2009, the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. King)
is recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
Mr. KING of Iowa. Madam Speaker, it's my privilege and honor to be
recognized by you to address the floor tonight.
I am standing here trying to decide whether I want to support or
rebut the statements from the gentleman from Colorado. I support a good
number of the statements that he has made, and I may well try to rebut
some of the other statements that he has made.
But the statement ``replace a broken system with one that works,''
it's an interesting comment. I think it's clear that our immigration
system is not working. Well, let me say that the system doesn't work,
but I am not certain that the laws are incorrect. And that's the point
that I would make is that I roll back to 1986 when Ronald Reagan was
straight-up honest and failed me when he signed the amnesty bill of
1986. And the intent was that about a million people would be granted a
path to citizenship and that would be it, it would be the end, and
there would never be another immigration bill ever as long as any of us
lived, and we would preserve the rule of law, and we'd learn to respect
the rule of law, but we would allow for the million or so that were
here illegally to have their path to citizenship in order to put this
away, package it up, and be able to move on.
Well, it wasn't 1 million. It was closer to 3 million people, and
there was fraud and there was corruption and there were counterfeit
documents that were used that was part of that tripling. We might not
have counted it right. It might have been more than a million. It might
have been 1\1/2\ million. It was unlikely to be 2 million. But it
turned out to be 3 million because people were gaming the system.
In my particular office, I took applications in and I made sure they
filled out their I-9 forms, and I took copies of their documents and
made sure my files were complete and considered their applications
because I was sure that INS would be into my office to go through my
books and make sure that I followed the law because it was going to be
enforced by this newly robust Federal Government. That was the
commitment. Amnesty now, enforcement forever, never amnesty again.
That was 1986. And here we are all these years later, 24 years later,
and we have had by each succeeding administration--I'm not particularly
happy with the enforcement we saw in the Reagan administration, and I
was less happy with the enforcement that I saw in Bush 41 and less
happy with what I saw under Bill Clinton and less happy with what I saw
under George W. Bush, and I'm less happy with what I've seen under
President Obama. Less and less effective enforcement.
And they do find a way to put together the data so that they can
point to their enforcement and allege that in this particular
administration, the enforcement against employers appears to be
marginally stronger than it was under George Bush, but the enforcement
against illegal workers is significantly less than it was under George
Bush, and I wasn't happy with what George Bush did.
So is the system broken? I think the enforcement of the system is
broken, Madam Speaker. I think that we have had a succession of
Presidents who didn't demonstrate the will to enforce our immigration
law, and because of that, there has been a growing disrespect for our
immigration law. And even people that respect the law have seen that
their competition who would hire illegals have a comparative advantage
against them if they are going to adhere to the intent of the law. So
the competition pushes other employers to violate the intent and the
rule of law sometimes and hire the illegals to give them that
comparative advantage against their competition. And slowly the respect
for the rule of law and their adherence and compliance with the law has
been diminished in this country to the point where I have people in my
neighborhood that will say, Well, if you don't think I should hire an
illegal, then who is going to fix my leaky roof? Who's going to paint
my house? Who's going to do these other things?
That's not my job, Madam Speaker. My job is to stand up for the rule
of law. And, yes, if I think there are laws that are unjust, then I
should join with my colleagues and we should find a way to change them.
I don't happen to believe that our immigration laws today are unjust.
I believe they are unenforced. And I think they are founded on good and
just rule of law foundation.
Not having the documents in front of me, but I will reach into it a
little bit. I've seen some documents that illustrated the laws that
Mexico has with regard to their immigration laws, which are if ours are
considered Draconian, theirs, in fact, are Draconian. And President
Calderon has been arguing against Arizona law while he is enforcing
more Draconian laws in the nation of Mexico against people who would
come into their southern border. Crossing the border illegally is a
felony, punishable up to 2 years in the penitentiary. That's one of the
examples that we have.

[[Page H3070]]

