[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 151 (2005), Part 18]
[House]
[Pages 24821-24827]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                      AMERICA'S IMMIGRATION POLICY

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 4, 2005, the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. King) is recognized for 
60 minutes.
  Mr. KING of Iowa. Mr. Speaker, before I pass this microphone over to 
my good friend and colleague, the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. 
Hayworth), I cannot help but express some of the frustration with 
sitting here and listening to this. I am really grateful that the 
American people do not have the same sentiment that I have heard 
tonight on the floor of Congress.
  When I go to the coffee shop and to the break room in my district, I 
do not hear anything like this rhetoric that I have heard here tonight.
  When I hear that we have cut food stamps, I was involved in that. We 
did not cut food stamps. What we did was we changed the regulations so 
you have to be on some other kind of benefit so there was less fraud. 
There is $1 billion of fraud going into the wrong people in food stamps 
just in the last year that I have a report. We only touched about 20 
percent of the fraud, Mr. Speaker.
  Fuel prices. Help us open up drilling on the outer continental shelf. 
Help us drill in ANWR. Let us develop the energy that we have in this 
country, and we will not be looking at $3 dollar fuel. We know who is 
to blame. It is the environmental extremists. And if Exxon Mobil made 
$10 billion in the last quarter, let us take a look and see where they 
invest it. If they invest it in that drilling, the American people will 
reap the benefits.
  There are a whole series of things here tonight, Mr. Speaker, and 
that frustrates me greatly. But I wanted to talk a little bit about the 
immigration issue.
  I would ask my friend, the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Hayworth) if 
he would pick that issue up.
  Mr. HAYWORTH. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend from Iowa; and before I 
get to the topic at hand, I, too, would like to offer a few 
observations about the preceding presentation in the people's House.
  Those who have heard me speak from time to time know that quite often 
I cite the observation of that great American author, Mark Twain, who 
said, history does not repeat itself, but it rhymes. In the preceding 
hour, here on the floor of the people's House, we may have heard from 
the, quote, 30-Something Coalition, but it was that same old something, 
those tired and shop-worn charges, those assertions that the American 
people can only regard, to put it diplomatically, as unrealistic.
  We heard a Member from Florida talk about cuts in school lunch 
programs. We heard a Member from Massachusetts repeat what was a 
blatantly false charge about Medicare withering on the vine, when in 
fact the discussion had to do with the bureaucrats in a four letter 
organization felony as HICFA.
  Indeed, there are fundamentally different ways to address the 
challenges we confront. My friends on the left honestly and sincerely 
believe that Government is the answer; and though their rhetoric is 
devoid of it, they seem to be concerned with budgets that affect the 
care and feeding and the propagation of Washington bureaucrats and the 
employees' unions they engender rather than solving real problems 
affecting real people.
  It is somewhat mind-boggling to hear the same old charges; and it is 
interesting, the selective memory of those on the left. For it was one 
of their celebrated leaders, John F. Kennedy, who said a rising tide 
lifts all boats, who said that by reducing taxation across the board 
and allowing the American people to save, spend and invest their own 
money economic prosperity can result.
  And that is not a partisan argument, nor was it the sole domain of 
Jack Kennedy. Indeed, whether it was Calvin Coolidge or Jack Kennedy or 
Ronald Reagan or, more recently, George W. Bush, working with this 
governing majority in Congress, letting the American people have and 
keep more of their own money to save, spend and invest, we in fact have 
had an economic rebirth through the difficulties of 9/11, through the 
challenges posed by the natural disasters.
  The American economy continues to grow. Are there challenges? You 
bet. Are there challenges we confront in energy? Absolutely. But the 
key is, as I was happy to offer, tax credits for solar energy in our 
sweeping energy bill, as many of us have embraced and asked us to take 
a look at new technologies, neither do we abandon the notion of 
maximizing existing supplies, using rational conservation and moving 
forward.
  Of course, it cannot begin to compare with outlandish charges. This 
gets to the crux of the challenge. We have an awesome responsibility. 
It is to help govern this country. Our friends on the left, be they 30-
something, or 40-something or 50-something, or 60-something, choose not 
to join us in governing. They choose to carp and complain and issue 
malicious and libelous charges. They offer no plan. They offer 
complaints.
  In stark contrast, our governing majority has a plan to bring budget 
reform that results in real savings. And yet, even as they decry what 
they call fiscal irresponsibility, they attack the reform process that 
results in real savings.
  One note about the incorrect information on student loans. We 
actually increased money going to students. We tightened down the 
margins on the lenders. We do not hurt the students. But, of course, 
our friends on the left always equate compassion with the amount of 
money taken from the American people to go to Washington bureaucrats; 
and I believe, regardless of the age, regardless of the time, that is 
precisely the wrong formula. Just as they mistakenly address compassion 
by the number of people on welfare. No, true compassion is the number 
of people who leave the welfare rolls and go to work.
  And for those who cite curious cases played up in the dominant media 
culture about CIA agents who send

