[Congressional Record Volume 165, Number 164 (Thursday, October 17, 2019)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5869-S5874]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




RELATING TO A NATIONAL EMERGENCY DECLARED BY THE PRESIDENT ON FEBRUARY 
                             15, 2019--VETO

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the pending business.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       Veto message to accompany S.J. Res. 54, a joint resolution 
     relating to a national emergency declared by the President on 
     February 15, 2019.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senate Democratic leader.


                Unanimous Consent Request--H.J. Res. 77

  Mr. SCHUMER. Madam President, I am going to speak for a minute before 
I make my unanimous consent request.
  Now, we have a crisis here in this world and here in America. Because 
of the President's precipitous action to take a small number of 
American troops out of northern Syria and green-light Erdogan's 
invasion, we are in real trouble. We are in trouble in a whole lot of 
ways.
  Most importantly, we, in New York, know that a small group of bad 
people can cause terrible terrorism with huge loss of life, even when 
they are 7,000 miles away. There are about 70,000 ISIS prisoners and 
their families now being guarded by the Kurds, but because of the 
President's action, they will no longer be guarded.
  When we went to the White House yesterday and asked the President and 
his military folks what is the plan to prevent many of these ISIS 
would-be terrorists from escaping, they didn't have one. They didn't 
have one because the Kurds have left, and the only people who might 
guard them are the Syrians or the Turks, and neither of them have a 
great interest in stopping ISIS.
  In fact, I asked the Defense Secretary Esper: Is there any 
intelligence that shows that either the Syrians or the Turks would do a 
good job at guarding the ISIS prisoners and preventing them from 
escaping?
  No, there was no intelligence to that effect. As a result, ISIS 
prisoners are escaping, will continue to escape, and America will pay 
an awful price--an awful price. The Kurds will pay an awful price. They 
have fought alongside our soldiers. They are our allies.
  I talked to my friend from Kentucky who said the Kurds are better off 
with the Syrians. Well, the Kurds sure don't think so. They would 
rather be back to the status quo. Talk to their leaders. Certainly, 
America will not be better off at all with ISIS prisoners escaping.
  Who did this? The President. The President's incompetence has put 
American lives in danger--simply, starkly put but accurate. In New 
York, as I said, we know well how a small group of fanatics halfway 
around the world can do incredible damage and kill thousands of 
Americans here on our soil.
  It should shake every Member of this body, regardless of their 
ideology and regardless of their views on Turkey, that the President 
made this decision so abruptly without heeding the advice of our 
commanders on the ground and now has no plan to manage the 
consequences.
  After meeting with the President yesterday, it was clear to both 
Democrats and Republicans in the room that he does not grasp the 
gravity of the situation. He doesn't understand it. The most important 
thing we can do right now is send President Trump a message that 
Congress, the vast majority of Democrats and Republicans, demand he 
reverse course.
  I am asking this as a unanimous consent to not go through a long 
regular process because the bottom line is, the longer we wait, the 
more Kurds will die--our allies--the more ISIS prisoners will escape, 
and the greater danger, hour by hour, day by day, America falls into. 
We should move this resolution. We need unanimous consent.
  I spoke to my good friend from Kentucky. He said he wanted to put a 
resolution on the floor about military aid to Turkey, something many on 
my side would be sympathetic to. I offered him the ability of moving 
his resolution--we would have to, of course, get permission of all 
Members, but I would work through that--in return for us moving our 
resolution. He still said no. He still said no. I think that is a 
horrible decision. I think it could well risk the lives of Americans 
down the road. I think it will certainly risk the lives of many more 
Kurds, who are our allies.
  We will return to this issue. I wish we could pass it now--the same 
bill that passed the House with the vast majority of Republicans, 2 to 
1, with Leaders McCarthy and Scalise and Cheney voting for it--and go 
forward. I understand the motivations of my friend from Kentucky are 
sincere and real. He has had these positions consistently. They are not 
the positions of the majority on his side nor on our side on many 
issues. On some, we have worked together and agreed, but I think it is 
so wrong not to move forward. It is so wrong to let the man, both 
Democrats and Republicans saw in the White House yesterday, stay in 
control without pressuring him to do better--without pressuring him to 
do better.
  There is no better, quicker, or more powerful way to pressure the 
President to undo the damage he has caused than to pass a bipartisan 
joint resolution that will go directly to his desk. We will come back 
to this issue. It will not go away. It cannot go away for the safety of 
America, for the safety of the Kurds, for some degree of stability, not 
chaos in the Middle East that the President, President Trump, 
precipitously caused.
  I plead with my colleague from Kentucky and anyone else who might 
object to let us have the vote. Let us make our arguments and prevail. 
We are willing to do debate time. Let us not say it has to be my way or 
the highway when so many lives and such danger is at risk.
  I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate 
consideration of Calendar No. 246, H.J. Res. 77; that the joint 
resolution be read a third time and the Senate vote on passage with no 
intervening action or debate.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  The Senator from Kentucky.
  Mr. PAUL. Madam President, reserving the right to object. The 
Constitution is quite clear on this subject. If the minority leader 
wishes to engage in the civil war in Syria that has been going on for 
nearly a decade, we should obey the Constitution. He should come to the 
floor and say we are ready to declare a war, we are ready to authorize 
force, and we are going to stick our troops in the middle of this 
messy, messy five-sided civil war, where we would be ostensibly opposed 
to the Turkish Government that has made an incursion. We would then be 
opposed to our NATO ally. It would be the first time in history that we 
would be inserting ourselves militarily against a NATO ally.
  None of this is to excuse Turkey's action. In fact, today I will 
offer a resolution that would actually do something.