So I would, Madam Speaker, just remind the American people that we
have grounded these laws in just and rational cause. And now Arizona
has seen that the Federal Government has been unwilling to enforce the
laws, and they are watching a crime rate that, if you look at the data
over the last 10 years, has increased in almost every category over the
last 10 years. In order to be objective, not probably to the extent
that has been articulated by many of the pundits, but it has been a
gradual and significant increase in the crime rates in Arizona in the
areas of murder and rape, violent crime, and certainly about the only
thing, except illegal border crossings, which have diminished
marginally over the last couple of years.
And a year ago last August, there was a report that there were as
many as 1\1/2\ million that have been in the United States illegally
that reversed their travels and voluntarily deported themselves back to
Mexico and points south. Most of that is attributable to the decline in
the economy rather than the increase in enforcement.
But it doesn't mean that there has been a diminishment of illegal
drugs coming across the border or a diminishment in illegal activity
along the border. In fact, those numbers are up. The violence numbers
are up. The illegal drugs are up. The contraband crossing the borders
are up. And the numbers of just individual illegal people by
interdiction data that's delivered to us by Janet Napolitano, the
Secretary of Homeland Security, are marginally down.
Now, it may or may not be that there are more illegal border
crossings. It might well be that they are just simply interdicting
fewer coming across the border and there is less enforcement. Although
I do believe that there are marginally fewer illegal border crossings
but more illegal drugs, more violence, more kidnappings. The State of
Arizona has the highest kidnap rate in the Nation. In fact, some of the
cities there have the highest or second highest kidnap rate in the
world. That's because of the drugs and it's because of the cartels that
are doing business in that area.
So Arizona passed a law, and this law does a number of things. It
sets up a situation where law enforcement--it requires all of the
political subdivisions in Arizona, the counties, the cities, the other
political subdivisions, and the State, to enforce Federal immigration
law. It sets it up so that an individual has standing to sue the
political subdivision, local government, if they fail to enforce
immigration law. And it provides for reasonable suspicion for a law
enforcement officer to pick up an individual that's out in public if
they reasonably suspect that that individual is unlawfully present in
the United States. Those are good things, and they are all that I have
described within the parameters of existing Federal law today.
The argument that has been made and the demonstrations that are
queued up for May 1, and that will be this coming Saturday, they are
trying to establish demonstrations all over America of people rising up
to demonstrate against Arizona's immigration law. Well, look at what
has happened. The Federal Government hasn't enforced immigration law.
I would say that our immigration laws are true and just and right
altogether. And our problem is not because our laws are wrong. Our
problem is not because we need to replace broken laws. It's that we
need to take this system that--``broken'' is not the right word for it,
I would say to the gentleman from Colorado (Mr. Polis). I think instead
it's a system that is not being utilized because we lack the will to
enforce immigration law in the United States. And that will has been
diminishing over the years. The greater the number of illegals, the
more people get to know their neighbors that may be in the United
States illegally. They don't see that when you contribute to or allow
or tolerate people who are unlawfully present in the United States in
your neighborhood, when you hire them, you're contributing to the
problem. People don't see that.
They just understand that we're all God's children. They like the
people that came in. They see that they work hard, and so, therefore,
they become their advocates. It's a natural thing to happen. But at the
same time, while our laws are being broken and our laws are being
disrespected, there's an undermining of the American system.
There's a reason that the people want to come to the United States.
There isn't a country in the world where there aren't significant
numbers of people that don't want to become Americans. And the reasons
for that fall into a lot of categories, but one of them is we have
respect for the rule of law. Our traditions honor the rule of law. Lady
Justice is blind. When you think of the image of Lady Justice standing
there blindfolded with the scales of justice balanced, without
consideration for race, creed, color, ethnicity, national origin, age,
or disability. That's the American creed.

We have equal justice for all, and justice is blind with regard to
those characteristics. So people want to come here. They want to come
to the United States from countries, countries that do not have that
tradition of honoring the rule of law. They want to come to the United
States from countries that have a corrupt tradition where you have to
pay to play and it's who you know and how you pay them off or you curl
up and you try to avoid the scrutiny of government and interactivity
with the government agencies.
Here in this country, we're straight up, open, and honest, and, for
the most part, moral and ethical, and we respect the law. But if we
grant amnesty to 12 or 20 or more million people because it's described
as an insurmountable problem, that the argument that's often made that
we can't deport 12 or 20 million people, in fact, we could. We could do
that. It's not logistically impossible to do so.
I went over to London a little over a year ago to deal with the
immigration issue over there. And I listened to them talk about the
numbers of illegals that they have, and I have forgotten the exact
number, but let's just say that we are in that 12 to 20 million
category, and population ratio-wise, they are down in that 1\1/2\
million category, perhaps, of illegals in England. And what is their
argument? You can't deport 1\1/2\ million people. It's too many. It's
an impossible thing logistically.
Well, interestingly we're here with 12 to 20 million. We're making
the same argument. Well, then, how many could we deport? If it's not 20
million and it's not 12 million and the British say they can't deport
1\1/2\ million, could we depart 1\1/2\ million if we chose to do that,
or is it 1 million or \1/2\ million or 100,000 or 10,000 or one? What
is our capability logistically to deport people that are in the United
States illegally?
And I will suggest that it's in direct proportion to our resources
and our will to enforce the law. Our problem is not that we can't do so
logistically. Our problem is we lack the will to do so from a moral
standard because we're listening to both sides of this argument. The
argument that people are here, that they just want to work. They want
to earn for their families. And for the most part, that's true. And we
disregard the argument that is this point that I need to make, Madam
Speaker, and that is that 90 percent of the illegal drugs consumed in
the United States of America come from or through Mexico, 90 percent.
It's a consistent number that comes from the Drug Enforcement Agency,
and it's been consistent throughout several years.

{time} 2030

And the illegal drug distribution chains in America, magically, and
this is a Drug Enforcement Agency response, magically if every one of
the people that are in the United States illegally, magically tomorrow
morning woke up in their home country where they were legal to live and
reside, if that happened by magic wand overnight, there is at least one
link in every illegal drug distribution chain in America that would be
severed because at least one link has an illegal alien that's part of
that drug distribution chain.
And so if it was in our endeavor to shut off the illegal drug
distribution in America, we would simply make sure we enforced our
immigration laws. And that would be a very temporary fix, and it might
only last for hours or days, not much longer than weeks and perhaps not
months, but it would sever the distribution of all illegal drugs in
America, however temporarily that might be.

