[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 104 (Thursday, June 21, 2018)]
[House]
[Pages H5370-H5380]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
PROVIDING FOR CONSIDERATION OF H.R. 4760, SECURING AMERICA'S FUTURE ACT
OF 2018
Mr. BURGESS. Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I
[[Page H5371]]
call up House Resolution 954 and ask for its immediate consideration.
The Clerk read the resolution, as follows:
H. Res. 954
Resolved, That upon adoption of this resolution it shall be
in order to consider in the House the bill (H.R. 4760) to
amend the immigration laws and the homeland security laws,
and for other purposes. All points of order against
consideration of the bill are waived. The amendments printed
in the report of the Committee on Rules accompanying this
resolution shall be considered as adopted. The bill, as
amended, shall be considered as read. All points of order
against provisions in the bill, as amended, are waived. The
previous question shall be considered as ordered on the bill,
as amended, and on any further amendment thereto, to final
passage without intervening motion except: (1) one hour of
debate, with 40 minutes equally divided and controlled by the
chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on the
Judiciary and 20 minutes equally divided and controlled by
the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on
Homeland Security; and (2) one motion to recommit with or
without instructions.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Texas is recognized for 1
hour.
Mr. BURGESS. Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the
customary 30 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Mrs. Torres),
pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During
consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose
of debate only.
General Leave
Mr. BURGESS. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members
may have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the
gentleman from Texas?
There was no objection.
Mr. BURGESS. Mr. Speaker, House Resolution 954 provides for the
consideration of a bill aimed at curbing the flow of illegal
immigration across our southern border by combining a strong border
wall and security measures with targeted modifications to the current
immigration visa process.
The rule provides for one hour of debate on H.R. 4760, the Securing
America's Future Act of 2018, with 40 minutes equally divided and
controlled by the Committee on the Judiciary and 20 minutes controlled
by the Committee on Homeland Security.
The rule provides for the adoption of the Goodlatte amendment
reflecting a number of provisions, which were negotiated with numerous
parties since the bill was first introduced in January of this year.
This amendment will be incorporated into H.R. 4760 upon adoption of the
rule today.
It also includes the McCaul amendment, which makes technical
corrections to the underlying bill.
Further, the rule provides the minority with one motion to recommit
with or without instructions.
The laws and legal agreement currently governing our enforcement
efforts along the southern border are between 20 and 60 years old.
America is a Nation built and continually supported by immigrants.
However, the world has changed and how we accept new immigrants may
adapt as well.
H.R. 4760 begins the process of reforming our immigration system for
the first time in decades, and I encourage the passage of the rule to
consider this important bill.
The Securing America's Future Act refocuses legal immigration for the
skills that our country needs. It also secures our border, strengthens
interior enforcement, and makes changes to the Deferred Action for
Childhood Arrivals program. The diversity visa lottery program, which
awards 50,000 green cards to a randomly selected pool of applicants, is
eliminated, along with visas for relatives except for spouses and minor
children. Overall, immigration levels are decreased, while visas for
skilled workers are increased and the agricultural guest worker program
is reformed to better meet the needs of our farmers and food
processors.
Construction of a border wall system is authorized, including the use
of additional cameras, sensors, and aviation assets. Recently,
President Trump approved the use of the National Guard along the
border, increasing capacity by over 1,100 personnel and 14 aircraft.
This bill would also authorize the use of the National Guard aviation
and intelligence support. It requires full implementation of the
biometric entry-exit system at all ports of entry and provides for
10,000 border patrol agents and officers.
To strengthen interior enforcement, the bill mandates E-Verify so
that all employers check the immigration status of their employees. It
combats sanctuary city policies by withholding law enforcement grants
and allows the Department of Homeland Security to detain dangerous,
illegal immigrants who cannot be immediately removed from the country.
Many illegal immigrants without legal status claim asylum when
apprehended by border agents. While there are legitimate claims of fear
of persecution, there are also instances of immigrants being coached to
say the correct phrase to obtain asylum. To combat this fraud, the bill
increases the credible fear standard. It also makes being a gang member
a removable offense and qualifies illegal presence as a Federal
misdemeanor.
In 2015, Kate Steinle was killed by an immigrant without status while
walking with her father in San Francisco. The man responsible for her
death had been deported multiple times and should never have been in
the country on that day.
Constituents of the 26th District of Texas experienced a similar
tragedy in 2013 when a young girl in a crosswalk was struck and killed
by someone in the country without legal status.
While the recent enforcement policies along our southern border have
led to a temporary separation of parents and children, a father and a
grandmother in the 26th District of Texas will never be reunited with
their daughter and granddaughter.
Kate's Law enhances criminal penalties for multiple illegal reentry
to help prevent future tragedies. Inclusion of this provision will
reduce the possibility of the tragic killing of American citizens.
Finally, the bill provides for a 3-year renewable legal status for
Deferred Action for Childhood Arrival recipients that allows them to
work and travel overseas. This will apply to approximately 700,000
individuals who are currently in the United States. While it was not
the fault of these then-children that they entered the country without
legal documentation, the fact of the matter is that they are here now
and we need a solution.
While I do not support an expedited path to citizenship, I do support
allowing them to get in line and apply just like any other law-abiding
potential immigrant. The bill does not allow for a special path to
citizenship. However, it does allow the Deferred Action for Childhood
Arrival recipient to obtain a green card and apply for citizenship like
any other law-abiding applicant.
Recently, we have heard a lot about the enforcement policies along
the southern border. Mr. Speaker, this crisis is not new. In 2014, the
number of unaccompanied alien children increased exponentially and
reached crisis levels. It remained steadily above 400,000 apprehensions
from 2013 until the present.
During a visit by the Honduran First Lady in 2014, she was asked if
Honduras wanted their children back, and without hesitation, she
responded that they did. So a planeload of women and children was sent
back to Honduras that resulted in an immediate reduction in the
attempted crossings of unaccompanied alien children. However, because
there was no follow-on enforcement actions, the numbers again began to
increase, reaching above 563,000 in 2016.
In the lead-up to the 2010 election, the numbers increased, because
then-candidate Trump spoke about securing our border with a wall that
would finally end the possibility of illegal entry along our southern
border. When candidate Trump became President-elect Trump, this number
dramatically decreased because potential immigrants believed that
construction of the border wall was imminent.
As a Member of Congress representing a border State, I have
maintained regular contact with Customs and Border Protection and the
Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials. What we heard during
this period, 2016, was that immigrants crossing the border illegally
wanted to get into the country before the possibility of a Trump
election occurred and could direct construction of the border wall.
They were under the impression that if
[[Page H5372]]
you crossed our border, at a point of entry or illegally, you would be
granted amnesty and welcomed into the country. While we do welcome
legal immigrants, this perception led to only more vulnerable children
being entrusted by parents to human traffickers, typically for large
sums of money, to bring their children to the United States.
On this journey, children could experience harsh conditions. Some
were abused physically, sexually, and emotionally. And this abuse is
not a threat just from the adults that are supposed to care for them,
but also it can occur from their fellow travelers. A lot of these kids
are just trying to survive, trying to make it to a life where they may
one day thrive, but this existence is often all they have known, and
they react in a way that reflects this reality.
While there is a concern about children arriving with parents who are
then prosecuted for illegal entry and subsequently placed in the
custody of the Health and Human Services Office of Refugee
Resettlement, numerous children never get to make this journey with
their parents or even relatives. Many adults are now bringing
nonrelated children with them in an attempt to be released into the
United States because of their association with a child that cannot,
because of the Flores Agreement from 1997, be held in custody.
When the influx of unaccompanied alien children began exceeding the
capacity of the Office of Refugee Resettlement, I traveled to the
border area specifically to visit these facilities. I engaged with the
Office of Refugee Resettlement to fully understand the care that these
children were receiving in 2014, 2015, and 2016. The Office of Refugee
Resettlement responded to my concerns about threats of communicable
diseases from foreign countries being brought to our homeland. Mr.
Speaker, there was not even a physician employed in the Office of
Refugee Resettlement in 2014 before I raised this issue.
The issue became a concern because there were members of Customs and
Border Control that actually felt that they were perhaps developing a
condition as a result of contact with people because of a skin parasite
that was easily communicated. And the question arose, could other
diseases be communicated as well? And people were rightfully concerned
about that. It is not just an illness like scabies; it is an issue like
multiple-drug-resistant tuberculosis that people were most concerned
about.
