[Congressional Record Volume 161, Number 116 (Thursday, July 23, 2015)]
[House]
[Pages H5461-H5463]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           IMMIGRATION REFORM

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Buck). Under the Speaker's announced 
policy of January 6, 2015, the Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Texas (Mr. Gohmert) for 30 minutes.
  Mr. GOHMERT. Mr. Speaker, we had a statement from the White House 
spokesman yesterday at a White House press briefing in which he had 
said that the Republicans have ``no one to blame but themselves.''
  So, Mr. Speaker, I thought it would be helpful if we looked at the 
statements he made about the vast amount of crime in America 
disproportionately being committed by people who are illegally in the 
United States.
  First, the White House spokesman said it included--and he is talking 
about the President's bill and how if the House had passed that, then 
all our problems are over. And he said about the President's bill, it 
included a historic investment in border security.
  Well, let me help. Obviously, he is just not up on what the law said. 
He hadn't read it as I had. But what it did is it set forward a plan to 
have a plan made by Homeland Security within so many months. It has 
been a good while since I looked at it, but they had all kinds of time 
to put together a plan. And then that would be looked at by GAO, the 
Government Accountability Office, as I recall, and then they had so 
much time, a vast amount of time, to analyze that to see if the 
situational awareness and occupational control would be adequate under 
the plan that was being proposed by Homeland Security, the very people 
that have not secured the border so far.
  And then as time went on, I believe at the end of 5 years, it got 
really serious. If the border occupational control and situational 
awareness were not adequate, then there was a real tough penalty, and 
that was that the, I believe it was, Secretary of Homeland Security had 
to give a report on why it was not adequately controlled.
  Look, the Senate bill was a disaster. It did nothing to control our 
border. It was the same kind of gobbledygook we have been dealing with 
for quite some time from the White House.
  And we have said consistently, as Republicans in this House, most of 
us, if the President will secure the border, we will pass an 
immigration bill that takes care of everything else. It is pretty 
basic: secure the border, then we will deal with the people that are 
here illegally.
  Until the border is secured, then you are going to keep having people 
like Juan Francisco Lopez-Sanchez coming back across. So it won't 
matter how expansive a bill is and how much situational awareness there 
is on our borders or in our country; it won't matter because people 
like Mr. Lopez-Sanchez will keep coming back.
  We have got to have border security. That is all there is to it. Once 
the border is secure, we can work everything else out. And I pointed 
out many times what I have learned on the border, what I have heard 
repeatedly from our immigration officers, our border patrolmen, that 
they are not allowed to properly secure the border.
  We had this massive influx of people coming in, and apparently it is 
expected to grow some more again this year, but we are not securing the 
border. We let them come in. And once they are on our side of the 
border, then we go ahead and ship them off. This had been going on for 
some time.
  One of the border patrolmen told me that, among the drug cartels and 
the gangs in Mexico, the Homeland Security Department is called 
``logistics,'' after the commercial. I forget if it is FedEx or UPS, 
one of them that say: Hey, we are the logistics. You give us your 
package, and then we get it wherever you want it to go.
  I asked just in the last couple of weeks the Secretary of Homeland 
Security: Are you still shipping people all over the place? I didn't 
get an adequate answer. I am afraid the answer is: There is still the 
logistics. We won't stop you at the border if you come across the 
river, we are not going to have people out there at the river to stop 
you from coming onto United States property. Now we are going to let 
you get onto United States property, and then we are going to take you 
where you need to go. You may have to stay in a facility here or there. 
That's the kind of thing that was going on that was luring more and 
more people.
  And as the border patrolmen, multiple, told me, Chris Crane has 
testified about himself that every time somebody in Washington talks 
about amnesty, talks about legalizing people that are here, it becomes 
a massive draw, a lure to people to come into this country illegally. 
That lures people to their deaths. It lures young girls into situations 
where they end up being sex slaves, we are told, that the sex 
trafficking is horrendous, and that young girls coming up here are 
often raped on the way by the gangs bringing them.
  And as one border patrolman had said, since he was Hispanic and he 
spoke better Spanish than many of the people coming across, he would 
ask them the question they are required to ask about why did you come 
to America, and 90 percent of the time he said they would say to get 
away from gang violence. He would say in Spanish: Hey, some gringo may 
accept that, but you and I both know you paid a gang, some gang to 
bring you up here. So don't be telling me you came to get away from the 
gangs; you used a gang to get here.
  And 90 percent of the time, their responses were: Well, yeah, that is 
true, but we were told to say we are getting away from gang violence.
  Well, the spokesperson for the White House also said about the Senate 
bill it would also have ramped up Interior enforcement of immigration 
laws against dangerous individuals.
  Well, in Juan Francisco Lopez-Sanchez' case, the immigration laws 
were being enforced to some extent, not completely, but to some extent. 
He had been to prison a number of times. He violated the immigration 
laws and had illegal reentry, been deported five times. So at least on 
five occasions, the Interior enforcement was happening. The issue was 
that the Bureau of Prisons released him to a sanctuary city of San 
Francisco and not to ICE, and San Francisco released him then to walk 
freely.
  So, even if we followed the White House advice and ramped up Interior 
enforcement, which clearly this administration has no intention 
whatsoever of doing--and I have stories to back that up shortly--then 
it would not have changed, in all likelihood, the outcome of that case. 
For those who are tempted to say, ``You are making a big deal about one 
case where a sweet young daughter was shot dead by somebody deported 
five times, a criminal, a felon, multiple-time felon, but it is not 
that big a deal,'' well, it is a big deal.
  Just recently, we had an article, the 7th of July of this year, 
written by Caroline May, headline, ``Illegal Immigrants Accounted for 
Nearly 37 Percent of Federal Sentences in FY 2014.''
  According to fiscal year 2014 USSC data, of 74,911 sentencing cases, 
citizens accounted for 43,479, or 58 percent; illegal immigrants 
accounted for 27,505, or 36.7 percent; and legal immigrants made up for 
4 percent of those sentences.
  As far as drug trafficking, illegal immigrants represented 16.8 
percent of all drug trafficking cases. They represented 20 percent of 
the kidnapping and hostage taking cases. They represented 74.1 percent 
of the drug possession cases, 12.3 percent of money laundering cases, 
and 12 percent of murder convictions.
  Of the Federal murder convictions in America, 12 percent would not 
have happened. Since this President has taken office, there are 
thousands of people who would not have been murdered if we enforced our 
immigration