[[Page H3071]]

So when we look at what happens when we have 12 to 20 or more million
illegals in America, what are the effects on our society? First, they
are delivering 90 percent of the drugs from or through Mexico. And some
of them at least touch the delivery of every illegal drug that's
delivered in the United States of America while that's going on.
What is accompanied by the illegal drug trade? Violence, murder,
theft, rape, all of those things that go along with crime are wrapped
up and associated with the illegal drug distribution. And the people
that are illegally distributing drugs that are in the United States
illegally are also, however inadvertently, the channel of their work is
enabled by, and not always willfully, and sometimes even unknowingly,
it's enabled by the illegal community in the United States. It becomes
an underground railroad for illegal people and illegal drugs that are
pouring through, from and through Mexico into the United States. And it
is something that brings about a high amount of death and destruction
and diminishment of human capital, human resources, and human
potential. That's why we outlaw those illegal drugs in the first place.
It doesn't mean that all the people that are involved in that are
willfully evil or willfully trying to undermine our society. It might
be inadvertent. But they are part of the problem. And if we are to have
the rule of law, we have to enforce the rule of law. And to imagine
that when law enforcement comes in contact with people who are here
illegally that we would be unwilling to put them back into the
condition that they were in at the time they broke the law is
unconscionable for a rule-of-law Nation to think such a thing.
Think in terms of this: if someone walks into the bank and robs the
bank and would walk out of that bank with all of the loot, and we would
interdict them with our law enforcement and decide, well, you really
only want to provide for your family, so we are going to let you go on
here because we don't have the will to stop you at this point. Or our
immigration laws, simply deporting people is the equivalent of putting
them back in the condition they were in before they broke the law. It's
the equivalent of taking a bank robber and saying you don't get to keep
the money, but we are going to take you out of the bank and set you
outside the door and let you go. That's the equivalent of deportation.
It is we put people back in the condition they were in before they
broke the law. It's like taking a bank robber out of the bank, not
letting them keep the loot, and you set them outside the door and say,
okay, go. You are free to go. It's as if you never broke our law.
That's what deportation is. It is not Draconian. It is not harsh. It is
not cruel and unusual punishment. It is de minimis that we can do if we
are going to enforce the law. And if we are not willing to put people
back in the condition they were in before they broke our immigration
law, then we cannot have enforcement of our immigration law whatsoever.
It doesn't work to set a standard of amnesty that's been advocated by
President Bush, President Obama, by many of the leaders over here on
the left side of the aisle that we should give people a path to
citizenship, make them pay a fine, force them to learn English. That
seems a little odd to me, how you force somebody to learn a language
and require them to pay their back taxes. Those are the minimum
standards for somebody who would come into the United States legally in
the first place.
If you want to become an American citizen, get in line. Get in line
in a foreign country. Don't jump the line. Don't jump the border. And
when you do that, and you go take your citizenship test--first, you
have to pass the test that asks the question what's the economic system
of the United States of America? And the answer is free enterprise
capitalism. That's a little heads up there, Madam Speaker, on that one.
But when people come into the United States legally, they are
required to learn English. If they want to become a citizen, if they
want to go through the naturalization process, they are required to
learn English. They are required to demonstrate proficiency in English
in both the written and the spoken word. They have to understand our
history and understand those principles that made America great. And we
are not going to naturalize somebody that didn't pay their back taxes.
And the idea of a fine for being in the United States illegally, and
that's the only other condition that we would add, whether that would
be pay a fee of $1,500--I remember when it started out to be $500. And
then $500 seemed like a pittance, so they raised it to $1,000 and then
$1,500. And under the Bush administration we had the discussion and the
argument that their position was, well, it's not amnesty if they have
to pay a fine. Oh, really? If the fine is cheaper than what you have to
pay a coyote to sneak into the United States is it really a fine? And
does the fine replace the penalty that exists for violating Federal
law? And I say no.
If you grant people the objective of their crime, it's amnesty. To
grant amnesty is to pardon people for the violation of the law and
grant them the objective of their crime. That's what amnesty is. And so
if we are going to have amnesty, let's be honest about it, Madam
Speaker. Let's ask the people in this Congress, the President of the
United States, the executive branch of government, and the people in
the United States Senate that are now crafting up legislation are you
for or against amnesty. If they want to support amnesty, it's fine with
me if they will just admit that. And then we can have a debate as to
what degree of amnesty they are going to advocate.

But it's offensive to the American people to hear United States
Senators or Members of the House of Representatives, Congressmen and -
women, or the President of the United States, or his spokesmen or -
women, argue that amnesty isn't amnesty when we know very well what
amnesty is. Pardon immigration lawbreakers and reward them with the
objective of their crimes. That's amnesty.
President Reagan understood it. He admitted amnesty was amnesty. He
signed the amnesty bill in 1986. Yes, he let me down, but he was honest
about it. And we haven't been honest during the second half of the Bush
administration, and we certainly aren't honest during the Obama
administration, this first third or so of the Obama administration
about amnesty or immigration.
And so here are my concerns, that 90 percent of the illegal drugs
that are consumed in the United States come from or through Mexico. Of
all the violence that pours forth from that, it costs American lives
dozens and dozens, in fact by the hundreds, every year Americans that
die at the hands of illegals that are here in the United States of
America illegally. That's the definition. And if we would be effective
in enforcing immigration law, those people who died at the hands who
are here illegally would still be alive.
When the school bus wrecked in southwest Minnesota and we lost four
or five young girls there because it was caused by an accident by an
individual who had two or three times been interdicted by law
enforcement in the United States but was turned loose again, those
girls would be young women today. They would be alive today. And their
parents know that. It happens over and over hundreds of times. In fact,
it's happened thousands of times since we failed to enforce our
immigration laws.
So what do we do? We put together the will to enforce our immigration
laws. The American people rise up and make the argument that we are
going to have the rule of law, that we are going to shut off all
illegal traffic at the border. We are going to force all that traffic
through the ports of entry.
It's been a little while since we have talked about the necessity of
building a wall and a fence on the southern border. Someone said to me
we can't build 2,000 miles of fence. Yes, we could. We could build
2,000 miles of triple fencing. We could put sensors on it. We could put
lights on it. We could build roads in between. We could patrol it. We
could enforce it. We can fix it so nobody gets through all that. Yes,
we can. And for the people that will argue if you build a 20-foot fence
I will show you a 21-foot ladder, that's got to be the silliest and the
weakest and the most specious argument I have heard here on the floor
of the United States Congress. I have heard the Secretary of