While treatment in facilities has vastly improved in the last couple
of years, the path by which immigrants come here is still dangerous. On
one of my visits near the border at McAllen, Texas, I traveled with
border patrol agents along a cactus-strewn, dusty road, mesquite bushes
growing in from the sides. They brought a bus down there, a big bus.
They stopped, they flashed their lights, they honked their horn, and
the bus filled up with people. The bus went off to town, bouncing
across this dusty road, and I remained back with the Customs and Border
Patrol.
Then a State agent came up, someone from Fish and Wildlife, and said:
I need help. I have got people over here that I think belong in your
jurisdiction because you are the Federal Government.
And Customs and Border Patrol went over to the area that he had
pointed out, and here were a number of women, small children, and
teenage boys. They had come across the river, delivered by traffickers,
just literally on the other side of the river, and dropped there. They
had no idea what was the direction to town. They were not equipped to
travel in the harsh conditions. It was probably 110 degrees outside
that day. Small children, children, babes in arms, probably 1 year of
age or less: this is what the traffickers left on the side of the
river.
Had the Fish and Wildlife Service not come by and the U.S. Customs
and Border Patrol not come by, I don't know how these people would have
made it to town. And it is quite possible they would not have made it
safely.
So the situation along the southern border is not just a border
crisis, it is also an immigration crisis. Attorney General Sessions
announced a zero-tolerance policy to finally and fully enforce our
laws. I believe he did this so that Americans and immigrants alike
would recognize and remember that we are a Nation of laws, and also to
demonstrate that the dangerous journey to our southern border is
sometimes not worth the risk and the struggle required to make it
within just a few miles of a fence.
The ebb and flow of border crossings has consistently reflected the
rhetoric of American leadership and perception of enforcement of our
laws. The rate of border crossings rapidly increased in the last year
because there has been no significant visible action by the Congress to
President Trump's request for a border wall. However, this is not the
only factor.
It is no secret that countries in what are called the northern
triangle, Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador, are some of the most
dangerous countries in the world. Yet, these countries receive millions
of dollars of aid each year for economic development, for military
financing, and security initiatives.
{time} 1045
This funding rapidly increased to more than $600 million each year
beginning in fiscal year 2014, mostly in response to the growing crisis
with unaccompanied alien children. So I think it is appropriate to ask
ourselves, is the funding being allocated in a way that will help
improve domestic conditions on the ground and reduce the desire to
leave?
To address this concern, I introduced the Unaccompanied Alien
Children Assistance Control Act, and I offered this bill as an
amendment to H.R. 4760. Simply put, this bill would reduce foreign aid
allocations to Mexico, Honduras, El Salvador, and Guatemala by $15,000
per child to each country if their child crosses the border illegally
or if they are referred to the Office of Refugee Resettlement for
custody and care.
While this may not seem like a lot, the reality is that each child
cared for by the Office of Refugee Resettlement costs the American
taxpayer about $35,000. Even Attorney General Sessions has stated that
the care these children receive is better than the average American
child.
While we cannot leave children without care, we must recognize that
prioritizing alien children over our own sends the wrong message.
Removing that $15,000 of foreign aid per child will send a message to
Mexican and Northern Triangle leaders that our accepting their children
will not be without cost to them.
As we all know, Mr. Speaker, if you want to make it important, it has
to be about the money.
Unfortunately, the accountability in these countries is poor, and the
use of funds largely goes unchecked. They rely on American aid, and we
must ensure that it is being used appropriately and wisely to combat
the forces that are driving their future generations--it is their
future--away from their own countries.
By withholding funding in the face of rampant corruption, we not only
provide a potential funding stream for President Trump's proposed
border system, but we send a signal that we will not willingly deprive
the children and desperate immigrants of the life they desire and need
in their countries of origin.
The best place for a child and a family is their home. Because of the
condition in the Northern Triangle countries, home for many children is
now a stark facility along a foreign border.
It is time to take steps that would not only strengthen our
immigration laws for the security of American citizens, but is in the
interest of restoring and maintaining the home from which many would-be
immigrants try to escape.
Congress has not successfully reformed our immigration laws in
decades. It is time to begin that debate to align our immigration
system with current realities. For this reason, I encourage the
adoption of the rule to begin consideration of H.R. 4760, Securing
America's Future Act.
Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support today's rule, and I
reserve the balance of my time.
Mrs. TORRES. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume,
and I thank the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Burgess) for yielding me the
customary 30 minutes.
[[Page H5373]]
This rule makes in order H.R. 4760, the so-called Securing America's
Future Act, and two amendments in the legislation.
Before I speak on the legislation, let us consider why we are here
today. President Trump has created immigration crisis after immigration
crisis. President Trump is the reason Dreamers are at risk of
deportation. President Trump is the reason families are being separated
at our Nation's borders. This is a Trump-manufactured crisis, plain and
simple.
President Trump's executive order, signed yesterday, does nothing to
fix this. His order does nothing to reunite the thousands of children
separated from their parents. In fact, his order directs his
deportation force to now jail families at the border, which is in
direct violation of current court orders. It will lead to more family
separation, and the only difference now is that families will wait 20
days before being separated.
I want every Member of this body and everyone watching at home to
imagine what it must be like. Imagine traveling thousands of miles to
flee some of the most dangerous countries in the world, countries with
the highest murder rates, and then, when you finally think you are
safe, having your child ripped away from you.
In 1946 to 1948, during the Truman administration, human experiments
were conducted in Guatemala. American doctors infected mostly
uneducated and indigenous people with syphilis. Today, in the Trump
administration, we are forcing drugs in pill form and injection on the
indigenous children seeking asylum.
So this brings us to why we are here today. Mr. Speaker, everyone
watching this debate should be crystal clear on what this bill does.
This bill fails to solve the separation of families on our Nation's
border. It reduces legal immigration. It fails to offer DACA recipients
a path to citizenship. It adds $25 billion to our growing wall of debt
on top of the $2 trillion that we already added when Republicans voted
for their tax scam.
This bill makes it harder for those seeking asylum to receive
protection, and it fails to protect the 2,000 children who have already
been separated from their parents.
Many will call this legislation the more conservative option that the
House will consider today. But let us be clear, this bill is not
conservative at all.
After adding trillions to our Nation's debt through the tax scam,
Republicans now are putting us in another $25 billion debt. Where are
we going to borrow this money from?
Remember, colleagues, President Trump has declared a trade war with
China. What will happen if China decides to cash in on that debt?
In addition, President Trump's family jails will cost the American
taxpayer 10 times more than the alternative policy he ended for family
migration.
Conservative? Absolutely not. Cruel? Inhumane? Absolutely, yes.
Mr. Speaker, last night, during consideration of this bill in the
Rules Committee, my colleagues and I offered many fixes, which were all
blocked by this rule. My amendment to replace the bill with the Keep
Families Together Act, which would have reunited families, was blocked.
Representative Roybal-Allard and Representative Polis joined me in
offering the Dream Act as an alternative, but that was blocked also.
Another Rules Committee Member, Representative Hastings, and his
amendment to fix TPS, blocked.
But not all amendments were blocked. Just like President Trump's
executive order contained misspellings, this bill contained a giant
typo to give President Trump an additional $100 billion for his wall.
So which is it? $25 billion? $100 billion? Are Mexicans going to pay
for it? What is it?
The committee has said that they are making this correction, and they
did so in the middle of the night. But I doubt President Trump would be
happy to hear that, so we will wait and see.
If this truly is a mistake, these kinds of corrections could have
been caught if Democrats had been allowed to participate in this
process, if we would have had a committee hearing.
Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to oppose this rule and this cruel
legislation now, and I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. BURGESS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 1 minute.
Mr. Speaker, this is not a crisis of President Trump's making. Those
of us who served here during the Bush administration were aware that
this was a problem. Certainly, those of us who served during the Obama
administration were aware that this was a problem.
When President Obama declared the Deferred Action for Childhood
Arrivals in 2012, it was immediately followed, 2 years later, by the
wave of unaccompanied alien children who came to our southern border.
This crisis has been a long time in the making. Congress does need to
solve this problem. The President is quite correct in that.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mrs. TORRES. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New
Jersey (Mr. Pascrell).
Mr. PASCRELL. Mr. Speaker, Leviticus Chapter 19: 33-34, in the Old
Testament--Democrats can quote the Bible also. As a practicing
Catholic, let me do that.
``When a foreigner resides among you in your land, do not mistreat
them. The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-
born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the
Lord your God.''