[[Page S5870]]

The resolution that is being offered is simply a way to have petty, 
partisan criticism of the President infect this body. Mine, actually, 
would have the force of law and would prevent any arms from being sold 
to Turkey, which would be a serious rebuke to what they are doing in 
Syria.
  The Constitution is quite clear. No authorization has ever been given 
for the use of force in Syria. There was no authorization of 
declaration of war and no permission to be there at all. So if they 
want to insert themselves in this civil war, by all means, let's have a 
debate. Let's have a constitutional debate, but I, for one, am not 
willing to send one young man or one young woman, one soldier over 
there without a clear mission.
  There is no clear mission. There is no clear enemy. In fact, the war 
is largely over. Assad is going to remain, for better or worse. So we 
have a despot on one side, Erdogan. We have another despot on the other 
side, Assad. Here is the deal: The Kurds have to live there. It is 
despairing that they have to live there, but you know what, their best 
chance for survival is having an ally inside of Syria.
  If they become allied, and it appears they are--if they become allied 
with Assad, you know what, there is a possibility of a Kurdish area 
within Syria. There may well be an opportunity for a Kurdish area 
similar to what has happened in Iraq.
  So I object to this resolution because this resolution does nothing 
to fix the problem. My resolution would stop arms sales to Turkey, so I 
will object to this resolution.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Young). Objection is heard.
  The minority leader.
  Mr. SCHUMER. I believe history will show that the country, the 
Senate, and even the Senator from Kentucky will regret his blocking of 
this resolution.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Kentucky.