[[Page H3072]]

Homeland Security say build a 50-foot fence and I will show you a 51-
foot ladder.
Madam Speaker, what in the world could that mean? All right, if you
build a rocket that will fly to the Moon, I will show you a rocket that
will fly a mile past the Moon. So what? What does that mean? They are
not going to be building a 51-foot ladder. And if they do, we are going
to be sitting there with our sensory devices, our roads, our
monitoring, and we are going to make sure if they can get over that
fence they don't get to the next one. And if they get over that one, we
are going to make sure they don't get to the next one.

I have designed a concrete wall. And it is not the only barrier; it
is not the only tool. And when those of us that talk about the
necessity for extending the fence and the wall on the southern border
and building double and tertiary fences and walls, the argument against
it becomes this silly argument of, well, that's not going to solve the
problem.
None of us believe it's the total solution. None of us believe that
building an effective wall and fence is the only thing we would do.
It's among the effective things that we could do.
So, Madam Speaker, here are some things that the American people
don't know. The President doesn't know. His actuaries don't know. The
Speaker of the House doesn't know. Harry Reid, the majority leader in
the Senate doesn't know. And the committee Chairs don't know. And I may
well be the only one in the United States Congress that knows this.
And, Madam Speaker, now the whole world is going to know. Here are the
numbers. About 2006 we were spending $8 billion on our southern border.
Now we are spending about $12 billion on our southern border. All
together. These aren't numbers that come out of the administration
except one piece at a time. And you have to add them up and calculate
it out and calculate it back to the numbers of miles of border that we
have. $12 billion when you add up all of the expenses necessary for ICE
that are operating down there near the border in that 20- to 40-mile,
maybe 50-mile range of the border.
You have to pay the personnel, their health care package, their
benefits package, their retirement funds, their equipment, their
vehicles that they drive, guns, uniforms, all those things that they
do. And you add to that Custom Border Protection, our CBP people, our
Customs personnel, our Border Patrol personnel. And all of the forces
that are there lined up that are part of that coordinated effort to
defend the border are right in the area of $12 billion. $12 billion for
2,000 miles of border. That is $6 million a mile, Madam Speaker.
Now, think of this. Most of us can think what a mile is. For me, I
live on the corner on a gravel road in Iowa. And a lot of those corners
you can stand out there in the middle of that intersection and you can
see a mile in each of four directions. It is not the case in mine, but
I know how far a mile is. Most of us do.
Now, when I stand on my corner and I look to the west that full mile,
a mile west, which is the clearest vision that I have, and I think
would the Federal Government pay me--if that were the border, would the
Federal Government pay me $6 million to guard that border for that
mile? Could I do that for $6 million? Would I be willing to take on
that contract and control that border for $6 million for that mile? And
that's the average for 2,000 miles. Some of it's barren and desolate.
Would I be willing to do that, Madam Speaker, for $6 million? You
betcha. You betcha, to pick up on a phrase. I would do that for $6
million a mile.
And, furthermore, I would be willing to guarantee nobody would get
across that mile. I would guard it, I would protect it, I would hire
the personnel necessary. And, in fact, rather than paying a lot of
people that were boots on the ground, I would have some, and they would
be in mobile vehicles, and we would have sensors, and we would have
some lights, and we would have radios, and we would have warning
devices and ground-based radar. We would do all that stuff.

