[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 149 (2003), Part 13]
[House]
[Pages 17923-17929]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                     CRITICAL ISSUES FACING AMERICA

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Feeney). Under the Speaker's announced 
policy of January 7, 2003, the gentleman from Colorado (Mr. Tancredo) 
is recognized for half the time until midnight, approximately 40 
minutes, as the designee of the majority leader.
  Mr. TANCREDO. Mr. Speaker, I first of all want to start off my 
comments tonight by saying I guess I am pleased to say and proud to say 
that there is a young man that I want to pay tribute to for just a 
moment, and his name is Randy Gifford. He is in California right now. 
He has had a number of really very exciting things happen in the near 
past because one is that he had his first child. He and his dear wife 
have given birth to a young boy by the name of Gabriel, and that was 
just the beginning of a lot of really good things that have been 
happening to them recently; and in fact I just found out a little bit 
ago that he had his first film, the first film that he has written and 
directed accepted to be debuted at the Breckenridge Film Festival in 
Colorado, and I have no doubt that this talented young man will soon be 
looking back at this particular accomplishment as the first step in a 
journey that is going to be a very successful one and one that he can 
look back on with great pride. I look at it with great pride because he 
is my son.
  I wanted to discuss a number of things tonight, and so many issues 
come to the fore, so many important decisions need to be made by this 
Congress and so many challenging issues confront us that it is hard to 
pick from this panoply of different agendas which one we should focus 
on. I certainly will talk about immigration. It is always a topic that 
I think needs to be discussed and needs to be dealt with in the light 
of day, but before that let me just talk about a couple of other 
things.
  And I listened to my colleagues on the other side tonight discuss 
their concerns with regard to Iraq, and really a lot of what they said 
boiled down to a concern, I guess, over the veracity of the 
administration and whether our goals, the goals of the United States as 
set out by the President of the United States were legitimate. Was the 
President being truthful? Was this some sort of scam, I guess, that was 
being played on the American public? To actually put men and women of 
this country, our young men and women who serve us so well in the Armed 
Forces, would we really place them at risk if we were not sure, if we 
did not believe with all our hearts that the vital interests of the 
United States were at risk? And I certainly understand that there can 
be questions about the authenticity of information that we received, 
whether or not the information that was received from all the various 
sources from which we gathered information were legitimate and what 
weight we should have put on some sources and some decisions as opposed 
to others. All that is of course legitimate fodder for discussion and 
debate.
  At a certain point it does sound, as I listened to my friends on the 
other side talk about this issue, that there is something that 
motivates them that perhaps goes beyond that desire for a legitimate 
understanding of exactly what happened and what were the circumstances 
that brought us to where we are today. I must admit to a certain extent 
it does seem like what is underlying the rhetoric is an overwhelming 
desire to find something wrong, to find something out that is bad, that 
is negative, that would perhaps lead to some sort of political change 
in this Nation, and that at some point in time it does sound to me like 
that desire supersedes all of the other desires and that the quest for 
legitimate inquiry is left behind in the dust and the desire to make 
political hay takes hold.
  And there is so much that can be said, and there are so many little 
technical points here and there; and I think that the administration 
and especially Secretary Rumsfeld, who I saw on television over the 
weekend, had done such a great job in explaining in very simple terms, 
in very common sense ways, in very honest analysis what we believe

[[Page 17924]]

to be the case, how we got the information we got, how that information 
led to a series of decisions that eventually meant a commitment of U.S. 
forces in Iraq.
  By the way, those of us who are in the position having to vote to 
support that decision, none of us come to that place, I think, easily. 
Certainly I know I did not. I do not think there is a Member of this 
Congress, frankly, who cavalierly cast a vote on something like that. 
And all of us wonder, and certainly I do, whenever I have to cast a 
vote to send someone's children off to war, I have to think about 
whether or not I am willing to send my son Randy or his brother Ray, 
and this is the highest possible standard I can imagine for any of us; 
but it is the standard we should all use because of course it is 
perhaps somewhat easier to vote to send someone else's children off to 
war than it is one's own; so we have to think about this very 
carefully: Am I willing to do this? Are the risks to the Nation so 
great that we would actually commit our forces?