                   Unanimous Consent Request--S. 2624

  Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, at this time I want to ask unanimous consent 
that we introduce S. 2624, Turkey arm sales, which would eliminate any 
further sale of arms to Turkey and, instead of sending a fake message 
or a sense of the Senate resolution, would actually be a binding 
resolution and would tell the Turks: Yes, we are serious. We object to 
your incursion into Syria. You need to respect the territorial 
integrity of Syria, and we therefore are no longer going to be selling 
you arms.
  I ask unanimous consent that this be passed.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  The Senator from Idaho.
  Mr. RISCH. Reserving the right to object, colleagues, this is a very 
fluid situation, as we all know, and, certainly, Americans who are 
watching this from home are confused about the parties. Then, when 
laying politics on top of it, where you have a level of animus toward 
the Commander in Chief that there is at this point, it becomes very 
difficult to sort this out. So as chairman of the Foreign Relations 
Committee, I want to try to lay out some fundamentals that we need to 
deal with.
  As has been pointed out by everyone--and I think everyone agrees--the 
situation on the ground in Syria is an incredibly complex situation. It 
is difficult to understand and impossible to manage at some point 
because of the fact that there are dozens and dozens of tribal entities 
that share religious or cultural or tribal affiliations either together 
or in opposition. The result of that is the mess that we have had in 
Syria for so long.
  On top of that, in northern Syria we have a situation where the Kurds 
and the Turks are at odds with each other. This has happened just 
recently, and as everybody in this body--House and Senate, Republicans, 
Democrats--knows, it is a very serious situation, but this is not new. 
The animosity and fight between the Turks and the Kurds have been going 
on for centuries. This fight between these two groups has been going on 
for centuries.
  Who are these two groups? First, we have the Turks on one side, on 
the north of the border, who are members of NATO and are at the very 
least theoretical allies of the United States, although in recent years 
that alliance has been strained, and that is an understatement of what 
the situation is.
  Recently, they negotiated a deal with the Russians to buy S-400 
missiles, which is a horrendous problem for a member of NATO. NATO was 
formed, of course, to push back against the Russians, and now you have 
a member of NATO that is engaging with the Russians in this fashion. 
This has caused us real grief.
  Those of us who deal with it have dealt with it for months. We have 
been pressing the Turks as hard as we can about the mistake they have 
made and the consequences it is going to have. They have an order for 
F-35s. They make a number of parts for the F-35. We have told them 
clearly, in no uncertain terms, for months that they can have the F-35s 
or they can have the S-400s, but they cannot have both. They insisted 
that they can. That is simply not going to happen. I think they are 
starting to believe that.
  Fast forward to where we are now. The Turks have amassed 30,000 
troops on the border with Syria and are ready to come in and take on 
the Kurds, who had moved into the northern part of Syria due to the 
failed-state status of Syria.
  To say that the President of the United States is responsible for 
this is simply a political statement that isn't true. You can dislike 
the Commander in Chief, you can dislike the calls that he makes, but 
this is a war that has been going on between these two groups for 
centuries. It was going to happen.
  The fact that Erdogan had amassed 30,000 troops on the border was a 
clear indication that it was going to go forward. We had about 28 
troops between the two standing armies and admittedly the President of 
the United States pulled those 28 troops out of harm's way.
  In any event, you can argue about what got us here, what the 
triggering factor was, whether it was or wasn't going to happen anyway, 
but what you can't argue about is what the situation is today. There 
isn't anyone in this body that would disagree that this is a very 
serious situation.
  Turkey is alone on this, by the way. With the possible exception of 
the Qataris, they are alone on this. The world has been watching this, 
condemning what Turkey is doing. They have done a cross-border 
incursion, and they are facing their age-old enemy, the Kurds, inside 
of Syria.
  So what do we do about this? Well, the House has passed a matter that 
the minority leader has talked about and wanted to pass. Senator Paul 
has brought his idea to the floor. But I want to tell you that the 
Foreign Relations Committee has been working on this since it blew up.
  I want to thank my staff, and I want to thank Senator Menendez' 
staff, the ranking member, who pulled an ``all-nighter'' last night, 
putting together a piece of legislation, and an ``all-morninger'' to 
get to the point where we are.
  This piece of legislation is going to be dropped very quickly. Risch-
Menendez is a bipartisan piece of legislation that addresses the issues 
that all of us are concerned about. It addresses the issues with 
Turkey. It addresses the issues with the Kurds. It addresses the issues 
that the minority leader addressed regarding the ISIS prisoners who are 
being held. It is a good piece of legislation.
  It is going to have numerous--and I mean numerous--cosponsors to the 
bill from both sides of the aisle. So with that in mind, I am going to 
enter an objection to Senator Paul's piece of legislation, not because 
I object to it as it stands by itself but because we have a 
comprehensive piece of legislation that does address this that is the 
result of consultation between both the majority and the minority and 
the administration to get us a bill that could actually become law.
  From my own standpoint, I am always at a point where I want to reach 
an objective and want to get to a result. Senator Paul's and the other 
legislation cannot become law. This bipartisan piece of legislation, 
Risch-Menendez, which addresses this very, very serious issue can 
become law. As a result of that, Mr. President, I object.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Objection is heard.
  The Senator from Utah.
  Mr. LEE. Mr. President, I applaud President Trump for the restraint, 
the

[[Page S5871]]