[[Page H5462]]

laws and had a secure border. It is not just this precious girl in San 
Francisco.
  It is not a race issue. There are Hispanics being killed. There are 
Hispanics being taken hostage. There are Hispanics being raped.

                              {time}  1800

  There are Whites, Blacks, Asians--you name it. They are victims of 
illegal immigrant criminal activity.
  It is absolutely outrageous for anyone in a government position to 
belittle thousands of people being murdered, raped, kidnapped, and to 
be so cavalier about it.
  The White House says, well, the bill that they were plugging for 
would have enhanced penalties for repeat immigration violators with 
sentences up to 20 years for certain illegal aliens who were convicted 
of felonies.
  Look, there were laws in place, and they were violated. He had been 
to prison. Until you secure the border, people like Mr. Lopez-Sanchez 
are going to keep coming back. You have to secure the border.
  He also said the bill would have increased penalties for passport and 
immigration document trafficking and fraud.
  Yes, like that would have stopped him. He came back across illegally 
five times. It wasn't a passport issue. It is just pretty dramatic what 
kind of things have occurred.
  I also filed a bill today--we have got some cosponsors--regarding the 
District of Columbia. The District of Columbia, by authority of the 
Constitution, was empowered to Congress. We set up local control.
  Some would say: Well, wait a minute. If you are trying to punish a 
sanctuary city like the District of Columbia, the only real Federal 
city in the country, the only real city under congressional, 
constitutional control, why don't you just leave it to the locals?
  We did, and the local officials allowed it to become a sanctuary city 
that was not enforcing the law.
  So the bill that was passed today wasn't near as tough as I felt like 
it should have been. It wasn't near as tough of a bill as the King 
amendment had been that we had previously passed with plenty of votes.
  We could have passed it again today, but that is not the bill that 
was brought. It is a good first step. It is a step in the right 
direction.
  That is why I ended up voting for it even though it was not as strong 
as the original King amendment. It is important to avoid having 
sanctuaries, refuges, for people who are felons, like the man who 
killed Kate Steinle.
  Then we have this story from July 22 by Elizabeth Harrington. It 
points out that the Obama administration is not only planning on not 
enforcing the law, despite all the hogwash coming out of the White 
House press room, and not only are they not going to enforce the law, 
but here is what is coming out.
  The article points out:
  ``The Obama administration is moving forward with plans to expand a 
waiver program that will allow additional illegal aliens to remain in 
the country rather than apply for legal status from abroad.
  ``The Department of Homeland Security issued a proposed rule on 
Tuesday that would make changes to a waiver program created by 
President Barack Obama's executive action on immigration in 2013,'' 
unconstitutional as it was.
  ``The action created a waiver that primarily allowed illegal 
immigrants with a U.S. citizen spouse or parent to stay . . . '' and it 
goes into the specifics. ``The new rule expands eligibility to a host 
of other categories of illegal immigrants.''
  Jessica Vaughan, director of policy studies at the Center for 
Immigration Studies, said:
  `` `It's a very bad policy. It makes it possible for illegal aliens 
to avoid the consequences established by Congress to deter people from 
settling here illegally and then laundering their status by adjusting 
to a green card.'
  ``Vaughan, who has been following the issue for over 2 years, said 
the changes to the waiver program would increase fraud.
  `` `It is a slap in the face to the many legal immigrants who abide 
by the law, follow the process, and wait their turn,' she said. `In 
addition, it will increase the likelihood of fraud in the marriage 