                              {time}  2245

  I believed, and I still believe, that the risks were that great. But 
it was not easy. It was not easy. Because I do not for a moment think 
that American power should be projected around the world in a cavalier 
fashion; and I believe that, for the most part, this country, under 
this President, has committed American troops only after it became 
apparent that that was the only option available to us and that it was 
in the pursuit of legitimate and laudable goals, both in the defense of 
the United States and the liberation of the people of Iraq.
  Interestingly, we see e-mails from the troops on the ground in Iraq, 
we see alternate sources of news, I guess I should say, on the Internet 
and even some of the popular media that portray a completely different 
picture of what is going on in Iraq today than what the popular media 
portrays. Every day the popular media suggests that things are falling 
apart in Iraq, that our involvement there is not turning out to be a 
positive thing. And certainly, every day, the most unfortunate news 
that we receive is that some American has either been hurt or wounded, 
hurt or killed in Iraq, and this is, especially to the family of those 
folks who have been wounded or killed, this is the ultimate in the 
sacrifice that this Nation has made and has asked them to make. So for 
them, it is everything.
  We must, however, try to put it in perspective and understand what it 
is that we are trying to gain, what it is that we are trying to do 
there and who the enemy really is. And that is a very, very wide-
ranging question, who the enemy really is and what it is we are trying 
to accomplish.
  But I think that the goals were laudable. I believe that our 
President operated with the best information available to him and made 
a decision and, although a very difficult one, I believe he made it 
with his heart in the right place.
  Not too long ago, Mr. Speaker, I heard of an exchange between 
Secretary of State Colin Powell and the Archbishop of Canterbury; and, 
in a way, I think this exchange sums up in a very succinct way what it 
is that motivates America today and what has motivated America for most 
of its history in terms of any sort of foreign policy goals. I think we 
can be proud of what it is that we have either accomplished or are 
trying to accomplish. Because it is not for territorial gain. It is not 
for any sort of economic gain. It is not for that that America extends 
its power around the world, or projects its power around the world, or 
risks its men and women. And in this exchange that I mentioned, I think 
again it characterizes it better than I ever, ever could in any other 
words.
  The Archbishop of Canterbury said to Secretary of State Colin Powell, 
and I am having to paraphrase here, because I do not have the exact 
quote, but it was very close to this. He said, isn't it true, Mr. 
Secretary, that the war in Iraq is nothing more than a desire on the 
part of the United States to extend its hegemony around the world and 
to maybe even, as an imperialistic power, gain control of other lands 
and places and people? And Secretary of State Powell said, Archbishop, 
you know, over the last hundred years or so, the United States has sent 
its young men and women off to defend freedom in far-off lands all over 
the world, and many of them did not come back. And the only thing we 
ever asked for in return, he said, the only land we ever wanted in 
return for that expenditure of our blood was the land necessary to bury 
the folks who did not return. And I think that is the truth about 
America.
  I think that it is something that we can be proud of. It is 
unfortunate that lives have to be expended in the quest for our own 
peace and security, but that is the nature of this world. I do believe 
with all my heart that we are in another very, very dangerous and very 
challenging battle, and it may be called a clash of civilizations. I 
happen to believe that it is. There are many people who would challenge 
that, I am sure, and want to characterize what is happening is as just 
a series of small engagements here and there brought about by 
individuals who have ``hijacked a religion.'' I believe it is more 
serious than that, and I believe that the battle is bigger than that. I 
believe it is a clash of civilizations.
  I believe western civilization is, in fact, at stake. The values, the 
principles that we stand for are being challenged around the world, and 
they are at risk. And it is extremely important for Americans to 
understand what is at risk and why we fight. Because if it is not for 
what I have just said, then the fight may be in vain and lives expended 
for naught. But if the fight is for what I suggest it is, then it is 
worth the endeavor. It is even worth the thought that we have to send 
our own off to war.
  Now what worries me about the kind of discussion we have had on the 
floor tonight and has been happening almost every week certainly for 
the last several weeks by members of the other party is that in a way, 
as I say, to the extent that they are trying to simply make sure that 
the decisions that were made were good ones or what information we may 
have made those decisions upon was faulty or good, all of that is 
appropriate, and I do not for a moment suggest that it should not be a 
discussion on the floor of the House. But after a while it begins to 
play into the hands of those people who, in fact, do hope for the 
demise of this civilization and of our country in particular, because 
we represent its best and brightest hope.
  So it is important for us, after all the rhetoric is done, all of the 
partisan snipes have been made, sniping has been made, that we revisit 
this basic underlying fact: that there is a challenge to the United 
States of America and to western civilization. It is posed by radicals, 
Islamists, people who cannot see a world in which they can coexist with 
western ideals, the ideals of individual freedom, the rule of law, and 
the ability for men and women to select from whatever they want to 
select from to follow, the dictates of their heart when it comes to a 
religion that they choose to adhere to. These things are true. The 
evidence is there. Thousands of Americans are dead in this battle and 
are dead at the hands of the people who are trying to accomplish what I 
have just described, the overthrow of western civilization and of the 
United States in particular.
  So please keep that in mind. Let us put this in perspective. The 
threat is real. The challenge is enormous. And it is incumbent upon 
every one of us to tell America what is at stake. It is incumbent upon 
every one of us to talk about the values that we should cherish and, 
for the most part, do cherish. It is incumbent upon the President and 
the Members of this body to tell the American people that there are 
things, in fact, worth defending, that there are principles worth 
risking life and limb for. And this thing in Iraq, this battle in Iraq 
is just a battle in a war, a war that is going to be fought for a long 
time, a war that will claim many more lives, unfortunately, and 
depressingly.
  But that is the truth, and not facing it head on leaves us open to a 
very, I think, corrosive sort of influence that I hope we can avoid. 
Because, in fact, as I say, the stakes are great. The risk is