resolve, and the commitment to constitutional principles that he 
demonstrated when he decided not to have the United States go into 
Syria, not to continue to involve our troops in a looming conflict in 
Syria.
  I agree that it is a horrible situation. I agree that we have people 
running both Syria and Turkey who are not our friends and who have 
shown significant hostility toward us. It is precisely because of that 
and not in spite of it that we shouldn't be there, especially when you 
take into account that we do not have a declaration of war relative to 
Syria. We do not have an authorization for the use of military force 
with regard to Syria. Under our system of government, the U.S. 
Constitution placed the power to declare war or otherwise authorize the 
use of military force in Congress. This was no accident. It is the 
branch of the Federal Government most accountable to the people at the 
most regular intervals.
  This was a significant break from our previous system of government--
the one that was based in London. In Federalist No. 69, Alexander 
Hamilton explained that this was no accident, that under the British 
model, the King, as the chief executive, had the power to take the 
country to war. It was Parliament's job, then, to follow along, to 
figure out what to do about it and how to fund it.
  This would not be the case in the American Republic. This is not the 
case under our Constitution. Yet, sadly, for decades we have had a 
Congress consisting of Republicans and Democrats, Senators and 
Representatives who have allowed the legislative muscle to atrophy, who 
have refused and declined to exercise the power to declare war.
  In that context, I have heard Republicans and Democrats, Senators and 
Representatives alike, defer again and again and again to Presidents of 
every conceivable partisan combination, saying: Let the President 
decide what we do.
  Through our own inaction, we have essentially relinquished the power 
to declare war.
  Why does this matter? This is the only connection the American people 
have to the power to declare war. When we send their brave sons and 
daughters into harm's way, we owe it to them to have an open, public 
robust debate and discussion in which we make a deal with them, in 
which we outline the terms for our engagement.
  We don't have that in Syria. There are those who are upset that we 
don't, and I understand that they are upset that we don't. If they are 
upset that we don't, it is not as though we are a victim. We are the 
actor, not the acted upon. We have the power right here and right now 
to bring up a proposal. If they want to declare war with regard to 
Syria, let's have that discussion.
  I am not a fan of war. I am not a fan of war starting on behalf of 
the United States anywhere in the world right now, but if somebody 
wants to make that discussion, let's have it, and let's debate it.
  But what people shouldn't be doing is criticizing President Trump, 
who has shown restraint and shown deference to the American people, who 
wants to protect our sons and daughters who would be protecting us. He 
is saying: Maybe, just maybe, when you have a bad guy in Turkey, 
wanting to do some things in Syria with regard to the Kurds, maybe, 
just maybe, when you take into account the fact that Turkey is, in 
fact, a NATO ally and we have a NATO article 5 obligation to do 
something about that, that is going to lead to full-blown war. We 
should therefore respect him. We should be grateful to him for taking 
that step of restraint.
  This President has been unique in modern history in not blindly 
deferring to the military industrial complex. I thank him for that and 
salute his willingness to stand behind our brave men and women.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Indiana.
  Mr. BRAUN. I rise to speak today because I just finished up visiting 
all 92 counties in our home State, and every one of them, especially at 
the tail end, have backed what we have been doing here, especially 
following the lead of President Trump.
  When it comes to the particular issue of Syria, I think it begs the 
question when people say it green-lighted what occurred there. What 
would the reaction have been had we not gotten out of harm's way? I am 
guessing it would have been a bigger fiasco in many different 
dimensions.
  The minority leader indicated that Mr. Paul's idea was horrible. I 
want to make the point that, collectively, over the last 40 to 50 
years, we have been engaged all the way back to the Vietnam war, where 
we have been adventuresome and have done it where we have not paid for 
it, and we are now in a pickle. That is why I was for what the 
President decided to do. You cannot continue being engaged like this 
when running trillion-dollar deficits--$22 trillion in debt. Hoosiers 
understand that, and most Americans do as well.
  So I am going to support Rand Paul's amendment, and I am glad that 
the President finally had the guts to do what most Americans have been 
for, and I am disappointed that the other side in any other situation 
would have been for that exact action.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator for Wisconsin.


                   Unanimous Consent Request--S. 2598

  Ms. BALDWIN. Mr. President, I rise today on behalf of nearly 25,000 
workers and retirees in Wisconsin who have paid into the Central States 
Pension Fund. More than 4 years ago, thousands of Wisconsinites started 
receiving letters in the mail telling them that their pensions--which 
they had worked for, planned on, and earned--would not be paid out in 
full as was promised to them.
  Instead, those letters said their pensions would be slashed by 50 
percent, 60 percent, or sometimes 70 percent. Since then, those 
retirees have organized. They have organized at home. They have called 
on their Members of Congress. They have come to Washington countless 
times to remind us of the promises that were made when they earned 
their pensions and to fight for a solution to the pending crisis.
  I have been proud to work side-by-side with these Wisconsin workers 
and retirees, and with my colleague Senator Brown to introduce the 
Butch Lewis Act.
  This legislation will put failing multiemployer pension plans, 
including Central States, back on solid ground, and it does so without 
cutting the pensions that retirees have earned. It does so without 
cutting the pensions retirees have earned. This is not just good policy 
for workers and retirees because putting these pensions back on strong 
footing would also protect the small businesses that employed them from 
the threat of closing their doors if these plans are allowed to fail.

  Compounding this looming crisis is the reality that the Pension 
Benefit Guaranty Corporation, known as the PBGC--the government's 
insurance for multiemployer pension plans like Central States--is on 
its own path to insolvency by 2025. This week, I reintroduced 
legislation to help address the financial challenges of the PBGC. The 
Pension Stability Act would add funding to the Pension Benefit Guaranty 
Corporation's multiemployer program by imposing a fee on financial 
firms convicted of financial crimes.
  This weekend, I was in Endeavor, WI, with retirees who meet once a 
month at the fire station to update one another on our progress here in 
Washington. I have been to many, many such meetings like that across 
the State. In the months since the House passed the Butch Lewis Act, 
there hasn't been much other progress to speak of. The Senate hasn't 
taken up the bill, no other proposals have been offered, and all the 
while, retirees and workers in the Central States Pension Fund continue 
to doubt their retirement security.
  Today, I am asking my colleagues in the Senate to join me and pass my 
Pension Stability Act and to help generate new revenue to help 
safeguard the retirement security of millions of Americans. If 
Washington does not act, workers and retirees will face massive cuts to 
the pensions they have earned over decades of hard work. I have come to 
the floor many times to remind this body about the retirees--some of 
whom stand to lose more than 50 percent of their pensions--and still, 
nothing has been done. So I am here once again to remind my colleagues 
that this is about a promise that must be kept.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the HELP Committee be 
discharged from further consideration of S. 2598 and the Senate proceed 
to its