{time} 2045

But we would also build a fence and a wall as a barrier to slow that
traffic down and make it hard enough that they wouldn't come through my
mile at all. In fact, I would shut down all the traffic in that mile
for $6 million. And if you award me that contract, I would be willing
to let you dock me from that contract. I would guarantee it. I would
bond it. I would let you dock me. If they got across my mile, then
subtract from my contract every illegal crosser that is there. Then you
would put the incentives in place to actually succeed in what we're
doing as opposed to just simply doing--it's not catch and release back
into America anymore. It's catch and release at the port of entry and
turn them back in to Mexico, and then they come back around with a
smirk on their face. And I have watched them do that, Madam Speaker.
Another tool that we need to have is the New IDEA Act. New IDEA is
legislation that I have introduced in the last three Congresses. The
New IDEA stands for the New Illegal Deduction Elimination Act. That's
the acronym, New Illegal Deduction Elimination Act. It comes from this
part. If you look around, across the agencies of the Federal Government
and think about those agencies and how aggressively and how effectively
they do their jobs, we have the Department of Homeland Security, which
has really pledged that they're not going to deport illegal workers in
America.
In fact, they picked up some illegal workers by accident in Boston
some months ago back in December or January. They found out that they
were illegal. They processed them. These workers were on their way up
to Gillette Stadium in Boston. So ICE, after they processed them,
hauled them up to work. They gave them chauffeured transportation up to
their job to be groundskeepers at Gillette Stadium in Boston, a
complete lack of focus on their job.
I mean, you talk about open borders. Jump across the border, come in
here and sneak in and get yourself a job and have your documents being
invalid, falsification, whatever it might be, misrepresents your
status. And if we run across you by accident because our ICE people are
out there doing what they do, we will take your fingerprints and your
names, and then we'll give you a chauffeured ride on up to work at
Gillette Stadium. That is bizarre. It is so far away from an
understanding of what it takes to enforce the law.
I take us back to a time in the fifties when my father was a manager
of the State police radio stations, and he also was the mayor of a
small community. The local town cop came across an illegal who happened
to be traveling through the community, and I don't know how they
interdicted him, whether it was his license plate light that was out or
whatever it was, but he was arrested. He was incarcerated. He was held
up in the city jail, and they had to process him. And my father, as
mayor, was the justice of the peace as well. There never was any
consideration about turning him loose because it was too hard to
enforce the law. The only thing that could come from that was the
person that was illegally in the United States was going to go back to
their home country. And by my recollection, that's what happened.
But the New Illegal Deduction Elimination Act recognizes that the
Department of Homeland Security hasn't shown a complete will to enforce
immigration law. They have got good officers out in the field. They
want to do so. They want to deliver on a mission and accomplish a
mission statement. They want to accomplish their mission statement, but
the lack of will from the White House down through the Secretary of
Homeland Security prevents them from being as effective as they can be.
So there's your agency. Department of Homeland Security is not as
effective as they can be, enforcing against employers because
politically that's more palatable but refusing to enforce against
illegal workers because they have decided that those illegal workers
can be Democrats. I stand on that statement, Madam Speaker. They've
decided those illegal workers can become Democrats, so they want to
pander to them.
We've got the Social Security Administration that has a database that
should be feeding information to the Department of Homeland Security.
Whenever you have duplications of those Social Security numbers, you

[[Page H3073]]

can bet that as soon as the second one shows up, if it's outside the
neighborhood in the driving range of the first one, that you have one
illegal there at least that's working off of that Social Security
number--and maybe both of them are illegal.
The Social Security Administration is willing to take the checks that
come from the payroll taxes of those millions who are working illegally
in America, paying their payroll taxes because it's withheld from their
paycheck, but declaring the maximum number of dependents so that they
pay Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, but not State and Federal
income tax. The Social Security Administration's willing to take those
checks from those illegal workers and not explore the duplications on
those Social Security numbers because the money's going into the
account which is being spent by this Congress but is kept in an
accounting process in Parkersburg, West Virginia, in a filing cabinet.
And bonds that are worth no more than this piece of paper was, a print
on top of it. I happen to have one in my filing cabinet as well. $3.54
billion in bonds in the Social Security account. It's an IOU from the
government to the government. They put them in a filing cabinet in
Parkersburg, West Virginia. But illegals pay into that out of
proportion because they're not going to file a tax return. And so the
dollars that are contributed on that Social Security number go into
that filing cabinet along with those bonds.
And we have the Department of Homeland Security who is not willing to
enforce the law to the extent that it must be against illegal workers.
They may be willing to enforce the law in even an increasing degree
over the Bush administration against employers who are hiring illegal
workers. The Social Security Administration is cashing the checks of
people who have fraudulently misrepresented their identity, and so
neither agency has demonstrated the will to enforce the law.