[[Page 17925]]

great. So it is important I think for us all to put that into 
perspective when we listen to the rhetoric of our friends on the other 
side of the aisle.
  Western civilization and America in particular is worth fighting for. 
It is worth saving. It is the best and greatest hope of mankind, I 
believe. And people should be willing to say that here on this floor 
and from the White House and in the media. It is worth fighting for.
  Now, let me go on to several other topics, if I could. When we talk 
about what is worth fighting for and where to commit American troops, 
there is another issue that is developing right now and it is the 
debate over whether or not we should be sending troops to Liberia as 
``peacekeepers.'' Well, there is not a lot of peace in Liberia to keep 
right now. We would have to create it. This is the difference. I mean, 
we have to ask ourselves. This is the question that I think is 
incredibly legitimate: What are the vital interests of the United 
States that are at stake in Liberia? Is it a place of great human 
rights abuses? It is undeniably that. Are there places throughout the 
world where those abuses are just as great if not greater? Undeniably 
so. Are there places on the African continent where human rights abuses 
are even greater than in Liberia? Absolutely so.
  I think, of course, immediately of Sudan, a country with which I have 
some intimate knowledge, having traveled there, having been the sponsor 
of the Sudan Peace Act and having committed as much as any other Member 
of this Congress to bringing an end to that conflict in that war-torn 
nation. But never in the discussion of the problems in Sudan did I ever 
suggest putting American troops in there because, of course, I could 
not see that, in fact, it did rise to that level, that it rose to the 
level of a situation that placed American vital interests at stake. I 
want to do everything I can, everything possible to bring an end to the 
conflict there and an end to the conflict in Liberia. But American 
troops I do not believe should go there.
  I do not believe that American troops should have been used in 
Bosnia. I would not have voted for it. I must admit to my colleagues 
that I believed it was an adventure that we should not have embarked 
upon, even though there were horrendous atrocities there. I did not see 
where it was in the interests of the United States. What was the threat 
from Bosnia to the United States? I do not believe it existed. And do 
we do what we can to help logistically? Do we send materials? Do we 
send aid? Absolutely. I think that is a laudable goal, again. But it 
does not rise to the level that I mentioned earlier, which is what I 
need to tell me whether or not I will vote to send American men and 
women and/or my own children off to war.
  So I hope we do not commit troops in Liberia, Mr. Speaker.

                              {time}  2300

  I hope that we will do what we can. I hope we will provide what we 
can to the members of the African Union, or to ECOFS, the Economic 
Community of African States. I believe we should, in fact, do what we 
can to support them logistically, but I do not believe that troops are 
necessary there or even would be a good thing for the region.
  Today as we see over and over again by reports continually coming 
back to us even though there are people today in Liberia saying that 
they want Americans there, many of those same folks would, I fear, in a 
short time be saying that they want Americans out and be doing things 
in order to effect that eventual end. So I want an end to the fighting. 
I want to do what we can. I would not sends troops there, and I hope we 
do not.
  Now, that is the kind of foreign policy discussion and I could 
certainly go on at length about each one of these things, but because 
this is that hour where we sometimes have to share the last hour with 
another speaker, my time has been cut in half so I want to get on to 
two more things, and these are on the domestic-policy sides of things. 
I wanted to really make a couple of comments about some things that are 
happening that are, I think, again, worthy of note and certainly issues 
that are becoming quite controversial in the United States.
  Now, we have had a lot of discussion recently about a new provision 
for Medicare that adds $400 billion or so, it could go up to what those 
people suggest is a trillion dollars in cost, to add prescription 
benefits to the Medicare plan. And I am a ``no'' vote, and I do believe 
that it is not the right thing to do. I do not believe we should expand 
this program.
  I believe that Medicare itself is a program that is in desperate need 
of reform and the amount of reform that comes with the bill that we 
talked about earlier, that we passed on this floor earlier, the amount 
of reform is rather small. The amount of mandates for a new program, 
mandatory spending is really high. I just do not think it balances out, 
but I think there is a way to achieve a reduction in the costs of 
prescription drugs for every senior in the United States and that is to 
allow reimportation.
  What does that mean? It means that in Canada and Mexico and other 
countries around the world, drugs are being sold, exactly the same 
drugs are being sold at much lower prices than any American is able to 
buy them at their drug store or pharmacy. So how does that happen?
  It happens that the countries on both sides of the United States have 
laws that restrict the amount that can be charged for drugs. And so you 
say to yourself, well, then why are the pharmaceutical companies 
selling drugs in those countries? Well, they are making a profit they 
say, but not enough of a profit to support all of the research that 
needs to be done and all of the advertising that is being done on 
television in the United States to push their drugs.
  Well, I must tell you that I think that is not a legitimate excuse 
for having the cost of one drug be $1 in one country and $20 in the 
other for a single pill. And I want to let the market dictate the 
actual cost of the drugs and the profit to the companies, and so I 
would allow for reimportation.
  Well, let me tell you what has happened recently. The pharmaceutical 
companies have put on a full court press here because the possibility 
is that this idea of the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Gutknecht), he 
has been the primary sponsor of this concept for quite some time. And 
because it is finally coming to the floor, it is finally raising up to 
a level where people can begin to think about the possibility of it 
passing, the drug companies are going ballistic. And they have gone out 
and sought out all kinds of friends that would not have necessarily 
thought would have been supporters of their side of the coin.
  Earlier this week, the Traditional Values Coalition, an organization 
in which I am certainly familiar and in the past have been supportive, 
they sent out a letter stating that the passage of this Gutknecht bill 
I was telling you about, the drug reimportation bill, would effectively 
repeal the prohibition on mailing abortion products around the world.
  Now, they say that it would allow abortion-inducing drugs to be 
mailed from international locations to individuals in the United States 
who are not pharmacists or doctors. These unscrupulous individuals 
would then be free to mail these abortion-producing drugs throughout 
the Nation to our daughters without parental knowledge.
  This is a direct quote from the mailing that went out from the 
Traditional Values Coalition who I believe, I must tell you, Mr. 
Speaker, I believe they have been co-opted here. And I just wonder to 
what extent they have actually benefited as a result of their decision 
to come in in opposition to the reimportation bill. Have they benefited 
financially? I would like to see whether or not this has been the case, 
because my hunch is they have.
  These mailers were sent out in en masse in a congressional district 
of a number of Members, myself included, who are and have always been 
and will continue to be staunchly pro-life. I have a 100 percent voting 
record on pro-life issues.