[[Page S5872]]

immediate consideration; further, that the bill be considered read a 
third time and passed and the motion to reconsider be considered made 
and laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  The Senator from Utah.
  Mr. LEE. Mr. President, reserving the right to object, I thank and 
commend my friend and distinguished colleague, the Senator from 
Wisconsin, for her work on this effort. I am not familiar with this 
legislation. I don't serve on the Health, Education, Labor, and 
Pensions Committee. I have friends who do. I have friends who couldn't 
be here today but who have asked me to voice objection on their behalf.
  On behalf of the senior Senator from Tennessee, Senator Alexander, I 
object.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Objection is heard.
  The Senator from Wisconsin.
  Ms. BALDWIN. Mr. President, my message to my colleagues on the other 
side of the aisle today is simple: If you will continue to object to my 
proposal to help shore up the PBGC and the proposals from me and other 
Democratic colleagues to put failing multiemployer pensions back on 
solid ground, then please bring up your own plans. Bring your ideas to 
the table, and let's work together to solve this pension crisis and 
protect the retirement security of Americans because just objecting to 
our plans is not an option for the 25,000 workers and retirees I am 
representing here today. Doing nothing is not an option. If we don't 
act, we will be breaking a promise made to 1.5 million workers and 
retirees nationwide. Pension promises must be kept.
  Once again, I will say Washington needs to act, and we need to do it 
now.
  I yield back.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Utah.