[[Page 24822]]

spouses on trips around the world to offer talking points in a partisan 
campaign and somehow defend that and seem to act as if there is no 
connection between the former, thank goodness, the former dictator of 
Iraq who now sits in a prison cell awaiting trial and other 
perpetrators of islamofascism, for those who would so readily forget 
the lessons of 9/11, we say to the American people, yes, the challenges 
are grave. We live in challenging times. But we dare not shrink from 
the challenge and make the curious divorcement of, oh, yes, we support 
our troops but not the conflict.
  As one observer explained, that is like saying, gee, I support a 
football team. I just do not want them to win the game.
  Were it so simple to compare war to a game, but we know something far 
more serious is at stake. We know over very national survival is at 
stake; and we believe that we should support our troops, yes, and work 
for an outcome that results in victory.
  That brings us to the subject at hand tonight, our border security 
and our national security. And despite the prattlings of the preceding 
hour, in many ways our Commander in Chief has answered the call in the 
wake of 
9/11.
  But when it comes to the border issues, the fact is the record is 
troubling, and it results in constructive criticism. Just as many 
within our party offered constructive criticism about the selection of 
a Supreme Court judge, reasonable people can offer constructive 
criticism.
  Item. Congress Daily, this morning, Thursday, November 3, Homeland 
Secretary unveils border security initiative. Homeland Security 
Secretary Chertoff Wednesday rolled out a multi-year plan to secure the 
Nation's border and reduce illegal immigration, dubbing the proposal as 
the, quote, enforcement complement to President Bush's temporary guest 
worker program.

                              {time}  2130

  Constructive criticism number one, in accompanying documents released 
yesterday in Houston, Texas, Secretary Chertoff said his Department had 
a 5-year plan to gain operational control of the borders.
  Mr. Speaker, the American people and our Nation cannot wait 5 years 
for operational control of our borders. The attacks of 9/11 came almost 
a half decade ago. Are we then to wait 10 years in wartime to secure 
our borders? That is wrong. That is the wrong time table. Border 
security at once because border security is synonymous with national 
security.
  The other troubling aspect of the dispatch in this morning's Congress 
Daily, the enforcement complement to President Bush's temporary guest 
worker program.
  Mr. Speaker, I have introduced, and my colleagues who join me tonight 
on this floor have sponsored, the Enforcement First Initiative. The 
American people demand enforcement first. Call it putting the cart 
before the horse, but those who talk about a guest worker program have 
it exactly backwards. What we should do is enforce existing laws, close 
loopholes and then and only then engage in a debate about guest worker 
programs.
  Indeed, this debate about border security, national security, illegal 
immigration, and the euphemism that accompanies it of undocumented 
workers, an Orwellian turn of phrase if there ever was one because many 
of these alleged undocumented have documents galore, and should we also 
point out that under the existing framework we have visa programs 
literally from A to Z under the existing legal framework, but again 
back to the situation at hand.
  A fair question could be posed in this fashion: If people are not 
obeying existing laws, what makes us think they would obey any new 
laws? So Enforcement First offers a comprehensive approach saying that 
this government shall enforce existing law and that we shall work to 
eliminate loopholes that exist that result in the gaming of our system, 
that result in the drain on taxpayers and that deny this fundamental 
truth that even those who may profoundly disagree with us who preceded 
us here in the well certainly have to embrace and that is that this is 
a Nation of laws.
  Therefore, if we are a Nation of laws and a Nation of immigrants, 
immigration should occur within a legal framework, not through the 
machinations of illegal schemes and scams that threaten our national 
security.
  Why do I say that? Well, one need look only so far as the testimony 
in open session in the other body from our former colleague Porter 
Goss, now Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, joined by 
others, who offered the testimony that their major concern is that 
someone meaning to do harm to this Nation might utilize our porous 
border to do so, to come here illegally. Indeed, we have seen other 
reports that al Qaeda operatives and others who embrace Islamofascism 
have instructed their minions on a mission in this hemisphere to seek 
to gain entry to the United States through our porous southern border.
  The Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation in testimony 
before a House subcommittee chaired by our friend, the gentleman from 
Texas (Mr. Culberson), confirmed the gentleman from Texas's (Mr. 
Culberson) assertion that illegals who come from nation-states 
embracing Islamofascism have attempted to gain entry into our country 
by blending into the mass exodus north of illegals and utilizing 
Hispanic surnames.
  Mr. Speaker, I offer these words not to sow the seeds of panic, but 
instead to offer a renewal of a sense of purpose in the wake of 9/11, 
mindful of the challenges a sovereign Nation of laws confronts. We must 
have heightened border security. It leads to greater national security. 
There must be internal enforcement. There must be a closing of 
loopholes, and that is the idea behind the notion of Enforcement First.
  So, Mr. Speaker, I say respectfully and diplomatically to the 
Secretary of Homeland Security, enforcement is not a commitment to a 
guest worker program. Enforcement is the long overdue step to protect 
our Nation from external threats in a time of war. And then once we do 
that, we can effectively discuss a guest worker program.
  My friend from Iowa who was very gracious to yield time. I will 
remain, but I want to yield back to him because other friends join us 
tonight during this hour.
  Mr. KING of Iowa. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Arizona 
(Mr. Hayworth) for his eloquent presentation on a lot of things that 
ail us that we heard about here tonight and also the border control and 
the immigration issue and the future of our country.
  As I listen to that group that comes here nearly every night, and it 
was interesting to see the gray hair amongst the 30-somethings that we 
had, it is extraordinarily depressing to hear that viewpoint. I 
happened to at random bounce across some Web pages that must be the 
perpetrators of that kind of thought process because it just does not 
connect with the rational reality of what is going on here with our 
authorization bills, our appropriations bills, the responsibility that 
we have, the fiscal responsibility, the vision we have for America. And 
I do not think that you could read the facts and connect the lingo that 
is coming from the other side and measure the two together. But it is 
depressing and I think sometimes that if I felt like that I do not 
think I could get out of bed every morning and go to work in this place 
and drag everybody else down when we are trying to lift this country 
up.
  Their vision seems to be, I will say, surrender and get out of Iraq, 
turn that over to Zarqawi, let that be a terrorist center for the 
world. Let them come in here and attack us whenever they want. Do not 
take any self-defense mechanism. Soak the rich. Starve the businesses. 
Get rid of the jobs. And the list goes on and on and on of the 
lamentations that we heard.
  We are an optimistic party. Even though when they say the name of our 
party it comes off as profanity, it really is an optimistic party. We 
have always reached for the stars and brought this country forward. The 
tax cuts that we did turned this economy around from the depths of 
September 11's