[[Page 17926]]

  The gentleman from Minnesota's (Mr. Gutknecht) bill, which the 
Traditional Values Coalition has characterized as the Abortion Drug 
Importation Act, is a pharmaceutical market access bill, completely 
separate from other Federal laws which govern the administration and 
distribution of specific drugs. In fact, if the Gutknecht bill passes, 
RU-486, the abortion bill, will still be governed by the same 
distribution regulations it currently falls under. The idea that under 
the Gutknecht bill pregnant teenagers would be able to mail in for a 
bottle of RU-486 pills as if they were aspirin is political scare-
mongering of the worst and lowest kind.
  Now, I have seen the disinformation mailings that the Traditional 
Values Coalition is sending out. And in addition to being ridiculously 
disingenuous, they are also very slick, very expensive, which begs the 
question: Who is really behind these efforts? The Traditional Values 
Coalition has obtained huge pro-life voting lists which have to be 
purchased to be used by other groups, and targeted conservative pro-
life Members who are in competitive races. Their tactics are 
reprehensible, immoral, unethical, and belie the name of the group. In 
fact, their actions represent anything but traditional values.
  There are, in fact, legitimate arguments to be made both for and 
against the merits of reimportation, but it is ludicrous to suggest 
that it is somehow an abortion issue. I simply wanted to bring that to 
the attention of the body tonight, Mr. Speaker, because I believe with 
all my heart in the concept of, I am a pro-life Member of this body and 
I believe in protecting life at its earliest beginning, at conception. 
And I have voted that way, and I want that to be the culture of this 
country; I want us to be a pro-life Nation. And I worry that actions 
like this taken by the Traditional Values Coalition actually hurt that 
effort because it places the coalition, I think, in a light that it 
should not be seen in, does not want to be seen in.
  I think it implies that they are willing to actually profit from the 
discussion of this, and they want to profit even if they have to fudge 
the facts a little bit. And it does not help them, and it does not help 
our cause. So I am going to join with other Members of the pro-life 
coalition in the House of Representatives to denounce this activity on 
the part of the Traditional Values Coalition and to say in no uncertain 
terms that this kind of lobbying is absolutely unacceptable, and it is 
certainly at the least disingenuous.
  That is the first of the domestic policy issues. And then I suppose 
to no one's surprise, the final domestic policy issue with which I want 
to deal tonight is, of course, immigration. I want to spend a little 
time, the remaining time I have, as a matter of fact, on the discussion 
of one specific aspect of immigration and that is the toll that massive 
immigration is taking on the jobs of Americans, both low-skilled, low-
wage jobs and high-skilled, high-wage jobs, spending a little time on 
the latter, H1B visas in particular.
  H1B visas, I will be using that term quite a bit, and let me explain 
what that means. An H1B visa is simply a category of visa that we hand 
out to people all over the world so that they can come to the United 
States for a specific purpose. In this case, the H1B visas were created 
specifically for sort of high-tech or white collar workers who were 
ostensibly needed in the United States because that industry was 
growing, as you recall, the bubble was expanding dramatically and 
everybody and their brother was making money at it; and there was a lot 
of employment and many of the firms came to us, many of the very high-
tech firms came to this Congress and said, we have to have more people. 
We cannot fill the jobs we have here in the computer sciences, computer 
technology, high-tech jobs; we cannot fill them with people coming out 
of our colleges because there just are not enough.