When did, Mr. Speaker, this barbaric, xenophobic, anti-immigrant
modern agenda begin? Let's go through it quickly.
One, the birther issue: An embarrassment to this country by the
administration, the head of the administration.
The Muslim ban: Imagine banning people that profess a particular
religion.
Third, Charlottesville: That debacle, equal opportunity.
Fourth, the incendiary talk that painted the entire Mexican
population--our ally, probably our third or fourth leading trade
partner, our ally--with a wide brush of pure prejudice, pure. He
painted the entire population.
To say that Democrats are for open borders, that is a lie. You know
it; I know it. I am standing up to reject it. You sit quietly. You sit
quietly and say nothing.
I was on the original starting gate at the Homeland Security after 9/
11. Democrats, just as well as Republicans, worked together to put that
together. How dare anybody insinuate that we don't accept the security
of this Nation.
By the way, by the way, we have four borders, not one. The people who
attacked us on 9/11 came from Canada. They didn't come from Mexico. You
have never met a Mexican terrorist, and I certainly haven't met one
either.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Members are reminded to address their
remarks to the Chair.
Mr. BURGESS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 1 minute.
Mr. Speaker, I would just point out that, under current conditions,
current laws, the United States of America takes in 1.1 million new
citizens every year. We are the most generous country on the face of
the Earth. American citizens should be rightly proud of that.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mrs. TORRES. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from
Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern), the distinguished ranking member of the
Committee on Rules.
{time} 1100
Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, what we are doing here today is simply
insane.
For 8 years, Republican leaders have blocked every attempt to debate
bipartisan immigration bills. They blocked Senate-passed comprehensive
immigration reform. They blocked the bipartisan Dream Act, which has
203 cosponsors.
Speaker Ryan has refused to consider the Dream Act, all while
shedding crocodile tears over the 700,000 Dreamers for whom America is
the only home they know. Instead, he has held the Dreamers hostage,
used them as bargaining chips, used them as leverage to waste tens of
billions of taxpayer dollars on a senseless wall and to militarize our
southern border.
[[Page H5374]]
Now, as our Nation is haunted by imagines of children being ripped
from their parents' arms and by the sounds of their cries, Speaker Ryan
decides this is the time to bring two of the most hateful, bigoted,
anti-immigrant pieces of legislation I have ever seen to the House
floor for debate under a closed process--no amendments, no committee
hearings.
This is a scandal, Mr. Speaker. Republicans should hide their faces
in shame.
It didn't have to be this way. If the bipartisan queen-of-the-hill
discharge petition was allowed to move forward, we could be having a
real debate on immigration. We could take up these two hyperpartisan
anti-immigrant bills, and we could also consider two bipartisan bills
to protect the Dreamers, namely, the Dream Act and the USA Act.
The petition was nearing 218 signatures, but Republicans couldn't
stand considering anything they disagree with. They couldn't even stand
debating them. This rule will kill the discharge petition because
Republicans fear a fair fight.
This is an insult to this institution and to the many Members on both
sides of the aisle who have waited so long to vote on these bills.
The Rules Committee even came back at 10 p.m. for an emergency
meeting to fix a so-called drafting error in this bill.
Do you know what the drafting error was?
$100 billion. That is right. Republicans almost accidentally gave
President Trump $125 billion for his border wall instead of the $25
billion. That is quite an error, although I am sure President Trump
would have loved it.
Oh, my God. This is what happens when you jam bills through with no
hearings, no markups, no CBO score, which would have caught this
enormous mistake.
Mr. Speaker, the President's executive order will only lead to
keeping these children behind bars, some with and some without their
parents, in unlimited, indefinite detention. And these Republican bills
turn this cruel policy into the law of the land.
This is not a solution, Mr. Speaker; this is cruel and inhuman
punishment.
The President of the United States must stop his vicious approach on
immigration. It is immoral. And he must stop his hate peddling and he
must stop his lies.
Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to reject this rule that kills the
discharge petition; reject this rule that kills any hope for action on
bipartisan immigration bills. I say to my colleagues: Have zero
tolerance for this rule and have zero tolerance for these bills.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Members are reminded to refrain from
engaging in personalities toward the President.
Mr. BURGESS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 3 minutes.
Mr. Speaker, I just remind people in this body that 10 years ago the
Democrats were in the majority. Indeed, then in the 2008 election that
occurred 10 years ago, they strengthened that majority. House
Republican Members were so far in the minority as to be irrelevant in
all exchanges.
There was a 60-vote majority over in the Senate. You may recall that
is where the Affordable Care Act and Dodd-Frank and other pieces of
legislation that I would have thought would never pass actually did
pass in that environment.
A question that I hear a lot is: Why didn't Democrats do something
about the Dreamer problem when they controlled all the levers of power?
And it is a valid question.
Senator Durbin had a bill, as you will recall, in that next session
of Congress that began in January of 2009. Senator Durbin had a bill to
deal with the Dreamer situation, and he worked on it all year. It never
came up until December of 2010.
Now, you remember in November of 2010, actually, the majority changed
in the House of Representatives and there were enough Republicans
elected that the Democrats would not be in the majority the next year.
So here we are in a so-called lame duck session of a party that is
exiting power, and I think it was December 8 of that year that, in the
House, the Democrats brought Senator Durbin's bill up and passed it on
the House floor, as would be expected. They did have a significant
majority.
They lost one vote over in the Senate, as I recall, and had 59
Democrats. Speaker Pelosi told me at a Rules Committee hearing several
months ago that it was then that the Republicans blocked that vote from
happening in the Senate.
But that is not exactly true.
Three Republicans voted with the Democrats on the Durbin bill. Five
Democrats voted in the negative, and that is what killed the Durbin
bill when the Democrats controlled all levers of power in 2010, the
last time they did.
Mr. Speaker, don't blame this problem on President Trump. It has been
in existence for some time, but it is up to us to solve it.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mrs. TORRES. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from
Florida (Mr. Hastings), a distinguished member of the Rules Committee.
Mr. HASTINGS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding me
the time.
Mr. Speaker, I would remind Mr. Burgess that he has the levers of
power now, and I predict that today, the two measures that we are going
to be dealing with are not likely to reach the President's desk.
But none of this was happening 4 months ago. None of this was
happening 2 months ago. But a policy that was announced by Jeff
Sessions is what brought us to this, and that had to come through the
President.
Last night, at our Rules Committee, I offered an amendment that would
have provided a pathway to citizenship for certain long-term temporary
protected status holders. Not surprisingly, in this historically closed
Congress, my amendment was not made in order.
Let me repeat that. This historically closed Congress--89 closed
rules. Never in the history of this body have we had as many closed
rules.
As we discussed the need for Dreamers to have a path to citizenship,
which they must, I wanted to make sure that those who are in our
country under temporary protected status are not passed over and
forgotten. They are from El Salvador. They are from Honduras,
Nicaragua, Nepal, Syria, Sudan, South Sudan, Somalia, and Haiti.
These individuals are hardworking taxpayers, many of whom have U.S.-
born children or U.S. citizen spouses, and they contribute to our
economy and our communities. They pay taxes, and in myriad and dynamic
ways they work at our airports and our service industries, in our
healthcare sector, and on our construction sites.
They are fathers, mothers, sisters, and brothers. They are members of
our faith-based communities. And every single one of them, to a person,
hails from a country still recovering from natural disasters, internal
violence, or both.
I will give you just one example.
On January 12, 2010, Haiti was devastated by a 7.0 magnitude
earthquake. 1.5 million people were displaced, 300,000 buildings were
destroyed, and 8 years on, tens of thousands of people remain in camps.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The time of the gentleman has expired.
Mrs. TORRES. Mr. Speaker, I yield an additional 30 seconds to the
gentleman from Florida.
Mr. HASTINGS. Mr. Speaker, then they had a hurricane. The hurricane
was the first category 4 hurricane to hit Haiti in over half a century,
claiming 1,000 lives and displacing more than 2 million people.
Haiti, quite simply, continues to climb out from the rubble of the
earthquake, cholera outbreak, and Hurricane Matthew, and we in the
United States have tried to help them to do so, as we should.
In its wisdom, the Trump administration has decided to end TPS for
Haiti and many other countries. Not only does this conclusion fly in
the face of the facts as we know them, but it needlessly inflicts
countless wounds on our communities and our families.
Mr. BURGESS. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the
gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Goodlatte), the chairman of the Judiciary
Committee and the author of H.R. 4760.