[[Page 24823]]

trough and, in fact, this year we have $274 billion in additional 
revenue beyond what was calculated by CBO and anticipated because of 
the tax cuts that we provided, and we need to make them permanent.
  On the immigration issue, which is our subject here tonight, that is 
important to our national security issues, the issue of the citizenship 
and immigration services and the job that they are supposed to be doing 
and the great difficulty they have in carrying out that task, the 
internal problems that they have, we have the gentleman on my left from 
Virginia (Mr. Goode), and I would be happy to yield to him.
  Mr. GOODE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. King), 
and I thank the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Hayworth) for their 
comments here tonight. I certainly learned a lot from both gentlemen 
and appreciated what they had to say, particularly on the immigration 
issue.
  I want to talk a little bit before talking about illegal immigration 
about something that occurred just the other day in the Rayburn 
Building. We had a meeting of the Immigration Reform Caucus, and both 
the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Hayworth) and the gentleman from Iowa 
(Mr. King) are members of that and it is chaired by the gentleman from 
Colorado (Mr. Tancredo), who has done yeoman's work on behalf of that 
group.
  We were anticipating hearing from someone from the U.S. Citizen and 
Immigration Services. Now, as you know, the Department of Homeland 
Security is the secretarial agency, and underneath that agency is the 
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. And they are charged with 
doing a number of different programs, one program of which is the FAST 
program. And that is involving temporary adjudicators that have been 
hired to make citizenship and permanent residency decisions. And I 
agree that the backlog is long and needs to be addressed. But I want to 
emphasize, I think it is better to take extra time, make sure the 
investigations are done, have law enforcement personnel there with the 
investigations to make sure no criminals or terrorists or others that 
would do us harm come through one of these programs.
  Another program is the Focus program, and that involves segregating 
and reviewing hundreds of pending applications for immigration benefits 
where there are specific concerns about potential ties to terrorists or 
terrorist organizations. And this gets us to what occurred in the House 
office buildings just the other day.
  I was coming to the Immigration Reform Caucus meeting anticipating 
hearing from a law enforcement officer at that meeting and voicing his 
opinions and letting us have the opportunity to ask questions about the 
agency and about how they handle these programs where they make 
decisions on permanency, residency, citizenship, and granting decisions 
for these persons who want to come to the United States of America. The 
handlers of that person would not let us ask questions.
  I hope that situation can be rectified and that the Immigration 
Reform Caucus and other members on different committees will have the 
opportunity to ask the questions that we want to ask, because, while 
illegal immigration is probably the number one problem facing the 
United States of America, we need to be sure that legal immigration is 
handled in the appropriate way and that programs like FAST and programs 
like Focus have the appropriate oversight and that the right questions 
are asked.
  I would like to take a few minutes now to focus on the illegal 
immigration problem. I want to thank, again, the gentleman from Iowa 
(Mr. King) and the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Hayworth) for being here 
tonight talking about this issue. They have been in the trenches for 
months and years, and this problem is not getting any better. It is 
only getting worse. But I am thankful because more Members of the House 
of Representatives are focusing on this problem. We have more Members 
than ever before introducing legislation addressing different aspects 
of the problem.
  Today, the gentleman from California (Mr. Hunter) introduced 
legislation that does many things. It is backed by groups such as the 
Federation of Americans for Immigration Reform; and having mentioned 
that group, I would also like to thank U.S. Border Control for their 
efforts in combating illegal immigration, Numbers USA for their efforts 
against illegal immigration. But our focus today was on a fence all 
along the southern border.
  We have a fence now between California and Mexico south of the city 
of San Diego. That fence has provided a great barrier to drug 
smuggling, to terrorists coming into this country, and to stopping the 
illegal crossing.