                  Unanimous Consent Request--H.R. 1044

  Mr. LEE. Mr. President, I rise yet again today to speak about an 
issue near and dear to my heart and an issue that has become the focus 
of many of my passions here in the Senate, and that is the Fairness for 
High-Skilled Immigrants Act. This is an important and overwhelmingly 
bipartisan piece of legislation. It is a piece of legislation that 
passed the House in July by an overwhelming vote of 365 to 65.
  Two of these things should strike the American people as remarkable: 
No. 1, that something with that much of a bipartisan margin passed in 
the House of Representatives, and No. 2, that it deals with 
immigration, and it was still that overwhelmingly bipartisan.
  As I explained in this Chamber before, the concept of this 
legislation is simple. Our current method for allocating green cards 
caps the total number of green cards that nationals of any one country 
may receive. In practice, this results in severe de facto 
discrimination on the basis of country of origin. Immigrants from 
countries with large populations are restricted to receiving the same 
number of visas as immigrants from smaller countries. Their wait times 
have ballooned, in some cases stretching out literally for decades. The 
problem compounds over time, and it has become even more unfair than it 
was many decades ago when it was first enacted into law.
  I repeat, this happens for absolutely no reason other than the 
country in which the immigrant was born. Let's say that two 
immigrants--one from India and the other from Germany--with the exact 
same skills, the exact same degrees, and the exact same job experience 
apply at the same hour of the same day for an employment-based green 
card. The German might wait maybe 12 months to receive a green card. 
Well, the Indian applicant will almost certainly wait a decade or far 
more. This kind of system is antithetical to American values and to the 
interest our country has in recruiting the very best and the very 
brightest from around the world irrespective of race, religion, or 
country of origin.
  It is simply unacceptable that in 2019 our immigration system still 
contains country-of-origin discrimination as a defining feature. The 
per-country caps simply must go. They are wrong. They were never good 
policy. Whatever policy they might have had in mind decades ago, it 
escapes me--except, in fact, that the policy itself was wrong at the 
outset. It has become more wrong over time as these problems have 
compounded.
  The obviousness of the moral error embedded within this legislation 
is more profound and easily visible today than it has ever been. If you 
were to describe this to anyone, they would scratch their head and say: 
Why would you want to do that unless you are engaging in some type of 
discrimination that we as a country understandably abandoned a long 
time ago and should no longer embrace?
  The harm inflicted by any kind of invidious discrimination, whether 
it be on the basis of race or sex or country of origin, does not exist 
simply in the abstract, in the ether; the human suffering caused by it 
happens to be real and heartbreaking.
  Although, in the time we have here this afternoon to discuss this, I 
am sure I can't come anywhere close to doing justice to all the people 
who are being harmed by the per-country cap system, I would like to 
share at least a few of their stories so that you understand how this 
law operates. I find that when you tell stories about a law, people 
understand the law and they understand what needs to change about the 
law a lot more than they would have otherwise.
  Agna Hingu is a registered nurse who lives in South Jordan, UT, 
currently working at a nonprofit healthcare organization in Utah. She 
received her bachelor's degree in this country. She has lived in this 
country for the past 10 years. Languishing in the decade-long backlog, 
she is now being forced to consider leaving the United States due to 
the continuous uncertainty of her immigration status and the incessant 
renewals of temporary visas. If she leaves, she will take her talents 
and her training with her, depriving Utah's residents of a smart, 
skilled, kind, and caring nurse.
  Ashish Patel first came to Utah legally in 2005 on a temporary high-
skilled work visa. Since that time, he has worked hard at his job, paid 
taxes, followed the law, got married, and had two kids, both of whom 
were born as American citizens. In February of 2011, Mr. Patel's 
petition to earn a green card was approved. Despite this and despite 
the fact that 8, going on 9 years have now elapsed, his green card 
remains unissued. Why? Well, solely because of the arbitrary, wrong, 
discriminatory per-country caps. Ashish Patel is still in the backlog 
even as immigrants of other countries who have applied years and years 
after he did and years and years after he received his approval have 
already been granted permanent resident status. If Mr. Patel had 
emigrated from any country in the world other than India, he would 
already have his green card today.
  Dr. Chaitanya Mamillapalli is an endocrinologist who has been serving 
in central Illinois for the past 9 years. He came to the United States 
in 2007. He will likely not receive his green card for at least another 
decade. His daughter was 1 year old when she came with her parents to 
this country. In a few years, she will age out of her temporary visa, 
and Dr. Mamillapalli will face a decision that confronts many people 
stuck in the backlog community: Does he separate from his daughter as 
she loses her temporary status, or does he abandon his life in the 
United States in order to keep his family together?
  Dr. Priya Shanmugam lives in Louisiana and is an aerospace engineer 
who studied at the University of Alabama and at UCLA. She dreams of 
working for NASA. After 13 years in the backlog, she is still waiting 
for a green card. As a result of that, she cannot fulfill her dream of 
joining America's space team and helping put the first person on Mars. 
Until she finally gets her green card, our country will continue to 
lose out on her talent.
  Dr. Krishnendu Roy is a professor of computer science and head of the 
Department of Computer Science at Valdosta State University in Georgia. 
He studied for his degree in Louisiana and has lived in the United 
States for over 16 years. During that time, he shaped the lives of 
countless students in Georgia through the classes he teaches by 
organizing computing camps for K-12 students and by mentoring the 
robotics team in his community. He has followed the law, and he has 
done exactly what is required of him under our immigration system in 
order to earn his green card. Yet he remains stuck in the

[[Page S5873]]

backlog, with no end to his wait in sight.
  Dr. Sri Obulareddy is an oncologist working just outside Dickinson, 
ND, who came to the United States in 2006. She moved to North Dakota 
because the area is experiencing a shortage of specialized physicians. 
Her impact on the community has been invaluable. Recently, she tried to 
return from a trip to India, but approval for her visa was delayed for 
6 weeks, forcing her patients to travel as far as 100 miles as they 
scrambled the find a temporary physician. The pain this caused her 
patients would never have come about if she had not been subjected to 
an arbitrary, discriminatory cap based on her country of origin and had 
already received her green card.