                              {time}  2310

  There are not enough of them so we need to go outside the country and 
bring people in here for a certain period of time until we can actually 
fill the job with an American citizen, and so Congress responded and 
created something called the H-1B visa. It was expanded in 1999 when 
the Congress raised the cap to 195,000 a year from its previous level 
of about 65,000.
  In 2000, Congress enacted the American Competitiveness and Workforce 
Improvement Act which expanded the program again, contained few 
protections for American workers. Congress was persuaded at the time 
that there was a critical shortage of computer scientists, software 
engineers and programmers.
  Even if that were true and I would tell my colleagues that now we are 
finding out that maybe that was not as accurate as we had hoped, maybe 
some of the testimony that was provided by companies like Sun 
Microsystems when they testified to the Senate and said that they 
really needed these people and that they would never displace American 
workers, apparently it sort of I guess was not true. They are now 
saying, no, that they did, in fact, replace American workers and did so 
because essentially foreign workers will work for less.
  Whatever was the case in 1998, 1996 in terms of the need for this 
particular program, no shortage exists today in the program. No program 
shortage exists in terms of the supply of labor for the high-tech 
industries in America, does not exist. It is not there. No one can 
suggest that there are no American workers today who are seeking jobs 
in the high-tech field because we know that that is not true.
  We know that as a matter of fact that the area that has been hit 
hardest by the drop in the dot com bubble, the burst of that dot com 
bubble I should say, where unemployment ranges maybe 7 to 7.5 percent, 
there is massive unemployment and underemployment of American workers 
in the computer field.
  The number of H-1B visas is supposedly limited by a cap, but that cap 
is often exceeded through loopholes and extensions, and beginning in 
2000, all universities and nonprofits were exempted from the cap. In 
1998, the cap was supposed to be 65,000. Do my colleagues know how many 
actually came in? Two hundred and five thousand. In 1999, the cap was 
115,000. Do my colleagues know how many we took in? Two hundred and 
thirty-four thousand.
  In the year 2000, the cap was 115,000. We took in 294,000. In 2001, 
the cap was 107,000. We took in 384,000. In 2002, when the cap went to 
195,000, we took in 294,100. In 2000, Congress added an exemption for 
universities and nonprofits. As I say, in the 2 years of 2001 and 2002, 
342,000 H-1B visas were issued in this category. If we add to this 
number the number of visas already issued not yet up for renewal, it is 
clear that there are well over 600,000 H-1B visa holders employed in 
2002.
  There are a number of problems with the program as it has been 
operated since it was expanded in 1998. Do we need the program? Is the 
program based on valid analysis of real labor market conditions? I 
would say it is not adequately tied to demonstrated labor shortages in 
the fields of computer science and technology. In fact, in 1996, the 
Department of Labor's Inspector General found that the program does not 
protect workers' jobs. It allows aliens to immigrate based on 
attachment to a specific job and then shops their services in 
competition with equally or more qualified workers without regard to 
the prevailing wage.
  All of these things they are supposed to not be able to do. They are 
not supposed to be able to dislocate any American worker. They are not 
supposed to be able to pay anything less than the going wage, but in 
fact, it has happened continuously and indiscriminately.
  The Department of Labor's certification program does not meet its 
intent of excluding foreign workers when qualified, willing, U.S. 
workers are available. In 2000, a report by the National Research 
Council concluded that there is no analytical base on which to set the 
proper level of H-1B visas and that decisions to increase or reduce the 
cap on such visas are fundamentally political.
  Continuing cries of shortages come from high-tech industry lobbyists, 
yet

[[Page 17927]]