                              {time}  2145

  We were able to see a picture of pre-fence days and then see a 
picture of post-fence days. The fence has improved the environment 
significantly in the San Diego area, and it has enhanced our border 
security.
  What we need to do now is extend the fence from San Diego to 
Brownsville. There would be port of entries along the fence, but, by 
doing this, the security that the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Hayworth) 
talks about that we need in this country would be significantly 
enhanced.
  There were a number of other aspects of this legislation. Currently, 
we have a policy by the Department of Homeland Security and its 
immigration services of basically one of catch-and-release. That means 
if you catch someone in this country illegally, because of a lack of 
facilities to house all of them is a factor, I also think it is a 
philosophical not wanting to carry out what I believe the law should be 
in this country, differences among some of us and some of those 
carrying out that law, of just letting the illegals go. If this 
legislation passes, those illegally in the country will be committing a 
violation of law, and they can be caught and detained, not caught and 
released.
  Another aspect of this legislation focuses on the diversity visa 
program, and that program has been in effect since the mid-years of the 
Clinton administration, which pushed for it. We had hoped that this 
program would end within a few years. It has rocked on, and this would 
end under this bill.
  We would also end the 245(i) practice. And now what does 245(i) mean? 
That means if you come into the country illegally and you get the right 
letter from an employer or you get the right letter from a relative, 
that means you can stay here by paying $1,000. We need to end that 
practice. 245(i) encourages persons to come across the border 
illegally. They say we will not have to go through the process. We will 
not have to be checked out. We will not have to have our background 
checked. We will not have to present our records and be analyzed before 
we get into the United States. We will just walk across the border.
  Or if they are already here, say we will not have to go back. We will 
get a 245(i). We will just pay a little extra money, and we will move 
to the head of the line, and that is unfair. That is unfair to those 
that wait in line, and it is unfair to the millions of Americans that 
pay taxes.
  Another aspect of this legislation, which is an attempt to compile 
many different items of legislation into a single bill, some of them 
are part of legislation that the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Hayworth) 
has sponsored, the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. King), and I could list 
others, the gentleman from Colorado (Mr. Tancredo), the gentleman from 
Georgia (Mr. Deal), the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Norwood), the 
gentleman from Texas (Mr. Culberson), the gentleman from Oklahoma (Mr. 
Sullivan), and I could go on and on. It captures and borrows from these 
bills, and I have to mention this because I want to salute the 
gentleman from Iowa (Mr. King).
  One of his measures says if you are an employer and you hire 
illegals, then you cannot deduct the cost and the taxes paid on those 
illegals from your Federal income tax return, and that is the way it 
should be. The legislation further emphasizes that there shall be

[[Page 24824]]