  Ash Kannan lives in Oklahoma. His story is a heartbreaking example of 
the devastating effects of the long wait for a green card and the 
effects that a family can endure under this system. Ash and his wife 
lost their toddler son to a congenital disease about 3 years ago. The 
illness that took their son could have been treated had they been able 
to move to a different home, one closer to the medical facility that 
provided the necessary treatment. They were unable to do so, and their 
son was thus unable to receive the care he required, that he needed, 
because Ash was forced to remain with the same employer while he waited 
in the green card backlog and, consequently, was unable to move.
  These are just some of the names and stories of some of the hard-
working, law-abiding immigrants who have come to the United States to 
build lives and to contribute to our communities but who have been told 
that because of the countries in which they were born, they have to 
wait decades in the green card backlog before they can start living the 
American dream.
  These stories stir us to action, and they darned well should. They 
should remind us that while policymaking is often messy and 
complicated, it is sometimes simple and straightforward because 
sometimes you stumble across something that is a good idea. Sometimes 
you stumble across something that was a bad idea that was put into law 
decades ago that should be taken out of the law. Sometimes the solution 
to our problems is clear and beyond question. In those cases, all we 
need is the will to act.
  I have yet to hear someone offer a reasoned defense of the per-
country caps as meritorious or sound public policy on their own terms, 
and that is because there is no such defense, at least not one that 
anyone would be willing to defend in public. Country-of-origin 
discrimination, whether it be in our immigration system, in our justice 
system, in the employment context, or in housing, is wrong and 
inconsistent with the values upon which our country was founded. It 
becomes even more repugnant when its human consequences are as obvious 
and tragic and focused on people of a particular country of origin as 
they are here.
  With respect to the ancestors of the people now serving in this body, 
what if there had been something in place that had arbitrarily and 
unfairly discriminated against people from England, Ireland, Scotland, 
Wales, Denmark, or other countries from which people have been 
immigrating to America for centuries?
  We should think about that for a moment and think about how we would 
never have been able to have enjoyed the blessings of America. I think 
it is equally wrong for us to identify a single country that we punish, 
that we exclude uniquely against other countries of origin in the 
context of employment-based immigrant visas.
  I understand and recognize that while the per-country caps themselves 
are completely indefensible--and they are--some people have concerns 
about how eliminating the caps might impact fraud and abuse within the 
H-1B system. That is a legitimate concern.
  To address those very concerns in this Congress, I have negotiated 
with Senator Grassley an amendment to the Fairness for High-Skilled 
Immigrants Act to include some new protections for American workers in 
how we process applications for H-1B visas.
  The amendment does three things. First, the Grassley amendment would 
strengthen the Department of Labor's ability to investigate and enforce 
labor application requirements. In addition, it reforms the labor 
condition application process to ensure the complete and adequate 
disclosure of information regarding the employers' H-1B hiring 
practices. Finally, it closes off loopholes by which employers could 
otherwise circumvent the annual cap on H-1B visa workers.
  These are important and worthy reforms that I was happy to add to the 
bill. Indeed, we saw an example just last month of the positive impact 
these reforms would have. In September, Immigration and Customs 
Enforcement announced a $2.5 million settlement with an Indian 
consulting firm for H-1B visa fraud. That firm was exploiting the so-
called ``B-1 in lieu of H-1B'' loophole. One of the new provisions we 
added to the bill this Congress would help close that specific 
loophole.
  Importantly, the Grassley amendment, like the underlying bill, 
consists of provisions that have long enjoyed support from Members of 
both sides of the aisle. They are drawn primarily from an H-1B reform 
bill that has been championed by both Senator Grassley and Senator 
Durbin. They are also modeled, in large part, on an amendment to the 
Fairness for High-Skilled Immigrants Act that Senator Schumer 
negotiated with Senator Grassley in a previous Congress.
  I am grateful that Senator Grassley was able to come to the table and 
work with me and others in good faith on a reasonable compromise to 
this bill. I believe the deal we struck is a fair and even-handed way 
to address longstanding concerns about our H-1B system, while 
eliminating country-of-origin discrimination in how we allocate skills-
based green cards.
  As I have said in the past, there is no question that immigration, if 
not the single most politically fraught issue, is one of the most 
politically fraught issues in Congress right now. That makes it all the 
more important for us to at least come together to get something done 
in those areas in which we can find common ground. It is a little bit 
like eating an elephant. You can't swallow the whole thing at once, 
either the elephant or the donkey. You have to do it one bite at a 
time. Why not start with an area in which there is broad-based, 
bipartisan agreement? That is what this bill is. The Fairness for High-
Skilled Immigrants Act is an important step toward common ground.
  Unquestionably, there are broader debates on immigration policy being 
had in Congress and across the country right now. Some wish to reform 
our immigration system by increasing the number of green cards we issue 
while others wish to move to a more merit-based system. That debate is 
almost certainly not going to be resolved this day, today, or this 
month or this year or, perhaps, even during this Congress.
  Notably, however, many Senators on both sides of that debate--ardent 
champions of both liberal and conservative immigration reforms, who 
ordinarily could not be farther apart when it comes to immigration 
policy--are cosponsors of the Fairness for High-Skilled Immigrants Act. 
The reason this is the case is that they recognize that regardless of 
what else we might do to reform our immigration system, country-of-
origin discrimination is outdated, outmoded, immoral, morally 
indefensible, and inconsistent with our values. It is also a problem 
that we can solve right now.
  The other reason the Fairness for High-Skilled Immigrants Act has 
been so successful in attracting support from both sides of the aisle 
and from every end along the political continuum is that we have 
scrupulously avoided the typical poison pill provisions that so often 
doom attempts at immigration reform. We have also quite carefully 
avoided this becoming about so many things that it is going to become 
controversial no matter what.
  This bill is not comprehensive immigration reform. It is not anything 
close to that. That is, in fact, why this bill is something that we can 
get done right now. It is the reason it was able to pass the House of 
Representatives with 365 votes.
  While it does not fix many of the other flaws that plague other 
components of our broken, outdated, outmoded, Elvis Presley, Buddy 
Holly-era immigration law system, it is a great and important step 
toward reform. If we are ever going to have a chance at