categories, which produce tens of thousands of new green cards each 
year.'
  `` `The President should not be issuing executive actions that serve 
only to expedite the legalization process for those who have ignored 
our laws. This legalization gimmick is undermining the integrity of our 
legal immigration system, and Congress should take steps to block it.'
  ``The public will have 60 days to comment on the proposal.''
  It appears to be yet another unconstitutional act by our President, 
still seeming to thumb his nose at the judge in south Texas who had put 
an injunction on the last amnesty that was issued by the President. So 
they are just going to keep going, apparently.
  This article by Julia Preston has a title from The New York Times: 
``Most Undocumented Immigrants Will Stay Under Obama's New Policies, 
Report Says.''
  ``Under new immigration enforcement programs the Obama administration 
is putting in place across the country, the vast majority of 
unauthorized immigrants--up to 87 percent--would not be the focus of 
deportation operations and would have `a degree of protection' to 
remain in the United States, according to a report published Thursday 
by the Migration Policy Institute.
  ``The report found that about 13 percent of an estimated 11 million 
immigrants without papers, or about 1.4 million people, have criminal 
records or recently crossed the border illegally, making them 
priorities for deportation under guidelines the administration 
announced in November.''
  It makes it very clear that there is so much disingenuousness coming 
out of the White House.
  Oh, yes, if we had passed this ridiculous bill that the Senate 
passed, which really was not going to address the issue of enforcement 
adequately, we were going to have studies and plans.
  If it did not work in 5 years, heck, we would let the Secretary give 
us a report on why it didn't all work. I mean, it is absurd. Secure the 
border. It is very basic. The President has got the power, and he has 
got the money.
  Heck, they just blew off the $4 billion virtual fence a few years ago 
that we had appropriated money for. What are they doing with that 
money? Why haven't they secured the border with that? They could do it.
  Just when you think news about people acting illegally and being 
given amnesty couldn't get much worse, this story by Steven Green, on 
July 20, by PJ Media, reads:
  ``Iranian worshippers chant slogans during their Friday prayer 
service at the Tehran University campus in Tehran, Iran, Friday . . . 
The main prayer service in the Iranian capital has been interrupted by 
repeated chants of `death to America'--despite this week's landmark 
nuclear deal with world powers that was welcomed by authorities in 
Tehran.''
  The devastating revelation from Mitch Ginsburg and the Times of 
Israel reads:
  ``Mojtaba Atarodi, arrested in California for attempting to acquire 
equipment for Iran's military-nuclear programs, was released in April 
as part of back channel talks, Times of Israel told. The contacts, 
mediated in Oman for years by close colleagues of the Sultan, have seen 
a series of U.S.-Iran prisoner releases''--not exchanges, but 
releases--``and there may be more to come.''

  I mean, it is incredible. We are told we have seen the deal. Oh, yes. 
There are parts, like the IAEA has got to work out its side deal that 
we don't see here in Congress, but it is a good deal.
  Let's not forget my friend who spoke last from the other side of the 
aisle was talking about how great the Dodd-Frank bill is. Let me just 
say this quickly about that.
  As for the Dodd-Frank bill that was passed, supposedly, to punish 
those evil investment banks on Wall Street, what has it really done? It 
has punished the community banks that didn't do anything wrong.
  They weren't invested in mortgage-backed securities. They weren't 
doing all kinds of machinations to try to create new forms of legalized 
gambling on Wall Street. They weren't engaged in that.
  Yet, Dodd-Frank has so punished community banks that every month