Mr. GOODLATTE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Texas for
yielding me this time and for his hard work on this issue as well.
[[Page H5375]]
Mr. Speaker, this is a very good bill. It is not something that was
cooked up overnight. This bill was introduced 6 months ago. It is based
upon legislation that has passed out of the Judiciary Committee in
previous Congresses, and some of it in this Congress. It is a good
effort to make sure that we are addressing all three aspects of
immigration law that need to be addressed.
It has a very good proposal with regard to the DACA recipients. They
get a legal status permanently for the rest of their lives, renewable
every 3 years, as long as they don't commit a crime. And that is a
statutory protection.
That is not something that is subject to court challenges. That is
not something that is subject to the whims of any President, past,
present, or future. It is something that allows them, then, to avail
themselves of existing pathways to citizenship, and it is something
that will allow them to work in the United States, live in the United
States, own a business in the United States, and travel in and out of
the United States.
I think it is a good first step in addressing this situation.
Secondly, the President has made it very clear, and people watching
the news coverage know, the difficulties that the administration--any
administration, this administration, the Obama administration, the Bush
administration before it--has with laws that need to be corrected to
make sure that loopholes are not followed at our border.
We have, now, a waiting list of 600,000 people applying for asylum.
Historically, asylum, which is a very good part of our immigration law,
has been granted to 5,000--some years, maybe as many as 10,000--people.
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, the great Soviet dissident, who wrote ``The
Gulag Archipelago,'' got political asylum in the United States. But
when everyone who is apprehended coming across the border illegally
trying to avoid detection, when they are apprehended then says, ``Oh, I
am here for political asylum,'' and you create a backlog 600,000 people
long and then they are released into the interior of the country and
don't return for their hearings in many, many, many instances, that is
a very flawed aspect of our immigration system. This bill addresses
that, as it does the problem with unaccompanied minors.
Children 13, 14, 15, 16, 17 years of age, mostly young boys, coming
across all of Mexico and then through the desert or across the Rio
Grande River and then thinking that this is an acceptable thing for
them to do to enter our country, they need to be returned safely home,
and the laws need to be reformed to accomplish that.
We need to reform many other aspects of our border security laws,
close these loopholes.
We need to have greater technology. We need to have, along some
segments of our border, improved wall technology. We have fences and
some walls already. The fences have big holes in them. People come with
chain cutters and cut holes through them in a matter of seconds and go
through them when it is foggy there in San Diego or other times when
they have that opportunity.
We need to have a more secure border both with technology and with a
wall in some places and with the necessary personnel to handle this,
including not just Border Patrol, but the judges and other officers who
are necessary to process people when they are apprehended. This is a
very serious problem, and it is addressed in this legislation.
We also need to move toward a merit-based immigration system.
We have, as the gentleman from Texas has repeatedly noted, the most
generous immigration policy in the world. We have tens of millions of
people who come to visit this country every year: some to work, some to
go to school, some to conduct business. For more than 75 different
categories of reasons they come here.
We also have more than a dozen immigrant visa categories that allow
people to come to the United States, and we give out, on average, about
1.1 million green cards a year to people who go through the process
lawfully. That is the most generous system in the world. We need to
recognize that as we do that, we have to move toward a system where we
are meeting the needs of American citizens, as well, as we do it.
Areas where we have shortages so that we can keep businesses in the
United States rather than having them move elsewhere in the world where
they can find the workers they need is an important part of this. So
eliminating things like the visa lottery, where we give 55,000 green
cards out for no good reason at all other than the pure luck that
people attain from that and instead use those to have a new system
where we have the opportunity to move towards a merit-based system,
which is not in this bill but should be the successor to this bill, is
an important thing to do.
I think that all of those measures are contained in this legislation.
I think it is very, very good legislation.
But this bill contains two important provisions that are not in the
second bill, and I want to particularly address those.
{time} 1115
First, we have in this bill the E-Verify program. This is a program,
a very fine program, that exists today. More than 800,000 businesses
use it. Many large businesses use it. I would bet that probably a
majority of the people who process job applications today utilize it.
But it is certainly not utilized by everybody.
As a consequence, it is not being totally effective, because the
people who aren't using it either don't want to know whether somebody
is lawfully present in the United States, or they think they are
unlawfully present and don't want to have a system that uncovers that.
But this bill, applying prospectively only--you don't have to apply
it to your current employees--works 99.7 percent of the time. It is
very, very accurate. And most importantly, it has a safe harbor for
both the worker and the employer. So that if you get a false positive,
and if you are getting that three-tenths of a percent of the time--that
is still a significant number of people when you use the E-Verify
system--the new law actually gives them a way to work out the catch-22
situation that workers and employers find themselves in.
Because under the current law, we use the I-9 forms. Oftentimes,
someone will look at it and say: I am not sure these are genuine
documents. But if they refuse to hire the individual and it turns out
that they are genuine documents, they can be sued for discrimination.
And on the other hand, if they hire the worker and it turns out they
are unlawfully present, they can be prosecuted for hiring someone
unlawfully present in the United States.
And so the safe harbor says, you can go ahead and hire that person
until we work out whether it is a false positive or a false negative
without that consequence, and only until we know that, will you then
have to not employ that person. You will face no consequences in doing
that. That is good for the worker and it is good for the employer as
well.
When you do that--there is no doubt that there are sectors of our
economy where we have a lot of people who are not lawfully present in
the United States working. And by far, the number-one sector that is
affected by that is our agricultural workforce. There are some
estimates that as many as 80 or 90 percent of people working in
agriculture, beyond the actual family members who own a farm, are not
lawfully present in this country.
Some estimate that more than 1 million people who are working, are
not lawfully present in this country. Wouldn't it be great if we could
turn that workforce into legal workers where they have the opportunity
to go back and forth across the border, to go home to where their
family is without the fear of being apprehended and prosecuted?
That is what this bill does. It gives farmers a much more reliable
workforce. It gives them a much better program where they can self-
certify, where the worker can come in for up to 2 years at a time. And
in the dairy industry where they have no program at all today, or in
processing plants, raw-food processing plants, they have no program at
all today, we have the ability to help those farmers.
This is an area of our economy that is very much affected by
international competition. It is exceedingly important that we pass
this legislation to
[[Page H5376]]
move immigration in the direction it needs to move, and this is an
enlightened way to do it. It is not a bad bill. It is a good bill for
the American people.
Mrs. TORRES. Mr. Speaker, Chairman Goodlatte just clarified that his
bill has been in print for 6 months. I thank the gentleman for
clarifying. The American people should know that your real intention
was to allocate $100 million for the Trump wall, and it wasn't until we
shined the light on that, that in the middle of the night the
Republican caucus scrambled to reduce that amount to $25 million.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from California (Ms.
Pelosi), the Democratic leader.
Ms. PELOSI. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding and for
her leadership on America.
I had the privilege of traveling with her, under the leadership of
our colleagues Juan Vargas and Susan Davis, to their districts earlier
this week to see firsthand what was happening at the border.
So I come to the floor now with that fresh information. And I come to
the floor as a mother of five children, grandmother of nine, who knows,
as many of you here who are parents know and all of you here who are
children know, the importance of the bond between parent and child and
how breaking that bond is outside the circle of civilized human
behavior.
Mr. Speaker, I want to quote a favorite President, I am sure of yours
and many in this body, President Ronald Reagan.
In his final days of the Presidency, President Ronald Reagan said:
``And since this is the last speech that I will give as President''--my
colleagues, I want you to hear this because this is about Ronald
Reagan. Maybe you don't want to hear it. Okay. They don't want to hear
it.
President Ronald Reagan said: ``And since this is the last speech
that I will give as President, I think it's fitting to leave one final
thought, an observation about a country which I love.''
President Reagan went on to say: ``Yes, the torch of Lady Liberty
symbolizes our freedom and represents our heritage, the compact with
our parents, our grandparents, and our ancestors. It is that lady who
gives us our great and special place in the world.''
President Reagan went on to say: ``For it's the great life force of
each generation of new Americans that guarantees that America's triumph
shall continue unsurpassed into the next century and beyond.''
These are the words of President Ronald Reagan in the final days of
his Presidency as he said in the ``last speech that I will give as
President.''
Beautiful values.
Today, we are considering two Republican bills that insult our
Nation's values and tarnish our heritage, as the President said, ``as a
beacon of freedom and opportunity.''
