[Congressional Record Volume 161, Number 37 (Wednesday, March 4, 2015)]
[House]
[Pages H1604-H1606]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  1515
                           PROGRESSIVE CAUCUS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Graves of Louisiana). Under the 
Speaker's announced policy of January 6, 2015, the gentlewoman from New 
Jersey (Mrs. Watson Coleman) is recognized for 60 minutes as the 
designee of the minority leader.


                             General Leave

  Mrs. WATSON COLEMAN. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all 
Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their 
remarks and include extraneous material on the subject of my Special 
Order today.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentlewoman from New Jersey?
  There was no objection.
  Mrs. WATSON COLEMAN. Mr. Speaker, we have spent the last week and a 
half debating funding for the Department of Homeland Security, a debate 
that started because my colleagues on the other side of the aisle 
didn't like the President's executive actions on immigration.
  House Republicans finally did do what they ought to have done all 
along: joining with Democrats to pass the bipartisan funds for DHS 
through Fiscal Year 2015. That legislation has restored certainty for 
thousands of employees at the Department of Homeland Security; and, 
even more importantly, it ensures the safety and security of our entire 
Nation.
  Mr. Speaker, while we settled the funding for DHS, we haven't 
addressed the issues that led us to the impasse in the first place.
  Republicans in both the House and the Senate wanted to hinder the 
President's legal authority to better manage our broken immigration 
system. They have called it illegal amnesty, and many of their 
conservative counterparts have gone as far as calling the President a 
tyrant, but they have not offered any plan of their own.
  Today, during this Special Order hour, I would like to take the 
opportunity, on behalf of our Progressive Caucus, to join with my 
colleague, the Congressman from Arizona, to express our concerns from 
the Progressive Caucus' perspective on our plans for the future as it 
relates to immigration.
  To that extent, Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Arizona 
(Mr. Grijalva).
  Mr. GRIJALVA. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman from New Jersey 
for having this opportunity for us to come and talk about the root 
issue, as she explained, the root issue that caused almost the 
potential of DHS and that Department having to be shut down because of 
the amendments added by this House of Representatives to an 
appropriations bill, a bill that should have been clean.
  It was a bipartisan piece of legislation, but amendments were added 
to it, amendments that were against the President's executive order, 
amendments that were aimed at undoing any progress that had been made 
with DREAMers, the DACA, the amendments that were punitive in its 
entirety, and did not seek any solution to deal with our broken 
immigration system.
  Thankfully, the adults in the House took control. A clean bill was 
passed with overwhelming and unanimous support from Democrats and with 
significant support from our Republican colleagues.
  That being done, that example should be a harbinger that on ``must-
pass'' legislation critical to the future of this Nation, critical to 
its tranquility, that we stop playing games with that legislation, and 
that the track to deal with immigration reform should be a track that 
we all pursue.

[[Page H1605]]