no earned income tax credit for illegals. There will be no credit for 
Social Security for the time that you are illegally in this country.
  Under the current situation, if there were to be an amnesty, and I 
vigorously oppose the amnesty because it only encourages more illegals 
to come across the border, if there is an amnesty, you will not be able 
to go back and recapture the time that you are in the country 
illegally.
  It also focuses on the practice that some who come from across our 
southern border want to have children in this country. They want to 
create an American baby because, under our current law, anyone born in 
the United States of America is an automatic citizen, and that helps 
those illegally here stay in this country. Under our bill, coming 
across the border and having a baby of illegal aliens who did not go 
through the proper process will not grant that child automatic 
citizenship.
  So this is indeed a comprehensive measure that will address illegal 
immigration, and it is my hope that we will be able to get legislation 
to the floor of the House of Representatives, hopefully before 
Christmas, if not, certainly by the first part of next year, so that we 
can take a stand and send to the American people the message that we 
are serious about stopping illegal immigration.
  We do not want amnesty for illegals. We want to preserve and protect 
the United States of America. We want border security; and, as the 
Congressman from Arizona says, we want enforcement first.
  If we do that and if we can get the other body and if we can get the 
executive branch down the road from the United States Capitol to come 
along and get on this train, America will be safer, will be more 
prosperous and will be more of a land of opportunity for the hard-
working and tax-paying citizens of this country.
  Mr. KING of Iowa. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Virginia 
(Mr. Goode) for his presentation and with clarity I appreciate.
  I want to add that we are taking a look into the functionality and 
the failure to function in citizenship and immigration services. It is 
this Congress' responsibility to have oversight. It is this Congress' 
responsibility to investigate. If we believe there is impropriety in 
some place, lack of efficiency, we are to bring this all together. This 
is our responsibility to the taxpayers of America, and it is our 
constitutional duty.
  Because there are a couple of minders there that will not allow an 
individual to speak, then that does not mean that we are going to back 
away from this. It just means we are going to resolve the situation 
eventually in the appropriate fashion, with patience and 
professionalism. That is the perspective that I think we need to take a 
look at with this.
  I want to touch back on an immigration issue, but the moment that I 
do that, I want to transition over to the energy policy. So, in the 
interim, I would be happy to yield a few minutes to the gentleman from 
Arizona for his concluding thoughts with regard to immigration.
  Mr. HAYWORTH. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend from Iowa, and I look 
forward to hearing from our colleague from Pennsylvania who, again in 
stark contrast to those who preceded us in the well, takes a thoughtful 
look at the challenges we confront and offers some common-sense 
solutions, especially in the realm of natural gas and where we are 
headed as a Nation in terms of energy exploration for existing 
technologies and, quite frankly, bringing on-line new technologies to 
deal with energy.
  But as I heard both my colleague from Virginia and my colleague from 
Iowa talk about the spectacle that occurred in the hallway of the 
Rayburn House Office Building yesterday, I just was astonished by the 
seeming triumph and insensitivity of the bureaucracy.
  Two minders accompanying a law enforcement officer essentially to put 
him on notice that his role in his employment with the Federal 
Government could very well be threatened. We have visited totalitarian 
nations where there are minders who follow us, some very cleverly 
concealed, some as hotel personnel, but to see that spectacle in this 
grand republic and see it utilized really to try and supercede the 
legitimate questions of constitutional officers was very disappointing.
  I would echo, Mr. Speaker, the words of my colleague from Iowa, there 
will be oversight. Count on it. The Congress will live up to its 
constitutional responsibilities. I will put those Washington 
bureaucrats on notice, those who believe they can get in the way of 
constitutional officers doing their jobs, that the people will demand 
answers through their constitutional representatives. But we understand 
the answer, in summation to our challenge for national security and 
border security, it is enforcement first. It is not amnesty. It is not 
the embrace of putting illegals in the front of the line and making a 
mockery of an orderly, lawful, immigration process.
  Borders are necessary. There is graffiti written in Spanish on one of 
the borders adjoining my State which reads, Borders are scars upon the 
earth. Mr. Speaker, borders are not scars upon the earth. Borders are 
reasonable and necessary to maintain the sovereignty of nation states; 
and, as the poet wrote, good fences make good neighbors.
  I salute the gentleman from Virginia joining with the chairman of the 
House Armed Services Committee with the True legislation today. I am 
pleased to be a cosponsor. I thank my friends from Virginia and from 
Iowa, others within the Immigration Reform Caucus. I thank them for the 
time, and I look forward with interest to hearing from our colleague 
from Pennsylvania with references to the challenges we confront here 
early in the 21st century for this Nation's energy needs.
  Mr. KING of Iowa. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Arizona and 
the gentleman from Virginia on this enlightening discussion we have had 
on immigration. I am quite pleased that an individual from Arizona 
would have the phrase, good fences make good neighbors. I thought that 
was an Iowa phrase.
  I want to point out, too, that when you build a fence or a wall to 
contain people, if you do that to keep them from leaving a place like 
it might have been East Germany, then that is wrong from a 
philosophical standpoint. If you have a place that is such an 
attraction that you build that fence to keep them out, that is a moral 
thing to do. There is a big difference.
  So, the fence in Israel, for example, between the West Bank and 
Israel proper, that is a fence to protect the people from the folks on 
the other side that want to come across with bombs. It is not immoral 
to build a fence to protect yourself from people that are assaulting.
  In fact, the southern border in the last year over 1,159,000 illegals 
that were collared at the border, so to speak. We heard T.J. Bonner, a 
border patrol, say here a couple of days ago that approximately 4 
million came across the southern border during that period of time and 
we collared 1,159,000. Of those 1,159,000, all but 1,640 of them 
promised to go back. We cannot verify that any of them went back, but 
we did actually adjudicate 1,640 of the 1,159,000 to go back to their 
home country.
  So we have got a very small percentage here. The catch-and-release 
program is real. I got into a little buy-in when I made that statement 
that it was a seven times catch-and-release program before they were 
adjudicated for deportation. Some of the bureaucrats took issue with 
that and wanted to have a meeting. So they brought eight of their 
people into the room, and the first statement was I am wrong, we need 
to retract the statement. An hour and 45 minutes later, they admitted 
that, even though that was not the written policy, it was the practice, 
and in fact, it might be more than seven times catch-and-release. That 
is how bad it is.
  I want to say just a couple of words about the new IDEA bill that the 
gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Goode) mentioned that I have drafted and 
that we have significant cosponsors on.
  It is clear for us, build a fence on the border, beef up the border 
patrol, but