academic and government studies fail to find evidence of any shortage. 
A National Research Council report in 2001 concluded that the H-1B 
visas have an adverse impact on wage levels. According to estimates 
among professionals in the field, there are at least 800,000 unemployed 
and underemployed computer technicians and programmers in the United 
States of America. Could it be that there is a relationship between 
this number and the 1,300,000 plus H-1B visas now in this country?
  The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics report that unemployment among 
electronics engineers has soared to 7 percent. Among computer hardware 
engineers the rate is 6.5 percent. The Institute of Electrical and 
Electronics Engineers says that these employees lost 241,000 jobs over 
the past 2 years, and computer scientists and systems analysts lost 
175,000 jobs.
  One of the Nation's leading academic experts on the computer science 
industry, Dr. Norman Matloff of the University of California at Davis, 
has demonstrated that there is no shortage of U.S. workers to fill 
these jobs. A UCLA study cited by Dr. Matloff shows that H-1B workers 
are paid 30 percent less than comparable Americans, and a Cornell 
University Study found that this difference is 20 to 30 percent.
  Remember, this was started out to be a temporary program. It was 
supposed to be a response to a temporary labor shortage in the computer 
science industry. Yet, by its structure, it has become a way for 
foreign workers to enter our labor market and then take up permanent 
residence.
  The 3-year term of the H-1B visa can be renewed for a second 3-year 
term for a total of 6 years. After 3 years, the worker can begin his 
petition for a change in status to permanent resident, and hundreds of 
thousands have done that. A 6-year term is not a temporary visa, and it 
ought to be changed to a single 2-year term that is not renewable. In 
fact, this whole program ought to be abolished. There is no need for 
it, and you cannot prove it.


                Announcement by the Speaker Pro Tempore

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Gingrey). The Chair wishes to inform the 
gentleman that he will be recognized for an additional 20 minutes.
  Mr. TANCREDO. Mr. Speaker, I thank the Chair.
  We have to ask ourselves, are there adequate worker protections in 
the H-1B visa program? All right. The present program pays lip service 
to worker protection, but in reality an independent study by the 
Department of Labor's own Inspector General has shown that these 
protections are a sham.
  The Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers believes that 
so-called safeguards to prevent employers from laying off workers and 
hiring H-1B employees are ineffective and limited to the employers' 
actions over a 90-day period prior to the hiring of H-1Bs. This 90-day 
rule is easily evaded and must be expanded to 6 months if the program 
is retained. Also, H-1B workers who are laid off must be required to 
return to their country of origin within 60-days.
  A General Accounting Office report found that the training funds 
appropriated and aimed at helping displaced U.S. workers are misused 
and benefit comparatively few U.S. workers.
  Lastly, are the qualifications and experiences of H-1B visa workers 
frequently fraudulent? That is a great question. Accusations that H-1B 
visa applicants often falsify their educational background and 
experience were verified by the State Department's Inspector General. 
Documents are frequently and routinely falsified.
  A yearlong study of the H-1B visa application from the American 
Consulate in India found that 45 percent of the work experience claims 
were fraudulent. There are places in India that they call body shops. 
These are simply companies that are set up for the purpose of creating 
these false documents, false degrees and diplomas and attaching them to 
the H-1B workers, sending them on. Once that worker gets here, it 
really does not matter because no one really comments on it, and they 
become part of our labor pool.

                              {time}  2320

  The Department of Labor Inspector General has averaged 14 indictments 
and 11 convictions in the labor certification program each year since 
1996; and believe me, that is the tiniest tip of the iceberg. The 
program could be amended and reformed and its major abuses corrected, 
but the simple fact is we do not need the program at all. It should be 
repealed, and I have introduced a bill to do just that.
  We could reduce the cap to 25,000 or 35,000; but the truth is we do 
not even need 10,000 new H-1B visas when we have unemployment of 7 
percent among software engineers.
  That is why I have introduced H.R. 2688 to repeal the H-1B program. 
It is now in the Committee of the Judiciary, and I ask for Members' 
support of this measure. I also have to say that this is just an 
example of something that I think needs to be discussed on this floor, 
and the American people have to understand and we need to tell them 
about it. That is the fact that we have embarked, both the Congress of 
the United States and the administration, and this is not new, this has 
been a long time in coming, we have embarked upon a cheap labor 
program. We have decided that it is in the best interests of someone, 
certainly the corporations, especially the high-tech corporations, to 
do what is necessary to reduce the wage rates of American workers who 
were employed in that industry.
  We have testimony, we have hundreds and hundreds of examples, we have 
tons of empirical evidence to show that the whole H-1B program is a 
fraud and that the idea that it came as a result of some need that 
still exists is ludicrous. So why are we still doing it? Why do we 
allow the 1 million or more H-1B visa holders who are living here 
essentially illegally, why do we allow them to stay? One reason, Mr. 
Speaker. It is because the high-tech corporations of this country have 
opposed it. They have put a great deal of their money into lobbying 
against any reversal of this program and of the whole philosophy of 
cheap labor.
  Maybe it is something that we cannot avoid that we will be forced, 
that all American workers will be forced to lower their wages, lower 
their standard of living to meet the competitors around the word who 
are competing for these jobs. If that is it, I want somebody who 
believes that to stand up and tell the American people that is where we 
are going and they will have to take less money for what they are 
doing, what they want to do for the rest of their lives, the jobs they 
are involved in, or become underemployed or unemployed. Maybe they have 
to sell their homes and get a smaller house and their whole standard of 
living has to change because of this whole new world economy.
  If that is the case, and I do not believe it is, but if that is what 
we believe to be the case, tell the American people that is what we are 
doing. Do not hide it under these things called temporary worker visas 
that are necessary because of the great demand that exists for these 
jobs and the low supply of labor in the United States to fill that 
demand, because that is absolutely and clearly a sham. It is a lie that 
is untrue, and we should not continue to perpetrate that lie.
  We have talked about the problems with the massive immigration into 
this country, specifically in the area of jobs and what it has done to 
the labor markets. We concentrated for a long time on low-skilled, low-
wage workers and what the effect of massive immigration of folks in 
that particular category meant to low-skilled, low-wage workers here. 
Guess what it is. This is not brain surgery, as they say.
  It is pretty simple to understand that if you bring millions of 
people into this country every single year who have very few skills, 
that they are going to compete with other low-skilled, low-wage workers 
in America. And these are primarily recent immigrants. But even those 
people who have been here for many years because, unfortunately, many 
times people who are in the minority communities who are stuck in these 
low-wage jobs, they are the most negatively affected by massive 
immigration because it is their jobs that are at risk, and it is their 
wages that go down. It is a cheap labor policy.