So I brought this legislation called the New IDEA Act which clarifies
that wages and benefits paid to illegals are not tax deductible for
Federal income tax purposes, and it establishes that there will be a
cooperative working effort between Social Security, Homeland Security,
and the IRS. The IRS, who has demonstrated they do have a desire to
enforce the law, they have been vigorous in enforcing the law, and they
would be very useful in stepping into the enforcement of illegal
immigration law, and they happen to be in just exactly the right
position to do so.
And so under my bill, should it become law--and in fact, my bill has
been advocated by the Democrats in the Senate who are proposing
immigration legislation, Senator Schumer and others. They didn't define
the title of the bill, but they defined the bill within their talking
points, so I can commend them for recognizing the need.
New IDEA, the New Illegal Deduction Elimination Act, clarifies that
wages and benefits paid to illegals are not tax deductible for income
tax purposes, and it directs the IRS to go in under the normal course
of their audits, run the Social Security numbers of those employees
through, which will show up on the tax forms, run them through the E-
Verify program. E-Verify is the Internet-based program that can verify
the identity of the employees. It identifies a person who can lawfully
work in the United States, and it has a very, very high degree of
success and accuracy.
So the IRS would come in in an audit, and they would audit
corporation A, and say corporation A has 25 employees. Their Social
Security numbers will be listed in their tax forms. They will punch
those Social Security numbers in to E-Verify. If it comes back that
they can lawfully work in the United States, fine. No problem. If it
comes back that they can't verify, then the IRS can give the employer
an opportunity to cure those records, to straighten them out and to
correct them. But failure to correct those records then can be
concluded by the IRS, under the New IDEA Act, the New Illegal Deduction
Elimination Act, the IRS can then deny the tax deductibility of the
wages and benefits paid to the illegals.
When the IRS denies that, then those wages--let's just say that it's
$1 million worth of wages that are paid, are deducted as a business
expense like you would deduct, oh, let's say, fuel or any of your
overhead that you might have, input from produced products or whatever
it might be. That business expense would be denied. And when it's
denied, presumably, it goes over into the income column. So $1 million
worth of wages are denied as an expense because it was paid to illegals
and denied by the IRS. It would go over here to the other column on the
profit side.
And I did this calculation at 34 percent corporate income tax, and it
might well be 35 percent today, and I think it's more accurate to say
so. But at 34 percent, your $10 an hour illegal, by the time you add
interest and penalty and the 34 percent tax, becomes a $16 an hour
illegal. The IRS steps in then to enforce immigration law by denying
the deductibility of wages and benefits paid to illegals, adding the
interest and the penalty, and the $10 an hour illegal becomes a $16 an
hour illegal. Employers will understand that instantly, and they will
set about cleaning up their workforce, using E-Verify.
And, by the way, we give that employer safe harbor if he uses E-
Verify, using E-Verify to clean up his workforce. And an employer that
can't function with the illegal staff that he has may make the decision
to incrementally transition over into legal employees over a period of
time. Whatever it takes. It's not draconian. It isn't stark. It isn't
something that shuts businesses down, but it is something that sets up
an incentive for businesses to comply with our immigration law. Should
they choose not to do that, then they can pay the Federal Treasury the
difference of $10 an hour up to $16 an hour.
We need to fix E-Verify, and we do in my bill. We set up E-Verify so
that an employer can use E-Verify to verify the employability status of
the applicant upon a bona fide job offer rather than having to hire the
individual. Under current E-Verify law, you can't use E-Verify to
determine if a job applicant can lawfully work in the United States.
You can only do that after you actually hire them. So if you hire an
individual, and you run their data through E-Verify and it comes back
that they can't confirm that they can lawfully work in the United
States, then you have to turn around and fire them.
And I'll take the position that American employers should not be
compelled to hire illegals in order to find out that they're illegal.
They should be able to say to the individual, Sam, John, Larry, Sally,
whoever you are, I'm offering you this job, and the job that I'm
offering you is contingent upon your data being approved through E-
Verify. I will do that now if you're willing to accept this job. If
they say yes, you run the data through. You've got, at a maximum, a 6-
second delay to get this verification done. If they don't meet the
test, you don't put them on the payroll. I think that it's immoral to
hire people that are illegal, and I don't want to be compelled to do
that because we've got a flaw in our E-Verify law.
So I appreciate the statement that Mr. Polis from Colorado made that
he's for zero illegal immigration. I don't know how you get to that
unless you're willing to enforce the law. I think we need to force all
traffic--legal and illegal--and all products--human and other
products--through the ports of entry on our southern border. I think we
need to go ahead and build a fence and a wall. And at the expense of $6
million a mile, that's the maintenance of our border. What will it cost
us to build a fence and how much will it cut in the cost to maintain
the enforcement of that? If we can, for a couple million dollars a
mile, build some very effective barriers, that means that we can cut
down on the cost to the boots on the ground to enforce those sections
and focus our boots on the ground that we have in the areas where we
have trouble with enforcement. That's a logical thing to do.

Look around the world. Look at the barrier that they have in Israel,
for example, where they had suicide bombers coming through over and
over and over again. They built a barrier there, and it's set up to
protect the Israelis from the people that would come and do them harm.
Is it immoral for them to protect themselves from that kind of damage
to their lives and to their limbs and to their treasure? I suggest it
is not. And those that would argue that a wall on our border is
comparable to the Berlin Wall just completely and intentionally and
willfully miss the

[[Page H3074]]

most important point, and that is that a wall to keep people out is
morally and fundamentally different than a wall to keep people in. The
Berlin Wall was about keeping people in. You don't hear the same people
argue against the Great Wall of China because they know the Great Wall
of China was designed to keep people out, not in. We know that the
barrier in Israel has worked. We know that our barriers on our southern
border where we have them have worked.
We have tertiary fencing down there in San Luis, Arizona, that is, as
near as I can determine, that section of fence--however short it is--
it's three layers of fencing. As near as I can determine, it has not
been defeated by anyone. It's easier to go around the end than it is to
go over, around, under, or through. I don't suggest we build 2,000
miles of wall and fencing with sensors and monitoring and patrol roads.
Madam Speaker, I suggest that we simply build a fence and build a wall
until they quit going around the end. If we do that, it may take 2,000
miles. It may not. We may just be building the 784 miles that are
required by the Secure Fence Act. We would need to have a smart
immigration policy.
And here we are, down into the depths of this downward spiral of our
economy, this economy that's been referred to a good number of times as
the ``great recession.'' And we're talking about, what, granting
amnesty to people, perhaps moving pieces of legislation through this
Congress that would legalize 12 million to 20 million people in an
economic environment where we have 15.4 million unemployed Americans
that fit the category, that fit the definition, another 5 million to 6
million Americans who no longer fit the definition for unemployment
because they quit trying. So we have over 20 million Americans that are
looking for work or should be looking for work or have given up, and we
have at least 8 million illegals that are working in the United States,
taking up jobs that Americans could and should be doing.