[[Page 24825]]

we need domestic enforcement. We know that the administration has not 
sanctioned a single employer for hiring illegals in the last year. That 
is an issue that needs to be enforced as well. But, on top of that, how 
do we dry up the jobs magnet? How do we get a policy in place and get 
some administration agency that actually is willing to enforce that 
policy?
  So I looked around the country, and I thought who really are the 
junkyard dogs of bureaucracy? Who likes to go to work and who does 
their job? Who has a reputation that you know they are going to follow 
through? The times I have been audited I can tell you it is the IRS. So 
I said, well, let us see if we can find a way to get the IRS into this 
game and enforce this illegal immigration.
  So that is where the idea comes from to remove Federal deductibility 
for wages and benefits that are paid to illegals. Let the IRS come and 
do a normal audit, and if the employer uses the InstaCheck program so 
they can verify over the Internet in an instant whether that employee 
is legal to be hired, go back on the Social Security Administration 
database and Department of Homeland Security database, come back with a 
positive hit, hire that person.
  We put safe harbor in the bill. If you are a responsible employer, 
you use InstaCheck, the basic pilot program to verify the 
employability, then the IRS will not touch you on that hire. But if 
they run the numbers when they do the audit, use the InstaCheck, and it 
finds out that the Social Security numbers and the identification does 
not match anything, then the wages and benefits that you spend on that 
employee become not a deductible expense but taxable income.

                              {time}  2200

  So, for example, if you are a corporation and in a 34 percent tax 
bracket and you are paying $10 an hour to illegals, the IRS will come 
in and say, well, no, that $10 an hour is not a deduction. We are going 
to tax that at 34 percent, and we are going to add the interest and 
penalty on there. Now that becomes about a $6 an hour penalty on the 
$10 an hour person, so now the illegals cost you $16 an hour. In 
theory, a least, a legal employee that you could hire for $16 an hour 
becomes a rational decision.
  As that happens, then the illegals that are here working at this 
discount rate because it is rational for employers to hire the 
illegals, they are cheaper for a lot of reasons, it becomes rational 
instead to say, no, sorry, I cannot put you to work because the IRS 
sometime in the next 6 years can come back and audit me and I will have 
to pay the bill. So I might as well pay it to somebody who is here 
legally for the right reason.
  This changes this great migration of four million people pouring 
across our southern border, and it sends them back again. Because what 
are they going to do if they cannot get employment here? It is a jobs 
magnet.
  New ideas. It is one piece of many things, as Mr. Goode spoke about 
and Mr. Hayworth did. So I am part of all of this. I want to stand here 
with it. If we have any more ideas, I want to hear them all. We need 
them from the American people. The American people are the ones who 
will move this Congress, so they need to write letters and send the 
message, and this Congress will hear you.
  So I thank the gentleman on the immigration issue tonight. I also had 
two subjects in mind that I feel is important to bring up, and energy 
is the other one.
  As we listened to the minority party on the other side do their 60 
minutes of nightly lamentations, we heard about the cost of gas, the 
cost of energy, and I did make a few remarks about how we can help that 
cause. But I would point out that I represent maybe the number one 
corn-producing congressional district in America. If you are going to 
raise anything, you have to have nitrogen fertilizer to do that. All 
crops take nitrogen. Corn takes a lot of nitrogen. About 90 percent of 
the cost of nitrogen fertilizer is the cost of natural gas.
  Natural gas has gone up 400 to 500 percent over the last 3 years, and 