  To try to put mean-spirited, divisive, ``got you,'' grandstanding 
amendments on a piece of ``must-pass'' legislation, whether it is 
Homeland Security the other day, Transportation in the future, that is 
not governing; that is merely pandering to a political ideology that 
has nothing to do with the underlying bill, as it did with national 
security.
  Let me talk a little bit about how we got to that situation, as the 
gentlelady said. In the time that I have been here, immigration reform 
and the broken system has been an acknowledged fact by all sides.
  There was an attempt that the Senate, a year ago, passed, a 
bipartisan bill, overwhelming support, that took us in a direction, a 
very critical first step to reforming this broken immigration system. 
For a year, we waited for the leadership of this House, the Republican 
leadership, to bring that bill up and let the people's House work its 
will. That never happened.
  Time and time again, we admonished the leadership in saying: If 
nothing is done by this House to allow an up-or-down vote on that piece 
of legislation that the Senate passed, the President will have no 
option but to relieve the anxiety, to relieve the painful family 
divisions that were going on in this country and to prevent additional 
community trauma that many of our communities were facing with the high 
level of detentions and deportations, the splitting of families, even 
when there was U.S. citizen children or a spouse involved.
  The President waited; he waited a considerable amount of time. I was 
one of those that criticized that waiting period, that should be done 
immediately. At the end, the President put the executive orders 
together, the expansion and enhancement of DACA for DREAMers, for young 
people, and DAPA, for those parents who have citizen children, that 
they, too, would get the 2-year umbrella of protection, could work and 
could come out of the shadows.
  This was not automatic, as it has been exaggerated by the opponents 
of his actions. This was a process that requires documentation and that 
requires qualifications in order to be eligible for the programs.
  As the President said, Department of Homeland Security, ICE, and 
Border Patrol can now concentrate on the smuggling and organized crime 
that occurs along our border that is the root cause of much of the 
violence and heartache that we see on our border.
  In Arizona, there has been over close to 5,000 individuals that have 
lost their lives in the desert trying to cross to the United States, 
countless acts of violence--all generated by human traffickers, drug 
smugglers, and organized crime on both sides of the border.
  It is time to concentrate on that very obvious threat to American 
security. The other is to go after the people that we don't want here. 
It is another exaggeration to say that this is blanket amnesty. It is 
not blanket amnesty, far from it.
  We, like everyone else--the people that don't belong here because of 
felonious behavior, violence, drug smuggling, and breaking the laws of 
this Nation, those are the people that ICE should put its emphasis on 
and get rid of felons, as the President said, and not families.
  The President did that order, much to the outcry of some colleagues 
of mine on the other side of the aisle--not all. I would never paint 
the whole Republican Conference with one brush, but there is a 
significant number that see the issue of immigration in a very 
different and clouded way.
  That clouded way has to do more with ideology. It has more to do with 
the sense that it is us versus them and an insecurity about the 
changing demography of this country and what it means to the Nation. 
That insecurity is just sad, an insecurity not founded in fact and not 
founded on the immigrant history of this Nation.
  As a first-generation American, I can tell you the pride and the 
values that I have were grown in this country, were nurtured in this 
country, and serving in this body could be the highest honor I could 