Both do absolutely nothing to solve the heartbreaking and horrific
situation for children on the border. According to the United States
Conference of Catholic Bishops, both bills ``perpetuate child detention
and undermine existing protections relating to such detention.''
That is from the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. Both
of these bills fail to provide a permanent legislative fix for our
Dreamers, selling out their American Dream to build the President's
obscene border wall.
Both are loaded full of every anti-immigrant provision imaginable,
dismantling legal family immigration, slamming our doors to millions
who have followed the rules and have been waiting for years for a visa,
and cutting off the lifeline of asylum to countless vulnerable
refugees.
In terms of those refugees, in testimony that was given at the House
Democratic Steering and Policy Committee meeting that the Democrats
had--the Republicans didn't come--the National Association of
Evangelicals testified that the United States Refugee Resettlement
Program is the crown jewel of American humanitarianism.
And, yet, it is horrible what they do in these bills to cut off the
lifeline of asylum to countless vulnerable refugees.
The Speaker's bill carries out the President's family deportation
agenda. It paves the way for long-term incarceration of families in
prison-like conditions and the denial of basic health and safety
protections for children.
The Republican plan is a family incarceration plan. It replaces one
form of child abuse with another, and it brazenly violates children's
human rights. Why do Republicans think traumatized, terrified little
children at the border do not deserve the same basic respect that their
own children do?
According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, family detention
poses serious dangers to children's health and can result in ``lifelong
consequences for educational achievement, economic productivity, health
status, and longevity.''
Congress should be working day and night to protect vulnerable
children. We should be working on legislation that protects Dreamers,
keeps families together, and respects America's heritage as a land of
newcomers, as spelled out by President Reagan in his last speech as
President of the United States.
These bills will not go anywhere in the Senate. Yet, a vote for these
bills is a vote to destroy the queen-of-the-hill discharge petition,
destroying the best chance this Congress has to provide a bipartisan,
permanent legislative fix for Dreamers.
Republicans need to walk away from these bills. They need to call on
the President to rescind his family incarceration policy, which is as
much a stain on our Nation's history as is his family separation
policy, tearing children away from their parents.
Democrats reject this outrageous legislation and reject the
Republicans' attack on Dreamers, vulnerable children, and families, and
we reject your zero policy. It has no place.
I urge a ``no'' vote on both of these bills in this rule and any
subsequent rules that come up.
Mr. BURGESS. Mr. Speaker, may I inquire as to how much time I have
remaining.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Texas has 2 minutes
remaining. The gentlewoman from California has 13\1/2\ minutes
remaining.
Mr. BURGESS. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time to close.
Ms. TORRES. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from
California (Ms. Barragan).
Ms. BARRAGAN. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in opposition to the
Goodlatte bill and in opposition to the rule.
Do you know how many Democrats were involved in crafting the
Goodlatte bill? Zero. If they had included Democrats, we could have
told them that this bill does nothing to resolve the humanitarian
crisis happening at the border.
Do you know how many hearings we had on the Goodlatte bill? Zero. If
they had included Democrats, we would have told them that this bill
does nothing to provide meaningful relief for Dreamers, and is dead on
arrival in the Senate.
How many Dreamers does this help earn citizenship? Zero.
How many children does this bill put back in the arms of their
parents? Zero.
How much compromise does this bill show people in need? Zero.
This administration likes to talk about zero tolerance. Well, we have
zero tolerance for this President's anti-immigration agenda and the
Republicans who enable it.
Bottom line, Mr. Speaker, this bill is a sham. It is the Republican's
attempt to make it look like they want to help Dreamers, but, in
reality, it is a nonstarter, and it is another heartless action taken
by this Congress. Oppose this bill. Oppose this rule.
Mr. BURGESS. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mrs. TORRES. Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from
Maryland (Mr. Hoyer), the Democratic whip.
Mr. HOYER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding.
Mr. Speaker, these rules would mark the capitulation by a large
number of Republicans who, for a time, reflected the views of 86
percent of the American people and the hopes of the Dreamers those
Americans support. If they vote for this pretense of reform and
security, they will have abandoned the principles they mouthed and the
people who relied on their courage.
Contrary to the Speaker and majority leader, the test for bringing
bills to
[[Page H5377]]
the floor must not be whether the President, untethered to principle,
would sign them, but whether they reflect the will of the people and
this House.
The Speaker refuses to put options on the floor supported by, at one
time, 247 Members of this House. Now, 240 Members have supported a rule
to give us four competing options to address the Trump-caused crisis.
That number may not comply with the Hastert rule, but it does comply
with democracy.
And it would give the Speaker his option as well. The Speaker clearly
fears that his alternative will fail. As a result, he has opposed an
open process. So much for the leadership that claimed--falsely--to
pursue transparency, openness, and a willingness to take the tough
issues head on and individually.
The bill it would bring to the floor, contrary to what Speaker Ryan
and Leader McCarthy claim, is no compromise. A compromise, by
definition, requires both sides to come together and meet in the
middle. We did. And we built a majority of support for a bill.
The Ryan bill is a capitulation by those who have professed support
of the Dreamers. Indeed, the only compromise in this bill is how it
compromises our values, our principles as Americans, and how it
compromises our economy and national security.
The conservative Cato Institute has said that only 12 percent of
Dreamers would ever actually attain citizenship under this hoax of a
bill.
{time} 1130
For those seeking refuge from fear for their lives and from assault,
and from having their children torn from their arms and separated--as
Laura Bush pleaded, ``immoral''--this bill does not provide a solution.
Instead, it provides for locking up those children in prison with their
parents. Isn't that a wonderful option?
The American people are overwhelmingly outraged by what is happening
at the border and want to see Congress take real action. As John McCain
stated, such a policy that is being promoted by the President and the
Republicans in Congress ``is an affront to the decency of the American
people.''
In addition, the Ryan bill imposes new restrictions on legal
immigration. Democrats will strongly oppose this noxious bill.
Mr. Speaker, please summon the courage to let the people's House work
its will and demand that the President return to a policy of treating
these children as we would want our own children to be treated. That is
not what these bills do. Reject these bills. We are America. We are
better than these bills.
Mrs. TORRES. Mr. Speaker, I yield 30 seconds to the gentlewoman from
California (Ms. Lofgren).
Ms. LOFGREN. Mr. Speaker, there are lots wrong with these bills. I
will discuss that during the debate on the bills. This is about the
rule. For my friends on the other side of the aisle, they need to
understand that this is a self-executing rule. When they vote ``yes''
on this rule, they are voting to strip $100 billion from funding
President Trump's wall.
Let me say that again. A vote for this rule is a vote to take $100
billion out of building President Trump's wall. I want them to
understand that they are going to have to go home and explain to their
constituents why they voted to strip $100 billion out of funding
President Trump's wall.
Mrs. TORRES. Mr. Speaker, if we defeat the previous question, I will
offer an amendment to strike the text of this rule and insert House
Resolution 774, Representative Denham's bipartisan queen-of-the-hill
resolution. This rule would bring up four separate immigration bills to
be debated and voted on the House floor.
Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of my
amendment in the Record, along with extraneous material, immediately
prior to the vote on the previous question.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the
gentlewoman from California?
There was no objection.
Mrs. TORRES. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from
California (Mr. Aguilar) to discuss our proposal.
Mr. AGUILAR. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding time.
Mr. Speaker, I am here today to ask every Member who believed in
bipartisan, open debate on DACA here in the House to vote ``no'' on the
previous question.
Every one of the 216 Members who signed the discharge petition should
join me. Why? Because a vote against the previous question is a vote
for queen-of-the-hill rule, and because if we defeat the previous
question, we will immediately offer the queen-of-the-hill rule and
finally start this debate.
There will be no more waiting for the last two signatures on the
discharge petition to materialize. There will be no more waiting until
the next discharge Monday comes up in the calendar. There will be no
more waiting. We will end this process and vote on queen of the hill
now.
Today, Republicans are bringing up two partisan, anti-immigrant
bills. Democrats were completely cut out of the process that produced
these bills, and, as a result, they will not get any bipartisan
support. It is questionable if either of these bills can actually pass
this House. If that is the case, then what is the point of all of this?
Is the goal to have a fake debate on DACA and have everything fail so
we are in the same place as the Senate? What good does that do?
Dreamers are still left wondering when and what Congress will do to
help them stay in this country.
Let's end this charade and actually have a bipartisan debate, and
let's pass a bipartisan bill to provide a pathway to citizenship for
Dreamers.