we see the cost of natural gas going in the area of $14.50 per million 
BTUs. We look around the world, and Mr. Peterson will give us more 
details on this in a moment, and we see not far away, natural gas 
coming out of Venezuela of $1.60 compared to the U.S. at $14.50.
  The other day they said they were going to go ahead and build the 
natural gas pipeline from Alaska down to the lower 48 States. It is 
4,700-some miles from the north slope down to Kansas City, the heart of 
America. Up there, there is 38 trillion cubic feet of natural gas that 
we know of. There is probably more in ANWR that we will open up, and 
hopefully we will drill there for oil as well. So, 4,700 some miles 
from the north slope of Alaska to Kansas City. Build the pipeline down 
to the lower 48, and we can get 38 trillion cubic feet of natural gas.
  Venezuela is making fertilizer and selling it to us now off of gas 
that costs about $1.60. Russia is doing the same thing off of natural 
gas that costs us 95 cents. We are losing our fertilizer industry in 
America. It does not take very much to control food production if you 
have control of the fertilizer itself.
  But down there in that gulf area, for example, all that gas in 
Venezuela, Venezuela is 2,700 miles from Kansas City, for example. So 
that gas is closer. But closer than that yet is all of this natural gas 
that we have on the Outer Continental Shelf of America, with 200 miles, 
406 trillion cubic feet of natural gas.
  Now, tell me, would you go to Alaska for 38 trillion cubic feet of 
natural gas and build a 4,000-some mile pipeline to get it down to the 
lower 48? Would you go to Venezuela and ship that gas in as liquified 
natural gas and go through the exchange process and the plants at the 
terminals that it takes to handle that? Or would you just go down there 
nice and close, where we already have a system all set up, and plug 
right into that existing massive quantity of 406 trillion cubic feet of 
natural gas that we have on the Outer Continental Shelf?
  To continue to be hostage to energy prices at $14.50 per million BTUs 
when the rest of the world is getting along on numbers like 95 cents or 
$1.60. China is up to about $4 something. But we are at a great 
disadvantage. And if we only open up this natural gas marginally, we 
will only lower the price marginally and we will still pay a great 
price economically, because we know that energy is the price of 
everything we have and everything we own.
  Having said that, Mr. Speaker, I would be happy to yield to the 
gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Peterson), who is really the lead on 
this issue, and I am very happy and proud that he has taken this issue 
to this Congress.
  Mr. PETERSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from 
Iowa, the gentleman from Virginia, and the gentleman from Arizona for 
the good job they did bringing up the security issue of this country. 
The number one issue is immigration enforcement, protecting our 
borders, and handling that issue in a much better way than we have 
historically done in this country.
  But the economic issue facing this country is the price of energy and 
the availability of energy. Natural gas is the clean fuel. It is almost 
the perfect fuel. It is what we heat our homes with. It is what we heat 
most of our schools, our hospitals, our YMCAs, our churches, our 
colleges, our universities. Most of our small businesses and mostly all 
commercial businesses run on that. Many, many industries use it in 
many, many ways. So 25 percent of the energy in this country is natural 
gas.
  We have heard a lot of discussion about oil and gasoline prices. In 
fact, on the evening news the American public understands the issue 
pretty well because it is reported well. But natural gas is not 
reported well. It is not talked about and not understood much.
  Gasoline prices were double, they were at their peak after Katrina. 
Natural gas prices were 700 percent what they were 5 years ago. Now 
that is just a huge increase. A gallon of milk would be $28. I think we 
would have panic in this country if a gallon of milk were at