{time} 2100

The argument that there is work that Americans won't do, we haven't
heard much of that argument in the last year or so, since the economy
went into the downward spiral. They haven't said that as often. I have
always argued that there isn't work that Americans won't do. We do
everything. There is no job in America that is not being done by
Americans. No matter how many legal or illegal immigrants might be
doing that work, there will always be Americans standing there doing
that work as well.
When we travel around the world and look at the work that is being
done, work that is characterized as work that Americans won't do, I see
that work being done by every nationality in every country. There is no
work that Americans won't do. When John McCain talked about he would
pay $50 an hour for people to come and pick lettuce, I am not sure that
he ever wrote that check; but I was quite concerned that I would lose
my construction crew, who might all migrate down to Arizona to pick
lettuce for $50 an hour.
It isn't a matter that there is work that Americans won't do, it is a
matter of there has been a flood of underskilled labor that are mobile.
They are more reactive. They can beat Americans to that job because
they are not as tied to real estate. They don't have those kinds of
possessions. They have a cell phone network, and if they need 25 people
to pick the lettuce in Arizona, that network brings a lot of illegals
in there to do that. It doesn't mean Americans won't do it. There is no
work Americans won't do.
I mentioned John McCain, and it isn't for the purpose of being
critical of the positions he has taken in the past, I say my hats off
to the people who have served this country. He is an authentic American
hero. He has gone through a tremendous amount of torture and pain and
suffering, and he has not lost his resolve to defend this country in a
fashion that be believes as a United States Senator.
I would just suggest, here are some real facts. I have asked this
question, and I come down to a bottom line consensus: What is the
toughest, dirtiest, most dangerous job that we ever ask Americans to
do? I will suggest that it is not in the United States. It has been and
perhaps will not be again in that particular location, but it is
rooting terrorists out of places like Fallujah, or places in
Afghanistan, where we ask our soldiers and our marines to put their
lives on the line to do that, sometimes in 130 degree heat with 70, 80
pounds that they are carrying. They go in and root those terrorists out
of Fallujah. They root them out of Afghanistan. They do that, and if
you calculate them at 40 hours a week, for about $8.09 an hour.
If Americans will do that, if they will take on the toughest, the
hottest or the coldest, the dirtiest, and the most dangerous jobs in
the world for that kind of money, there is no argument to be made that
there are jobs that Americans will not do. We work hard and are willing
to take a risk. We stand up for freedom and liberty and the rule of
law. The people who put on the uniform to put their lives on the line
are very much about defending the pillars of American exceptionalism,
the principles that made American great, and they are not about
defending someone having a path to citizenship being granted through
amnesty.
We owe the honor to the people who have defended our liberty and
freedom to stand up for the rule of law. The rule of law has been
reestablished by the statute in Arizona, the immigration legislation
that they have passed and has been signed into law by the governor.
These immigration laws in Arizona are laws that reflect the Federal
immigration law. They fit within the umbrella of the Federal
immigration law. Yes, there is a standard called Federal preemption,
and that means if the Federal Government passes a law, provided it is
constitutional that supersedes that of the States, that is Federal
preemption. But we don't have any statutes that preempt immigration law
in Arizona because they have drafted their immigration legislation to
fit within the umbrella of the Federal immigration law.
And they have set up some clear standards, clear standards that there
shall not be racial profiling used as the only criterion when it comes
to interdicting or stopping an individual.
Now that happens to fit consistently with Federal case law. We have a
responsibility and a duty and an obligation and a legal standard that
allows our law enforcement officers to use a profile provided their
race isn't the only criterion. And reasonable suspicion includes a
whole lot of other criteria in addition to race. We don't want to be
foolish or stupid about this.
I recall an incident that took place in Urbandale, Iowa, 15 or more
years ago. It is a community that at the time was not populated by
minorities in any significant percentage. There was a Cadillac being
driven down the street in a higher income residential area by an
African American. The law enforcement officer saw that and wondered,
and maybe it was actually Windsor Heights, come to think of it, but it
was one of the suburbs of Des Moines, and the officer saw that and
thought, That doesn't quite fit what goes on in this community. It
could have been the same police officer in an African American
community that would have made the call if it were perhaps a white
person in that community.
But it turned out to be the other way around. He ran the plates on
the car and the car was registered to a Caucasian female who lived in
the neighborhood. So the officer suspected something was out of order,
pulled the car over, and found out that the African American driving
the car was the husband of the Caucasian lady whom the car was
registered to who lived in the neighborhood.
Okay, it wasn't what you would normally see as typical. One could
argue it was racial profiling, but I would argue it was police work
picking up the things that were inconsistent and trying to pick the
populous. In any event, the settlement was $60,000 paid to the driver
of the car, the husband of the lady who owned the car and was a very
legitimate resident of the community and as far as I know, was a very
well-respected Iowan.
But sometimes you get caught in the anomaly, and you have to give the
police officers their due. They are picking out those things that are
out of order and don't fit the normal practice in the neighborhood. And
I know the difference. I live in a rural neighborhood. When somebody
drives down my road,

[[Page H3075]]

we generally know who they are and where they are going. If I drive
down the road, they know me. It is part of our own built-in security
system.