Mr. Speaker, this has been a crazy week for sure. But one thing is
clear: If we want to pass a fix for DACA, then we need to come together
and pass a bipartisan bill. This previous question vote gives us the
chance to do just that. Vote ``no'' on the previous question and bring
up the queen-of-the-hill rule.
Mrs. TORRES. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman
from Mississippi (Mr. Thompson), who is the distinguished ranking
member of the Committee on Homeland Security.
Mr. THOMPSON of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman
from California for yielding the time.
Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong opposition to the closed rule for H.R.
4760. I was proud to sign on to the bipartisan discharge petition to
force a vote on a Dreamer bill. Passage of this rule will not only kill
that discharge petition, but any hope of this Congress considering the
one bill that has enough bipartisan support to deliver a meaningful
remedy for the Dreamers.
What are we voting on instead? H.R. 4760 is an antifamily bill that
maintains the cruel zero-tolerance policy, limits access to asylum,
shrinks legal immigration, ends the diversity visa lottery program,
abolishes protections for unaccompanied children, and builds President
Trump's border wall.
We are considering only H.R. 4760--a measure that may not have the
votes to pass--to placate the most extreme elements of the Republican
Conference. Mr. Speaker, something is fundamentally wrong and broken in
this body when the will of a handful of extremists overrules the will
of a bipartisan majority.
Mr. Speaker, I urge a ``no'' vote on the rule and the underlying
bill.
Mrs. TORRES. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from
Vermont (Mr. Welch).
Mr. WELCH. Mr. Speaker, is this institution broken or has our
leadership fled the field?
This rule will deprive the House of having a debate on the Dreamers.
Eighty-two percent of the American people think these innocent kids who
came here should be given legal status.
The leadership has refused to allow us to debate. With the help of
Mr. Denham, in a courageous display of independence, he has a discharge
petition, the last remaining tool for a majority of this House to say
to leadership: Give us a vote. Let us debate.
But in an act of extraordinary irresponsibility--and I would say
cowardice--the leadership is quelling, crushing, and incinerating the
last vestige of independence in their own party.
This rule takes away from the House that tool to rise up and say: We
are ready to work for the American people and give legal status to the
Dreamers.
That is a disgrace. That is a reason why, if we care about ourselves
as an
[[Page H5378]]
institution responsible to the people who elected us, we will assert
our insistence that we vote. Vote ``no'' on this.
Mrs. TORRES. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from
California (Mr. Panetta).
Mr. PANETTA. Mr. Speaker, I cannot support H.R. 4760, and I cannot
support this rule, obviously, for a number of reasons that we heard
here today, but I would like to highlight two.
This bill does not provide the DACA fix that our Dreamers deserve.
Personally, I have nearly 20,000 Dreamers in my district in California.
I have met with many of them numerous times at their work and at their
jobs. Although they were brought here through no fault of their own,
these kids want to stay here; they want to live here; and, most
important, they want to contribute here.
They don't want this given to them. They are willing to earn it.
Unfortunately, this bill does not give them that chance. And that is
why I cannot support it.
Also, in my district, we lay claim to being the salad bowl of the
world. Our agriculture industry is due to our farmworkers. Now, I
appreciate that this bill addresses ag labor, and the added amendments
have tried to make it better, but it is just not enough.
This bill hurts our communities. Why? Because our ag workers are not
just an important part of our ag industry, they are an integral part to
our communities. Some of these people have been here 5, 10, 15, 20
years. They have spouses; they have kids; and they have families.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The time of the gentleman has expired.
Mrs. TORRES. Mr. Speaker, I yield the gentleman from California an
additional 15 seconds.
Mr. PANETTA. Mr. Speaker, because of the important role that they
will play, and because of the lack of any information on what this can
do for these ag workers, I am against the resolution.
Mr. BURGESS. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mrs. TORRES. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.
Mr. Speaker, in 1970, a Guatemalan couple decided to send their
daughter to the U.S. That young girl was I. I was welcomed here in a
loving home. I was not put in a freezing cell. My parents felt they had
no choice. My mother died a couple of years later.
These parents are making a choice that, frankly, I could not make
today for my children. A few months ago, I was away from home for so
long--4 weeks--that my grandson, a 3-year-old, felt he had to
reintroduce himself to me because he had not seen me for 4 weeks. He
didn't think that I would remember him. Imagine an infant when that
infant is returned to their parent; they will be introduced to a total
stranger.
Pope Francis just tweeted: Pray together, walk together, work
together. This is the way that leads to Christian unity.
Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to oppose this rule and this cruel
legislation. Let's help those who can't help themselves in these very
corrupt countries of the Northern Triangle. They are not s---holes as
the President has referred to them. Let's give them an opportunity to
live another day.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. BURGESS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.
Mr. Speaker, I want to talk to you about a story of separation, a
father and daughter who have been separated. Chris, my constituent,
came to me with this story several years ago.
He served his country in Iraq. While he was serving his country in
Iraq, his wife developed cancer and died. Chris returned home to be a
single dad to his daughter.
His daughter went out with friends one night and was struck and
killed by an automobile--an automobile driven by someone who was in the
country without the benefit of citizenship.
Chris comes to my townhalls and asks me: While I was serving my
country, you were supposed to be enforcing the laws on the border.
Because you did not do your job, I am now separated from my daughter in
perpetuity.
H.R. 4760, the Securing America's Future Act of 2018, is the product
of months of work by Chairman Goodlatte, Chairman McCaul, and other
stakeholders. This is an answer to our persistent problems with our
immigration system that so many Members of this body have been talking
about for years.
Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support today's rule and move
the debate forward on this legislation.
Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. Speaker, the Rules Committee report (H. Rept. 115-
772) to accompany House Resolution 954 should have included in its
waiver of all points of order against consideration of H.R. 4760 a
disclosure of the following violation:
Clause 12(a)(1) of rule XXI, requiring a comparative print to be made
publicly available prior to consideration of a bill amending or
repealing statutes to show, by typographical device, parts of statute
affected.
The material previously referred to by Mrs. Torres is as follows:
An Amendment to H. Res. 954 Offered by Mrs. Torres
Strike all after the resolved clause and insert:
That on the next legislative day after the adoption of this
resolution, immediately after the third daily order of
business under clause 1 of rule XIV, the House shall resolve
into the Committee of the Whole House on the State of the
Union for consideration of the bill (H.R. 4760) to amend the
immigration laws and the homeland security laws, and for
other purposes. The first reading of the bill shall be
dispensed with. All points of order against consideration of
the bill are waived. General debate shall be confined to the
bill and shall not exceed one hour equally divided and
controlled by the Majority Leader and the Minority Whip or
their respective designees. After general debate the bill
shall be considered for amendment under the five-minute rule.
The bill shall be considered as read. All points of order
against provisions in the bill are waived. No amendment shall
be in order except the amendments in the nature of a
substitute specified in section 2 of this resolution. Each
such amendment may be offered only in the order specified,
may be offered only by the Member designated, shall be
considered as read, and shall be debatable for 40 minutes
equally divided and controlled by the proponent and an
opponent. All points of order against such amendments are
waived (except those arising under clause 7 of rule XVI).
Clause 6(g) of rule XVIII shall not apply with respect to a
request for a recorded vote on any such amendment. If more
than one such amendment is adopted, then only the one
receiving the greater number of affirmative recorded votes
shall be considered as finally adopted. In the case of a tie
for the greater number of affirmative recorded votes, then
only the last amendment to receive that number of affirmative
recorded votes shall be considered as finally adopted. After
the conclusion of consideration of the bill for amendment,
the Committee shall rise and report the bill to the House
with such amendment as may have been finally adopted. The
previous question shall be considered as ordered on the bill
and amendments thereto to final passage without intervening
motion except one motion to recommit with or without
instructions. If the Committee of the Whole rises and reports
that it has come to no resolution on the bill, then on the
next legislative day the House shall, immediately after the
third daily order of business under clause 1 of rule XIV,
resolve into the Committee of the Whole for further
consideration of the bill.
Sec. 2. The amendments in the nature of a substitute
referred to in the first section of this resolution are as
follows:
(1) A proper amendment in the nature of a substitute, if
offered by Representative Goodlatte of Virginia or his
designee.
(2) A proper amendment in the nature of a substitute, if
offered by Representative Roybal-Allard of California or her
designee.
(3) A proper amendment in the nature of a substitute, if
offered by Representative Ryan of Wisconsin or his designee.