ever have. That story is repeated, day in and day out, for the history 
of this Nation, that the immigrant community has come to give and to 
contribute, not to take.
  The President has wide latitude, as President, with executive orders. 
The court case, an injunction to hold the implementation of his 
executive orders in Texas, where a selection process chose this judge 
for his previous legal opinions and his previous public comments 
regarding the issue of immigration, that sided very much with the 
opponents.
  I am totally confident--totally confident--that as we move up the 
chain of the Federal court system, that the constitutional authority 
that the President has for these executive orders, as previous 
Presidents had for executive orders, will be redeemed; and that lower 
injunction will be overturned.
  In the interim, we continue to tell people in the undocumented 
community, immigrant community: Come forward, bring your documentation, 
begin to prepare yourself for an opportunity to be one of the people 
and families that qualify for this program.
  What the President did with those executive orders is significant in 
many ways. Those executive orders began mending the social fabric of 
this Nation. One of the most divisive issues has been immigration, and 
maybe it is a good election ploy to continue to beat that horse dead in 
order to get elected.
  In the long term, in the generational term of this Nation, it does 
nothing but divide us along very superficial issues. It divides us 
along the issue of race and divides us along the issue of language and 
country of origin. Those are not divisions for the social well-being of 
this Nation that we can tolerate.
  Immigration reform is also about the domestic tranquility of this 
Nation and to heal that social fabric that has been ripped.
  I also want to say that the Progressive Caucus, from the onset, has 
been a tireless advocate for comprehensive immigration reform, humane 
policies, family-centered reforms, and reforms that deal with the 
reality of what is around us and doesn't ignore it.
  I am proud to be a member of that caucus and for its steadfast and 
unwavering support not only of comprehensive immigration reform, but of 
the President and his executive orders.
  Five amendments were presented as part of the DHS bill, which were at 
the center of the controversy, and the ones that were eliminated so we 
could finally vote on a key piece of legislation.
  One amendment, the Aderholt amendment, this amendment prohibits any 
funds or fees to be used to carry out the majority of the President's 
executive order, including DAPA and DACA.
  Reality, fact, the prohibition is irrelevant and moot. All the cost 
of this program comes from the individual making an application. It is 
a fee-driven process. There is no specific allocation that this body 
has made to it or that the Department is making to it.
  The Blackburn amendment, which I thought was of particular anguish to 
everyone, this amendment would end the DACA program, the DREAMer 
program for DREAMer children susceptible to deportation.
  Let's say those almost 300,000, if not more, young people that are 
qualified under DACA, suddenly, with that amendment, would have that 
protection taken away and their status would now be back in the 
deportable status.
  That amendment, in and of itself, does nothing for national security, 
does nothing to address the issue of a broken immigration system; but, 
indeed, adds a level of cruelty to the whole process of trying to solve 
this problem.
  Preventing the President from being able to have new enforcement 
priorities, going after criminals and felons, as opposed to trying to 
break up families and deport families, one of the amendments was meant 
to stop that.
  The Salmon amendment really made no sense. Undocumented people are 
not able and cannot receive and participate in the Affordable Care Act. 
Employers cannot register and have them employed, period, by Federal 
law. It was just to state the obvious and try to create an issue in 
which there wasn't one.