[[Page S5874]]

modernizing and repairing our immigration laws, we need to recognize 
that we cannot necessarily solve all of our problems at once. The fact 
that this is the case should not stand in our way of starting the work 
the American people sent us here to do.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on the 
Judiciary be discharged from further consideration of H.R. 1044 and 
that the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration. I ask unanimous 
consent that the Lee amendment at the desk be agreed to, that the bill, 
as amended, be considered read a third time and passed, and that the 
motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  The Senator from Illinois.
  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, in reserving the right to object, as I 
understand it, we have only 6 minutes until the rollcall vote, and I 
don't want to inconvenience my colleagues.
  I would like to ask permission from the Senator of Utah to make my 
unanimous consent request the first item of business after the rollcall 
vote is announced.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection to the Senator for 
Illinois' request?
  Mr. LEE. Mr. President, in reserving the right to object, I want to 
make sure I understand that the Senator wants to make his live UC 
request after the rollcall vote.
  Mr. DURBIN. That is correct.
  Mr. LEE. There is no objection.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Is there objection to the original request?
  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, in reserving the right to object, I would 
say the following: I have been on the floor of the Senate more often 
than any other Senator to ask for immigration reform. Our system is 
broken. As we debate this important issue, the Galleries are filled 
with people who are following this debate personally because it 
literally affects their lives and their families and their futures. 
This Senator has been willing to move forward on comprehensive 
immigration reform. Sadly, the Senator on the other side has not 
supported that. I hope he will consider doing it.
  In the meantime, though, what are we going to do about the current 
issue of an annual quota of no more than 140,000 EB immigrant visas and 
more than 500,000 applicants of Indian descent who are asking for 
permission to move forward with EB-2 green cards and their lives?
  What the Senator from Utah has suggested is that we shouldn't 
increase the 140,000 annual cap. I think that is wrong. If you follow 
Senator Lee's proposal and do exactly what he says--give these visas 
only to those who are waiting in line who are of Indian descent and 
give no visas to the rest of the world--in 10 years, there will still 
be over 165,000 people of Indian descent waiting in line, and the rest 
of the world will have been excluded. This is unfair. It doesn't make 
sense.
  I will offer a unanimous consent request to lift that 140,000 cap, 
and within 5 years, all who are waiting in line will get their chances 
for green cards--5 years--but not at the expense of the rest of the 
world. Let's do this in a fair fashion. While we are at it, it is 
unfair that your spouses and children are being counted when it comes 
to the 140,000. My bill exempts that. They are no longer going to be 
bound by any quota.
  Secondly, if your children are aging out, if they are reaching the 
age of 21--a new legal status and new worries for you and your family--
I eliminate that problem completely. My approach is one that will solve 
the problem by lifting the legal immigration for talented people like 
many who have gathered here today.
  The Senator from Utah says he can't support that. I hope he will 
reconsider. Lifting that cap is what we need to do--lifting the country 
quotas, making certain that those in line finally get their chances. 
This is all within 5 years, which is something the underlying bill does 
not do. So I hope the Senator from Utah will agree to my bill that I 
will be offering as an alternative after this rollcall vote.
  I object to this bill.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Objection is heard.
  The Senator from Utah.
  Mr. LEE. Mr. President, how much time remains?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. There are 2 minutes remaining.
  Mr. LEE. Mr. President, I will be brief.
  Just as the per-country cap system is a quintessential example of the 
poorly designed, broken system and of what a poorly designed broken 
system looks like, the objection that we have heard today is, I fear, 
emblematic of the broken state of affairs that we face when it comes to 
the immigration process.
  I mentioned earlier that one of the reasons this bill has been able 
to achieve as much support and as many cosponsors as it has and why it 
was able to pass the House of Representatives with 365 votes is that we 
have avoided poison pill efforts. The adjustment of the overall numbers 
that my friend and distinguished colleague from Illinois has proposed 
would doom this bill. He knows that it would doom this bill.
  To what avail? To what end? What good would it do to doom this bill?
  The fact still remains that regardless of where we put the overall 
number for employment-based green cards, we still have a problem in 
that we are treating people from India unfairly, arbitrarily, and 
discriminatorily. This has impacts everywhere. In Illinois today, there 
are over 40,000 green card applicants, plus their spouses and children, 
who are stuck in an interminable green card backlog that is morally 
indefensible.
  We must change this. I hope and I encourage my colleague to change 
his mind. We can pass this today. We could make our country a better 
place as a result.
  Thank you.
  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, is there any time remaining?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. There is no time remaining.

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