[[Page 17928]]

  Yet we hear from both sides of the aisle how we need to encourage 
this phenomenon. From the Democrats who are petrified of actually 
impeding the flow of illegal immigrants into this country, or legal 
immigrants, for fear that their voting constituent rolls would be 
impaired negatively, that the numbers would not be rising as quickly as 
they would like of potential voters for the Democratic Party, because 
they fear that political outcome and because a significant chunk of 
their supporters come from immigrant groups and immigration groups that 
want to expand immigration into the country, because that is the case, 
they will do nothing to impede this flow.
  On my side of the aisle there is this desire for cheap labor. We want 
to respond to the needs of corporations in this country that have 
lobbied so hard to get cheaper labor. Well, both of these agendas I 
think are unworthy of our efforts. Both sides of the aisle should think 
about something that is far more important than the immediate political 
future of either party, and that is the effect of this kind of massive 
immigration, legal and illegal, on the people of this country.
  Is it right and proper that our own Nation's borders should be porous 
so as to allow the flow of millions of people into this country to take 
the jobs of American citizens, to force people either to work for less 
money than they were working for just a few years ago or be unemployed, 
in order to achieve these political goals that I have just described, 
cheap labor and greater political benefit, greater potential voter 
pool? I think it is despicable, Mr. Speaker; but that is exactly where 
we are. That is exactly where we are because there is no other way that 
you can possibly explain this phenomenon.
  How can we explain the fact that maybe 70 percent of the population 
consistently tells pollsters that they are in desperate need and they 
have a great desire for control of immigration, for securing our 
borders, for even reducing the amount of legal immigration so we can 
actually integrate those people, the millions that have come in in the 
recent past?
  People say we are a Nation of immigrants. In this Nation's past we 
have had periods of high immigration, but we have had periods of very 
low immigration. It has been cyclical. It has not been a constantly 
increasing pattern since the day the Nation was founded. There are many 
decades with low-to-almost-nonexistent immigration in terms of the 
ratio of people coming and leaving, and yet the economy actually grew. 
In the late 1940s and early 1950s, immigration was a very small 
percentage of the population growth of this country, and yet we had an 
enormous growth rate in the productivity of the country and in the 
economy itself.