(4) A proper amendment in the nature of a substitute, if
offered by Representative Denham of California or his
designee.
Sec. 3. Clause 1(c) of rule XIX shall not apply to the
consideration of H.R. 4760.
The Vote on the Previous Question: What It Really Means
This vote, the vote on whether to order the previous
question on a special rule, is not merely a procedural vote.
A vote against ordering the previous question is a vote
against the Republican majority agenda and a vote to allow
the Democratic minority to offer an alternative plan. It is a
vote about what the House should be debating.
Mr. Clarence Cannon's Precedents of the House of
Representatives (VI, 308-311), describes the vote on the
previous question on the rule as ``a motion to direct or
control the consideration of the subject before the House
being made by the Member in charge.'' To defeat the previous
question is to give the opposition a chance to decide the
subject before the House. Cannon cites the Speaker's ruling
of January 13, 1920, to the effect that ``the refusal of the
House to sustain the demand for the previous question passes
the control of the resolution to the opposition'' in order to
offer an amendment. On March 15, 1909, a member of the
majority party offered a rule resolution. The House defeated
the previous question and a member of the opposition rose to
a parliamentary inquiry, asking who was entitled to
recognition.
[[Page H5379]]
Speaker Joseph G. Cannon (R-Illinois) said: ``The previous
question having been refused, the gentleman from New York,
Mr. Fitzgerald, who had asked the gentleman to yield to him
for an amendment, is entitled to the first recognition.''
The Republican majority may say ``the vote on the previous
question is simply a vote on whether to proceed to an
immediate vote on adopting the resolution . . . [and] has no
substantive legislative or policy implications whatsoever.''
But that is not what they have always said. Listen to the
Republican Leadership Manual on the Legislative Process in
the United States House of Representatives, (6th edition,
page 135). Here's how the Republicans describe the previous
question vote in their own manual: ``Although it is generally
not possible to amend the rule because the majority Member
controlling the time will not yield for the purpose of
offering an amendment, the same result may be achieved by
voting down the previous question on the rule. . . . When the
motion for the previous question is defeated, control of the
time passes to the Member who led the opposition to ordering
the previous question. That Member, because he then controls
the time, may offer an amendment to the rule, or yield for
the purpose of amendment.''
In Deschler's Procedure in the U.S. House of
Representatives, the subchapter titled ``Amending Special
Rules'' states: ``a refusal to order the previous question on
such a rule [a special rule reported from the Committee on
Rules] opens the resolution to amendment and further
debate.'' (Chapter 21, section 21.2) Section 21.3 continues:
``Upon rejection of the motion for the previous question on a
resolution reported from the Committee on Rules, control
shifts to the Member leading the opposition to the previous
question, who may offer a proper amendment or motion and who
controls the time for debate thereon.''
Clearly, the vote on the previous question on a rule does
have substantive policy implications. It is one of the only
available tools for those who oppose the Republican
majority's agenda and allows those with alternative views the
opportunity to offer an alternative plan.
Mr. BURGESS. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I
move the previous question on the resolution.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on ordering the previous
question.
The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that
the ayes appeared to have it.
Mrs. TORRES. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.
The yeas and nays were ordered.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 9 of rule XX, the Chair
will reduce to 5 minutes the minimum time for any electronic vote on
the question of adoption of the resolution.
The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--yeas 232,
nays 190, not voting 5, as follows:
[Roll No. 279]
YEAS--232
Abraham
Aderholt
Allen
Amash
Amodei
Arrington
Babin
Bacon
Banks (IN)
Barletta
Barr
Barton
Bergman
Biggs
Bilirakis
Bishop (MI)
Bishop (UT)
Blackburn
Blum
Bost
Brady (TX)
Brat
Brooks (AL)
Brooks (IN)
Buchanan
Buck
Bucshon
Budd
Burgess
Byrne
Calvert
Carter (GA)
Carter (TX)
Chabot
Cheney
Coffman
Cole
Collins (NY)
Comer
Comstock
Conaway
Cook
Costello (PA)
Cramer
Crawford
Culberson
Curbelo (FL)
Curtis
Davidson
Davis, Rodney
Denham
DeSantis
DesJarlais
Diaz-Balart
Donovan
Duffy
Duncan (SC)
Duncan (TN)
Dunn
Emmer
Estes (KS)
Faso
Ferguson
Fitzpatrick
Fleischmann
Flores
Fortenberry
Foxx
Frelinghuysen
Gaetz
Gallagher
Garrett
Gianforte
Gibbs
Gohmert
Goodlatte
Gosar
Gowdy
Granger
Graves (GA)
Graves (LA)
Graves (MO)
Griffith
Grothman
Guthrie
Handel
Harper
Harris
Hartzler
Hensarling
Herrera Beutler
Hice, Jody B.
Higgins (LA)
Hill
Holding
Hollingsworth
Hudson
Huizenga
Hultgren
Hunter
Hurd
Issa
Jenkins (KS)
Jenkins (WV)
Johnson (LA)
Johnson (OH)
Johnson, Sam
Jones
Jordan
Joyce (OH)
Katko
Kelly (MS)
Kelly (PA)
King (IA)
King (NY)
Kinzinger
Knight
Labrador
LaHood
LaMalfa
Lamborn
Lance
Latta
Lesko
Lewis (MN)
LoBiondo
Long
Loudermilk
Love
Lucas
Luetkemeyer
MacArthur
Marchant
Marino
Marshall
Massie
Mast
McCarthy
McCaul
McClintock
McHenry
McKinley
McMorris Rodgers
McSally
Meadows
Messer
Mitchell
Moolenaar
Mooney (WV)
Mullin
Newhouse
Noem
Norman
Nunes
Olson
Palazzo
Palmer
Paulsen
Pearce
Perry
Pittenger
Poe (TX)
Poliquin
Posey
Ratcliffe
Reed
Reichert
Renacci
Rice (SC)
Roby
Roe (TN)
Rogers (AL)
Rogers (KY)
Rohrabacher
Rokita
Rooney, Francis
Rooney, Thomas J.
Ros-Lehtinen
Roskam
Ross
Rothfus
Rouzer
Royce (CA)
Russell
Rutherford
Sanford
Scalise
Schweikert
Scott, Austin
Sensenbrenner
Sessions
Shimkus
Shuster
Simpson
Smith (MO)
Smith (NE)
Smith (NJ)
Smith (TX)
Smucker
Stefanik
Stewart
Stivers
Taylor
Tenney
Thompson (PA)
Thornberry
Tipton
Trott
Turner
Upton
Valadao
Vela
Wagner
Walberg
Walden
Walker
Walorski
Walters, Mimi
Weber (TX)
Webster (FL)
Wenstrup
Westerman
Williams
Wilson (SC)
Wittman
Womack
Woodall
Yoder
Yoho
Young (AK)
Young (IA)
Zeldin
NAYS--190
Adams
Aguilar
Barragan
Bass
Beatty
Bera
Beyer
Bishop (GA)
Blumenauer
Blunt Rochester
Bonamici
Boyle, Brendan F.
Brady (PA)
Brown (MD)
Brownley (CA)
Bustos
Butterfield
Capuano
Carbajal
Cardenas
Carson (IN)
Cartwright
Castor (FL)
Castro (TX)
Chu, Judy
Cicilline
Clark (MA)
Clarke (NY)
Clay
Cleaver
Clyburn
Cohen
Connolly
Cooper
Correa
Costa
Courtney
Crist
Crowley
Cuellar
Cummings
Davis (CA)
Davis, Danny
DeFazio
DeGette
Delaney
DeLauro
DelBene
Demings
DeSaulnier
Deutch
Dingell
Doggett
Doyle, Michael F.
Ellison
Engel
Eshoo
Espaillat
Esty (CT)
Evans
Foster
Frankel (FL)
Fudge
Gabbard
Gallego
Garamendi
Gomez
Gonzalez (TX)
Gottheimer
Green, Al
Green, Gene
Grijalva
Gutierrez
Hanabusa
Hastings
Heck
Higgins (NY)
Himes
Hoyer
Huffman
Jackson Lee
Jayapal
Johnson (GA)
Johnson, E. B.
Kaptur
Keating
Kelly (IL)
Kennedy
Khanna
Kihuen
Kildee
Kilmer
Kind
Krishnamoorthi
Kuster (NH)
Lamb
Langevin
Larsen (WA)
Larson (CT)
Lawrence
Lawson (FL)
Lee
Levin
Lewis (GA)
Lieu, Ted
Lipinski
Loebsack
Lofgren
Lowenthal
Lowey
Lujan Grisham, M.