                              {time}  1530

  And there is no prioritization, where people under this executive 
order will be ahead of other people. There are two different processes: 
one is for a legal reprieve of protection that lasts up to the tenure 
of this President, and the

[[Page H1606]]

other one, naturalization and getting legal permanent status, continues 
to be a process. One process doesn't get in front of the line of the 
other.
  I want to go back to one point. At some point, we are going to have 
to deal with the issue of immigration reform in a constructive, 
proactive way. And it is going to have to be dealt with because I think 
the economic security of this country is at stake; the domestic well-
being and quality of life for this country is at stake; the economy is 
at stake; and the security is at stake; and if for no other reason, to 
look at the benefits of those areas in the discussion of comprehensive 
immigration reform.
  We could continue on the path of making immigration reform and 
immigrants the cannon fodder in the 2016 election. We could continue to 
make immigration reform the collateral damage in any piece of 
legislation that is brought before this Congress, with the assumption 
that the individuals affected by these laws are not real human beings. 
We can continue to deny the obvious and the reality of this Nation, 
that when you have 11 million undocumented living, working amongst us, 
that the prudent, smart, and pragmatic thing to do is to deal with that 
issue and not exploit it or ignore it.
  We have heard so much pandering to this issue. We have heard of 
disease being brought to this country, which was proven untrue. The 
young children that were in detention that came in that surge across 
the border 6, 7 months ago, their rate of infection was no higher than 
the rate of infection for children throughout this Nation. We have 
heard the pandering about terrorism coming over the border. Not one 
incident has been qualified as fact--that, indeed, that has become a 
pathway for terrorism.
  The issue that somehow it is tearing at what America is, I think that 
is the most important point that we should take into consideration. 
``From many, there is one'' is the motto that this Nation holds dear to 
itself, that all of us come here, and that by being here, we began to 
form this Union of ours, integrating the values, the aspirations, the 
rule of law, and the history of that Nation in making it one.
  To continue to pretend that we can have a two-tiered society without 
consequences to the economy and the social well-being of this Nation is 
wrong. It is wrong for very humane and just reasons, but it is 
profoundly wrong on what this Nation is and what I learned and all of 
us have learned this Nation is and will continue to be: a nation 
founded on the rule of law, a nation founded by immigrants.
  I also want to say--and I will say it as delicately and as carefully 
as I can--that the issue of immigration reform to many people who are 
citizens--maybe second and third generation whose original folks were 
immigrants who happened to be of color, who happened to come from a 
country of origin where the language and the culture were different 
from the mainstream of this Nation, whom it integrated fully and who 
have contributed to the defense and the well-being of this Nation--they 
feel that the constant drumbeat of accusation, of ``it is us versus 
them,'' of division, that this issue not only is an issue of 
immigration reform for the people who need it and for the Nation that 
needs it, but it is also an issue of civil rights, that no one should 
be profiled into a situation where they are less than someone else 
because of where their parents came from, because of the language that 
they spoke or the country that they came from or the color of their 
skin.
  That is not America. And we continue to pander to those emotions, 
fear, as a means to score political points and possibly win an election 
here and there. That we do it at our own peril.
  So for many generations of Americans that have served this country, 
the issue of immigration strikes us as an issue about our rights, our 
presence, our history, and our ability to proudly stand with anyone 
else and be as American as the next person.
  With that, I thank the gentlewoman from New Jersey for organizing 
this, and I thank her for the opportunity that she has granted me to be 
able to state some things that sometimes the confines of our debates 
here don't allow us to.
  Mrs. WATSON COLEMAN. Thank you very much.
  I am very grateful to my colleague, the gentleman from Arizona, for 
sharing his vast knowledge, experience, and dedication to such an 
important issue.
  Mr. Speaker, I am relatively new to this Chamber; but I must tell you 
that, as I have been working here and observing, I am always reminded 
of the fact that this is a nation of immigrants. This is a nation that 
was conceived of by immigrants. It was created by immigrants. It was 
made great by immigrants because all of our Founding Fathers who are 
responsible for the way this country operates and the way we operate 
this democracy came to this land from another land.
  According to our polling that has been released by the Public 
Religion Research Institute in February, 77 percent of the country 
supports either a pathway to citizenship or permanent legal residency 
for undocumented immigrants. Only 19 percent want to enforce 
deportation. Citizenship is also favored over deportation in every 
single solitary State in this Nation, frequently by very wide margins.
  In the last Congress, as my colleague from Arizona noted, the 
Democratic-led Senate passed legislation that would have provided that 
pathway for 11 million immigrants seeking the American Dream but 
currently living in the shadows. That bill also would have strengthened 
border security, something I hear my Republican colleagues argue about 
quite frequently. That measure passed with significant Republican 
support, 68-32 votes; yet our Speaker, Speaker Boehner, declared that 
that bill was dead on arrival in the House.
  It is not just my constituents, it is not just Democrats that know it 
is time for a change on immigration. The American people are quickly 
reaching consensus that the American Dream should not be withheld and 
that there is nothing to fear from those who are seeking it.
  The American people are beginning to understand that the absolutely 
deplorable rhetoric used to keep immigrants in the shadows is just 
that, rhetoric. The American people are starting to agree that our 
legacy as a nation of immigrants means that offering the same 
opportunities to new generations should be the order of the day.
  Mr. Speaker, I am calling on my Republican colleagues right now to 
open the discussion on real immigration reform.
  This, as I said, is a nation of immigrants, built by people who came 
from different worlds, seeking opportunities to change their futures. 
So we should be having a conversation about how we honor that legacy 
and protect the promise of the American Dream for a new generation that 
is ready to work hard, play by the rules, and seize it.
  This is not a nation that will thrive by keeping our immigrants in 
the shadows. This is a nation right now that is just gaining traction 
and economic growth, with plenty of people still looking for employment 
and a government too burdened by austerity measures to provide any 
relief.

  So we should be having a conversation about the economic benefits of 
comprehensive immigration reform and the extraordinary impact it would 
have on job creation and innovation. It is not just the right thing to 
do; it is the fiscally right thing to do; it is a morally right thing 
to do; and it is a timely thing to do.
  We need to let go of our excuses and end the scare tactics. Let's get 
together and pass comprehensive immigration reform right now.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

                          ____________________