[[Page H5463]]

there are fewer community banks. They are getting gobbled up by the 
guys who caused the problems. That is what Dodd-Frank did.
  It added so much expense and burden on the local banks, and it 
provided a lot of benefits to the biggest banks. They are the ones that 
could absorb the parts of the law. We are losing banks constantly.
  As far as the great economic news, we know we have at least 93-plus 
million people for the first time in our history--94 million people, 
maybe, now--who have given up looking for jobs. It has never gotten 
that high before.
  It had gotten close once before, I think, under Carter, but it has 
never gotten this high before. People have just given up looking for 
jobs. You have got more on food stamps than ever before. Is that really 
something to be proud of? It is if you want indentured servitude of the 
people of the United States.
  The middle class, we hear now recently, is growing smaller. The gap 
between the ultra rich and the poor is growing bigger under this 
President's redistribution model because it doesn't work.
  The most troubling economic statistic that anybody should have been 
seeing over the last few years--over the last 2 years--came out in 
2013, that, under President Obama, for the first time in American 
history--ever--95 percent of all of the income went to the top 1 
percent income earners.
  It still bothers me greatly. But I read, actually, that, even though 
the top 1 percent is making 95 percent of all the income, it was a 
slower growth to them than in the last two expansions.
  So it really was not that great of news for them. Well, it isn't 
great for America when 95 percent of the income is made by the top 1 
percent.
  It is just this wink and nod with Wall Street from this 
administration of: We are going to call you fat cats. We are going to 
punish you. We are going to hit you with Dodd-Frank.
  And what happens? You kill the smaller banks. You hurt the middle 
class. You overburden the middle class. You make it more difficult for 
them to live. More people end up on food stamps. It is a disaster.
  That is why it was no surprise in the last couple of days when we saw 
a report that there is a great majority of Americans who feels like 
this President has hurt the economy more than he has helped it. I don't 
know that that is true, but I do know that more people, according to 
the poll, are saying that.
  Capital markets and Wall Street, oh, they have done well. Yes, that 
is what happens when we create more money than at any time in American 
history. We are creating money.
  Notice, Mr. Speaker, I am saying ``creating money'' because I learned 
it was improper to say we are printing more money than ever before.
  I was told by someone with the Fed--some years back when I asked: 
``How much more money are we printing than we have ever printed?''--
``Oh, none, really.''
  ``But there is more money in the system.''
  ``Oh, yes. We couldn't possibly print all of the money we are 
creating.''
  Are you kidding me? We are just adding numbers. We aren't even 
bothering to print it anymore as we are increasing money so fast. It is 
an outrage what has happened.
  The bottom line is Americans are suffering. Government does not make 
things better. It is better when they get a job, not more food stamps.
  It is time that we knock Dodd-Frank down to size where it does deal 
with the investment banks that caused the problem of 2008 and doesn't 
punish the banks that didn't get us in that trouble.
  In the time I have left, I have just got to go back to this 
horrendous Iranian deal. It is putting the United States and all 
freedom-loving people at risk.
  Iran cannot be trusted, and I am still concerned about the language, 
like, if you say in a bill or in the Iran agreement, oh, yes, you can't 
use ICBMs or develop them for 8 years or, at the broader conclusion of 
the IAEAs, that nuclear material is being used for peaceful purposes, 
whichever is earlier.

                              {time}  1815

  That concerns me about the 8-year requirement. Is it really an 8-year 
requirement, seriously? I mean, what does that mean? I went down and 
cleared that that was not classified, so I could speak of that. There 
are a few places where I have seen that that language, the broader 
conclusion by the IAEA, holy cow, that is completely out of our 
control. That is one of the time deadlines that some of the important 
timing can be?
  Iran continues to make clear, as this story from July 12 from Adam 
Kredo says, that Iran is saying, ``We will trample upon America.''
  ``Iranian cleric Ayatollah Mohammad Ali Movahedi Kermani, who was 
handpicked by the Islamic Republic's supreme leader to deliver the 
prayers, delivered a message of hostility toward the United States in 
the first official remarks since a final nuclear deal was signed 
between Iran and world powers in Vienna last week.''
  ``Analysts who spoke to the Washington Free Beacon about the anti-
American tone of last week's prayers said it is a sign Tehran believes 
it bested the United States in the talks.''
  You think?
  The article further down says: ``Iran's defense minister on Monday 
said the deal also will prohibit all foreigners from inspecting Iran's 
'defensive and missile capabilities' at sensitive military sites.''
  You don't have to have my SAT scores to know they are going to be 
classifying as many sites as they can as defensive sites that we cannot 
have inspected.
  It is time to say ``no'' to the deal. Americans need to rise up and 
demand it, and let's crush the Iranian deal before Iran crushes Israel 
and the Great Satan, United States.
  I yield back the balance of my time.

                          ____________________