Lujan, Ben Ray
Lynch
Maloney, Carolyn B.
Maloney, Sean
Matsui
McCollum
McEachin
McGovern
McNerney
Meeks
Meng
Moore
Moulton
Murphy (FL)
Nadler
Napolitano
Neal
Nolan
Norcross
O'Halleran
O'Rourke
Pallone
Panetta
Pascrell
Pelosi
Perlmutter
Peters
Peterson
Pingree
Pocan
Polis
Price (NC)
Quigley
Raskin
Rice (NY)
Richmond
Rosen
Roybal-Allard
Ruiz
Ruppersberger
Rush
Ryan (OH)
Sanchez
Sarbanes
Schakowsky
Schiff
Schneider
Schrader
Scott (VA)
Scott, David
Serrano
Sewell (AL)
Shea-Porter
Sherman
Sinema
Sires
Smith (WA)
Soto
Speier
Suozzi
Swalwell (CA)
Takano
Thompson (CA)
Thompson (MS)
Titus
Tonko
Torres
Tsongas
Vargas
Veasey
Velazquez
Visclosky
Walz
Wasserman Schultz
Waters, Maxine
Watson Coleman
Welch
Wilson (FL)
Yarmuth
NOT VOTING--5
Black
Collins (GA)
Jeffries
Kustoff (TN)
Payn
{time} 1207
Messrs. BIGGS and BRAT changed their vote from ``nay'' to ``yea.''
So the previous question was ordered.
The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the resolution.
The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that
the ayes appeared to have it.
Recorded Vote
Mrs. TORRES. Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.
A recorded vote was ordered.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. This will be a 5-minute vote.
The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--ayes 226,
noes 195, not voting 6, as follows:
[Roll No. 280]
AYES--226
Abraham
Aderholt
Allen
Amodei
Arrington
Babin
Bacon
Banks (IN)
Barletta
Barr
Barton
Bergman
Biggs
Bilirakis
Bishop (MI)
Bishop (UT)
Blackburn
Blum
Bost
Brady (TX)
Brat
Brooks (AL)
Brooks (IN)
Buchanan
Buck
Bucshon
Budd
Burgess
Byrne
Calvert
Carter (GA)
Carter (TX)
Chabot
Cheney
Coffman
Cole
Collins (NY)
Comer
Comstock
Conaway
Cook
Costello (PA)
Cramer
Crawford
Culberson
Curbelo (FL)
Curtis
Davidson
Davis, Rodney
Denham
DeSantis
DesJarlais
Diaz-Balart
Donovan
Duffy
Duncan (SC)
Duncan (TN)
Dunn
Emmer
Estes (KS)
Faso
Ferguson
Fitzpatrick
Fleischmann
Flores
Fortenberry
Foxx
Frelinghuysen
Gaetz
Gallagher
Garrett
Gianforte
Gibbs
Goodlatte
Gosar
Gowdy
Granger
Graves (GA)
Graves (LA)
Graves (MO)
Griffith
[[Page H5380]]
Grothman
Guthrie
Handel
Harper
Harris
Hartzler
Hensarling
Herrera Beutler
Hice, Jody B.
Higgins (LA)
Hill
Holding
Hollingsworth
Hudson
Huizenga
Hultgren
Hunter
Issa
Jenkins (KS)
Jenkins (WV)
Johnson (LA)
Johnson (OH)
Johnson, Sam
Jones
Jordan
Joyce (OH)
Katko
Kelly (MS)
Kelly (PA)
King (NY)
Kinzinger
Knight
Labrador
LaHood
LaMalfa
Lamborn
Lance
Latta
Lesko
Lewis (MN)
LoBiondo
Long
Loudermilk
Love
Lucas
Luetkemeyer
MacArthur
Marchant
Marino
Marshall
Mast
McCarthy
McCaul
McClintock
McHenry
McKinley
McMorris Rodgers
McSally
Meadows
Messer
Mitchell
Moolenaar
Mooney (WV)
Mullin
Newhouse
Noem
Norman
Nunes
Olson
Palazzo
Palmer
Paulsen
Pearce
Perry
Pittenger
Poe (TX)
Poliquin
Posey
Ratcliffe
Reed
Reichert
Renacci
Rice (SC)
Roby
Roe (TN)
Rogers (AL)
Rogers (KY)
Rohrabacher
Rokita
Rooney, Francis
Rooney, Thomas J.
Ros-Lehtinen
Roskam
Ross
Rothfus
Rouzer
Royce (CA)
Russell
Rutherford
Sanford
Scalise
Schweikert
Scott, Austin
Sensenbrenner
Sessions
Shimkus
Shuster
Simpson
Smith (MO)
Smith (NE)
Smith (NJ)
Smith (TX)
Smucker
Stefanik
Stewart
Stivers
Taylor
Tenney
Thompson (PA)
Thornberry
Tipton
Trott
Turner
Upton
Valadao
Wagner
Walberg
Walden
Walker
Walorski
Walters, Mimi
Weber (TX)
Webster (FL)
Wenstrup
Westerman
Williams
Wilson (SC)
Wittman
Womack
Woodall
Yoder
Yoho
Young (AK)
Young (IA)
Zeldin
NOES--195
Adams
Aguilar
Amash
Barragan
Bass
Beatty
Bera
Beyer
Bishop (GA)
Blumenauer
Blunt Rochester
Bonamici
Boyle, Brendan F.
Brady (PA)
Brown (MD)
Brownley (CA)
Bustos
Butterfield
Capuano
Carbajal
Cardenas
Carson (IN)
Cartwright
Castor (FL)
Castro (TX)
Chu, Judy
Cicilline
Clark (MA)
Clarke (NY)
Clay
Cleaver
Clyburn
Cohen
Connolly
Cooper
Correa
Costa
Courtney
Crist
Crowley
Cuellar
Cummings
Davis (CA)
Davis, Danny
DeFazio
DeGette
Delaney
DeLauro
DelBene
Demings
DeSaulnier
Deutch
Dingell
Doggett
Doyle, Michael F.
Ellison
Engel
Eshoo
Espaillat
Esty (CT)
Evans
Foster
Frankel (FL)
Fudge
Gabbard
Gallego
Garamendi
Gohmert
Gomez
Gonzalez (TX)
Gottheimer
Green, Al
Green, Gene
Grijalva
Gutierrez
Hanabusa
Hastings
Heck
Higgins (NY)
Himes
Hoyer
Huffman
Hurd
Jackson Lee
Jayapal
Johnson (GA)
Johnson, E. B.
Kaptur
Keating
Kelly (IL)
Kennedy
Khanna
Kihuen
Kildee
Kilmer
Kind
King (IA)
Krishnamoorthi
Kuster (NH)
Lamb
Langevin
Larsen (WA)
Larson (CT)
Lawrence
Lawson (FL)
Lee
Levin
Lewis (GA)
Lieu, Ted
Lipinski
Loebsack
Lofgren
Lowenthal
Lowey
Lujan Grisham, M.
Lujan, Ben Ray
Lynch
Maloney, Carolyn B.
Maloney, Sean
Massie
Matsui
McCollum
McEachin
McGovern
McNerney
Meeks
Meng
Moore
Moulton
Murphy (FL)
Nadler
Napolitano
Neal
Nolan
Norcross
O'Halleran
Pallone
Panetta
Pascrell
Pelosi
Perlmutter
Peters
Peterson
Pingree
Pocan
Polis
Price (NC)
Quigley
Raskin
Rice (NY)
Richmond
Rosen
Roybal-Allard
Ruiz
Ruppersberger
Rush
Ryan (OH)
Sanchez
Sarbanes
Schakowsky
Schiff
Schneider
Schrader
Scott (VA)
Scott, David
Serrano
Sewell (AL)
Shea-Porter
Sherman
Sinema
Sires
Smith (WA)
Soto
Speier
Suozzi
Swalwell (CA)
Takano
Thompson (CA)
Thompson (MS)
Titus
Tonko
Torres
Tsongas
Vargas
Veasey
Vela
Velazquez
Visclosky
Walz
Wasserman Schultz
Waters, Maxine
Watson Coleman
Welch
Wilson (FL)
Yarmuth
NOT VOTING--6
Black
Collins (GA)
Jeffries
Kustoff (TN)
O'Rourke
Payne
{time} 1214
So the resolution was agreed to.
The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.
____________________