Where I reside out here in D.C., I know who stands on the street and
what the flow of traffic is, and you see those things that are outside
the normal flow. That's what police officers do. It isn't and should
not be targeting people because of their race. But race can be a factor
in a legitimate police activity as long as it is not the only factor.
That is what the Arizona law says.
I want to presume that those police officers are operating to enforce
the rule of law and protect society and to use the tools that they have
to protect the people. That's what they are. They provide security all
across this country. Having grown in an law enforcement family, I
respect the job that they do and the risk that they take and the
judgment and the education that is necessary for them if they are going
to enforce the law.
In Arizona, the executive order by the governor ensures that they are
going to continue to teach and train their officers so that they stay
within compliance of Federal law, Arizona law, Arizona Constitution and
the United States Constitution. And if there are deviations from that,
I am very confident that the people who are driving wedges between us
as Americans will find a way to litigate.
I regret and it saddens me, and in fact it infuriates me, Madam
Speaker, that we would see the people who are race baiters who are
seeking to drive wedges between the American people, trying to
capitalize on this and scare the American people and make it out to be
something that it is not. What it is is, it is a law that sets up and
honors the Federal immigration law that uses the Arizona law
enforcement people to enforce an immigration law that is now a State
law that is the mirror of the Federal law. We need to understand that
in the case of U.S. v. Santana Garcia, and several others, that there
are Federal precedents that local law enforcement implicitly has the
authority to enforce immigration law.
Regardless of whether there is a 287(g) agreement, local law
enforcement has the authority to enforce immigration law, and there is
a Federal law that prohibits sanctuary cities. It has been exploited by
many cities in the country, including San Francisco and Houston, a
number of cities that want to boycott Arizona, the violation of the
Federal law from prohibiting cities from becoming sanctuary cities has
been a circumvention, and it says the series of requirements that are
in there that prohibit local cities from, let me say, protecting
illegals in their communities, and have they found a way to pass
memorandums of understanding or city ordinances that direct their
police officers to not gather information, because the statute that was
written wasn't tight enough and requires that once they have the
information, they have to transfer it on to Federal law enforcement
officials, so they just prohibit their local law enforcement officers
from gathering information on illegals.
And so they become sanctuary cities and the streets of the city fill
up with people who are here illegally. They are taking jobs from
Americans. They are among the 8 millions taking jobs from Americans;
and as the streets fill up, they are also turning a blind eye to the
illegal drugs and the violence and the abuse that comes out of that
community in its entirety.
Madam Speaker, I go back to 12 to 20 million illegals living in
America, at least 8 million working in America, 15.4 million
unemployed, another 5 to 6 million that quit looking for work that fit
that category except they are not trying any longer, over 20 million
Americans who need a job, 8 million illegals that are occupying jobs
that would all go to people who are either Americans or lawfully
present in the United States, in an economy that has been declining and
shrinking.
And by the way, we have 1.5 million green cards that are issued on an
annual basis. If you look at the workforce in America, 10 years ago the
workforce in American was 142 million, now it is 153 million.

{time} 2115

It has increased about a little over 1 million a year over the last
10 years. And if you would go back and look, the numbers of green cards
has accelerated from about three quarters of a million in that period
of time--and that actually is a guess, Madam Speaker--on up to about
1.5 million a year now. Almost the sum total of the expansion of our
workforce has been attributable to the legal immigration green cards
that are a component of this. And so our economy has to grow and create
1.5 million new jobs a year just to accommodate the legal immigration,
let alone the illegal immigration. Those are the facts of what we're
faced with today.
So, Madam Speaker, I'm going to make this statement, that we have to
put a stop to the illegal immigration in America. We've got to direct
all traffic through our ports of entry where we can stop the traffic of
illegal drugs, contraband, and people coming into the United States. We
need to enforce our immigration law. We need to adopt the new ID Act so
the IRS can help us enforce immigration law. And then, while all this
is going on, we've got to take a look at the legal immigration in
America and make a determination as to how many jobs we want this
economy to create to accommodate those who are coming in here legally,
and we have to have an economy that's going to be robust.
Furthermore, according to Robert Rector of the Heritage Foundation, a
household that's headed by a high school dropout costs taxpayers in
America an average of $22,449; $22,449 over 50 years of heading the
household, a $1.5 million cost to the taxpayers to help sustain this
household because we have become a welfare state. When my grandmother
came here before the turn of the previous century, she didn't come here
to a welfare state. She came here to a meritocracy, and they wanted to
ensure that the people that came through Ellis Island were physically
and mentally fit and could sustain themselves. And even though they
were screened in Europe before they got on the ship, 2 percent of them
were sent back from Ellis Island because they didn't meet the standard.
And so here we are today, 1.5 million legal immigrants who are
granted work permits in the United States consuming all the new jobs in
America and expanding the workforce when we have many more Americans
that we could tap into to do this work that we haven't tried. That's
15.4 million unemployed, plus 5 to 6 million who no longer meet that
category, 20 million altogether. And if I would put them into this
category, those Americans of working age are in the area of 80 million
Americans of working age who are simply not in the workforce. So if we
would just simply hire one out of 10 of those, we could replace all the
illegal workers by hiring 10 percent of those who are not in the
workforce, but are of working age; and about 20 million of those are
looking for work.
So, Madam Speaker, we have an economy we need to heal up. We've got a
rule of law we've got to reestablish. We have demonstrations that are
likely to come across America that are designed to just pit Americans
against Americans, race-based, race baiting for political purposes,
when what we're really looking for here is the enforcement of the rule
of law and a robust economy that's going to employ American workers.
We are the most generous country in the world when it comes to
allowing legal immigration, roughly 1.5 million a year. No other
country comes close to matching that. We need to take a look at our
economy, the rule of law, the culture in America, enforce the rule of
law, stand with Arizona--who has not done anything except define their
Arizona immigration law to reflect that of the Federal law. And the
President of the United States, who has directed the Justice Department
to examine Arizona law, I think is finding out that it's
constitutional, it's statutorily consistent, it cannot be and should
not be preempted by Federal law, and it should be honored and respected
and supported, not investigated, nor litigated. And I encourage and I
thank the people in Arizona for having the courage to step up and pass
their legislation.
Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

[[Page H3076]]

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