                              {time}  2330

  There are many times in our Nation's history where that has happened. 
We do not need massive immigration to fuel economic growth. We can 
point to the areas, as I say, the times in the past where this economic 
growth has been achieved without massive immigration. We need a time-
out. We need some time to actually in a way, if you will, digest the 
massive numbers of people that have come in and to help them get 
integrated into this country. That has been the process in the past. 
But we are abandoning that for the political goals that I have 
identified here. We are suggesting that we can keep the doors open 
forever, that our borders can and, in fact, should be erased.
  There are people who believe that. I want them to stand up in front 
of this body and defend it. I want them to say that we need to have 
open borders, because that is what they really want.
  I think that it is just, as I said earlier, about the need to tell 
the American people exactly what it is we are involved with even in the 
clash of civilizations. It is important to tell the American people 
what we are involved with in terms of our immigration policy and let 
them make the decision as to whether we are right or wrong, who is 
right or wrong.
  Maybe I am 180 degrees off base. Maybe I am completely wrong about my 
concerns with regard to immigration and the impact it will have on this 
country, the negative impact. Let us get it debated. I want somebody to 
stand up and say, no. In fact, we need to abolish the borders. We need 
to repeal all the laws on immigration. We are just a region. We are not 
really a country at all. Lines on the map, they have become 
anachronistic, not important at all; and, in fact, markets should 
determine the flow of goods and services and people and that is all. 
Markets should determine everything.
  Maybe they have got a case to make. Let them make it to the American 
people. I believe that we have a duty to the people of this Nation to 
tell them exactly what is at stake here, just as I said earlier about 
the war on terrorism, what is at stake.
  Mr. Speaker, I believe with all my heart that massive immigration 
into this country will not only determine what kind of a country we 
become, that is divided, balkanized or united, it will determine 
whether or not we will be a country, a nation, at all. There are folks 
who want us to simply be a place on the earth that has residents, not 
citizens. The whole concept of citizenship is under attack every single 
day.
  Constantly, we are seeing proposals, especially on the other side of 
the aisle but not uniquely from the Democrats, something from our side, 
too, proposals to have amnesty for people who are living here 
illegally, proposals to extend all kinds of benefits to people who are 
living here illegally, proposals to give people who are living here 
illegally, who have violated the laws of the land to come in, proposals 
to say to them, we not only will teach all of your children in K-12, we 
will teach them in higher education at taxpayers' expense, that we will 
give you driver's licenses, that we will give you social service 
benefits, and that we will in fact even let you vote.
  There are places called sanctuary cities popping up all over the 
country, and they are telling their police forces in these cities that 
they are not to cooperate with the INS in any way, shape or form. They 
are telling people in the community that they can come and vote if they 
are simply residents of the community, not citizens of the United 
States but simply residents of a community.
  I ask you, Mr. Speaker, if in fact that is what we are doing, if in 
fact you provide all of the benefits of citizenship to people who are 
not citizens and in fact are not even here legally, then what in the 
world is the value of the word? What is the value of citizenship? It is 
destroyed. It means nothing. That is what is at stake here. It is not 
just jobs. Believe me, if you are one of the folks that is out of work, 
that is a pretty important issue. But it is not even the most important 
issue for the Nation to deal with right now.
  We have got to think about what is the effect of the elimination of 
the concept of citizenship. What does it mean when a nation abandons 
its own borders? What does it mean when it tells people by the millions 
that they should attach themselves not to the principles of the United 
States, the principles of western civilization but they should actually 
hang onto the political and cultural heritage that they came with and 
that they came from, they should keep it, and they should keep the 
language, not become immersed in an English language, not become part 
of the American mosaic but stay separate and distinct. How does that 
benefit us if our goal is to create a continuing American society 
revolving around the ideals on which this Nation was founded?
  And that is important to understand, that this country uniquely was 
founded on ideas, nothing else. No other country has that distinction. 
Ideas are the only thing that holds us together here. It is not 
culture, it is not language, it is not habit, not custom, none of 
those, not the color of our skin, not our ethnicity, none of those 
things do we have in common in this Nation. What holds us together is 
an adherence to principles.
  Mr. Speaker, I fear that that adherence is being destroyed in the 
pursuit, in this incredible desire, I call it the cult of 
multiculturalism that permeates our society, the cult of 
multiculturalism.

[[Page 17929]]

  Multicultural is a term that can be positive in many respects. You 
can explain how important it is to be a diverse country and the value 
of that and all that, and I can certainly understand that. As an 
Italian American, I certainly appreciate my heritage and try to pass it 
on to my children, but I stop far short of suggesting that that 
heritage has anything superior to offer to the American culture that my 
grandparents accepted and desired and had a strong desire to move into 
as quickly as possible. It is the cult of multiculturalism that 
permeates our society, this desire to destroy everything that is good 
about America, to say to children, there is nothing unique about 
America, nothing good about America, that every other society is as 
good if not better, that all cultures, no matter what they do, if they 
force women to be thrown on the funeral pyre of their husband, if they 
stone women for adultery, if they perform various operations on them. 
You can go on and on and on about certain things other cultures do and 
you can say, it's okay, it is just another culture.
  Mr. Speaker, I think that western civilization is superior. I do. I 
believe it is superior. I think it has at least as much to offer, and 
if you do not want to buy that, then consider it has at least to offer 
as any other culture in the world. There are many things that we should 
be prideful of, there are many things that are part of western 
civilization and American culture that we should try to hang on to and 
fight for. It goes back to that first discussion we had tonight. It is 
very hard to make sure that you can do that if your own society is 
being torn apart, being cut up into little pieces, everybody is put 
into victimized classes and told that whatever culture they came from 
was better, was superior and they should hang on to it; politically, 
hang on to it; ethnically, hang on to it; linguistically, hang on to 
it.
  This is not what America was founded on. It has to be discussed, has 
to be brought to the attention of the American public and ask them for 
their opinion and then reflect that opinion here in this body and in 
the White House. This issue has got to be brought up in every debate, 
in every election in the country from city council to the President of 
the United States. It is the overriding domestic issue. It will 
determine where we are as a Nation; and, as I say, it will determine if 
we are a Nation. That is why it is important. That is why I bring it to 
this body night after night as long as I have the voice to do so.

                          ____________________