[[Page 24826]]

$28, yet there is no panic in the country about natural gas, except 
from those who use a lot of it, but they are having a hard time getting 
government to listen at any level.
  You just heard my friend from Iowa talking about the fertilizer 
industry and the tremendous amount of energy that is used for 
fertilizing natural gas. Petrochemical is one of the best-paying 
industries we have left in America. All the chemicals we buy at the 
hardware and grocery store, all the chemicals we use in the 
manufacturing process, one of the basic ingredients is natural gas. 
Plus, natural gas is used to heat those products and make them in the 
first place. Most petrochemicals, 40 to 50 percent of the cost of 
production is natural gas, thus putting them at a huge competitive 
disadvantage compared to the rest of the world.
  Polymers and plastics. We all know how polymers and plastics are such 
a major part of our life. Almost everything we touch has polymers and 
plastics as a part of it. Even for you ladies, skin softeners and 
makeup, the basic ingredient for skin softeners is a product derived 
out of natural gas.
  We heard about the plight of the farmers. The farmers have a real 
energy issue, because it hits them from when they plant, it hits them 
when they harvest, it hits them when they dry their grain, using 
natural gas usually. They just get hit again and again, and it has been 
very difficult for them to be profitable.
  Why is natural gas such an issue? It is not a world price. When we 
pay $60 in this country for oil, the whole world does. When we pay $65, 
the whole world does. But when we pay $14.50, we are at 12-something 
today, we are an island to ourselves. The rest of the world is much 
cheaper. Europe is under half what we pay. Now, our big competitors, 
Japan, Taiwan, and China, they are a third of what we pay. When you add 
cheap labor to those countries and the ability to engineer, they are 
bright countries, very sophisticated countries, they have learned from 
us. When you give them another advantage of the energy they use to make 
products, and especially products that consume a lot of natural gas, 
you give them this huge advantage.
  The rest of the world is under 2. As my colleague said, Russia is 95 
cents, and I think North Africa is 80 cents. How can our employers and 
our companies compete when energy is a large part of their cost and 
they have to compete with other countries? They cannot. Our large 
employers are hanging on hoping government will do something about this 
crisis, and something major. Not tinker, but something major, and soon. 
Soon.
  If we do not, I think Representative Pearce said a few weeks ago here 
on the floor that we are going to solve this, that we are going to 
change this, and we can do it now and save a million or two jobs in 
this country, some of the best jobs we have left, or we can do it later 
and hope we can recover, and many of those jobs we will never get back.
  How did this happen? Well, for decades, natural gas was two bucks. 
Oil was $10. Nothing could compete with that. Renewables could not 
really grow because those prices were so cheap that nothing could 
compete. That went on for decades.
  Ten years ago, a major shift in policy also happened. Congress 
legislatively for a time permitted natural gas unlimitedly to be used 
to make electricity. We used to use make about 6 to 7 percent of our 
electricity with natural gas, and it was only allowed at peak power. 
That is early in the morning and into the evening, when we use more 
electricity than we normally do. You can turn a gas plant on and off, 
but you cannot do that with coal and nuclear, so gas was allowed to be 
used for peak power.
  Well, they took the prohibition away about 10 years ago; and now 25 
percent of the electricity in this country is made with natural gas.
  Well, there were those who predicted that if we did not open up 
supply that would cause a shortage down the road. And when a few years 
went by, that is exactly what has happened, because we have it locked 
up.
  How did it get locked up? Well, there was a moratorium many years 
ago, about 25 years ago, put on by President Bush. It was supposed to 
be a temporary moratorium where we would have an inventory and that 
inventory would take a few years. But then he did not win reelection. 
President Clinton came in, and he extended the moratorium through 2012, 
and our current President has not touched it.
  Shortly thereafter, Congress placed a moratorium on the OCS. So now 
we have a Presidential moratorium and we have a legislative moratorium 
that has been preventing the production of natural gas on the Outer 
Continental Shelf for about 20 some years.
  Now, what is the Continental Shelf? Well, the first three miles of 
our offshore is owned by the States and then from 3 to 200 miles is 
owned by the Federal Government. So 200 miles is what is called the 
Continental Shelf, and that is where many countries produce a huge 
amount of their energy because there is lots of it there.
  Now many feel that that 400 trillion cubic feet that was mentioned is 
way underestimated. Because the work that was done was over 30 years 
ago, and the measuring devices we have today, the seismographic 
instruments, are so much more accurate. But government has prevented 
that from being done.
  We actually had a bill that the State of Florida prevented from 
passing so we could not measure. In fact, the current energy bill had a 
measurement in there but did not have funding in it, so it was a paper 
measurement, which I do not know how you do that. We were not going to 
be able to spend any money. But they are protesting that measurements 
not be done today, the State of Florida.
  Now Canada, a very environmentally sensitive country, the U.K., 
Belgium, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, New Zealand and Australia, they all 
produce both gas and oil. We are only talking about natural gas, but 
they produce both gas and oil on their Continental Shelf, and that is 
really where most of the world does it.
  Now what is the advantage of that? I think my friend from Iowa said 
that very well. It is where the population is. As you go up and down 
our coastlines, and 85 percent of our coastline today is part of the 
moratorium. We only have 15 percent we produce in. That is where the 
population is. We do not have to build 5,000 mile high-pressure 
expensive lines. You just hook into the cities where the population 
base is and then hook into the system that is already serving them that 
comes in from Texas and Oklahoma and the gulf, and the system is hooked 
together. It is by far, by far the best place we can produce and 
produce quickly.
  Now why are we doing that? Well, number one, it is the Florida 
delegation; and the government of Florida has had a huge influence in 
this body. They have actually prevented it, and they are currently 
opposing all measures to open up the Outer Continental Shelf.
  We have the Peterson-Abercrombie plan, and I think my friend from 
Iowa is a sponsor of that, and what we want to do is to move the 
moratorium. We want to give the States control of the first 20 miles. 
You can only see production for about 12 miles. So, after 12 miles, 
even from a tall building, you cannot see it. So we will say, all 
right, States can control 20 miles, both gas and oil. From 20 miles 
out, gas will be open for production in all the Outer Continental 
Shelf. And Florida will be included. They should help out, too. And 
then oil would be left up to the States, and they could petition the 
Department of the Interior to remove the moratorium on oil if they so 
chose to.
  That gives us a huge opportunity to produce the gas that is needed, 
in my view, to give our industries and give our citizens the ability to 
have affordable natural gas to heat our homes, to run our businesses 
and fuel the big industries that are going to leave this country.
  There has never been a natural gas production well that has ever 
harmed a beach or that has ever been a problem even on land. A natural 
gas well is a six-inch hole in the ground. You put a steel casing in 
cement at the bottom and at the top, and you let gas out into a 
pipeline.

[[Page 24827]]

  This is not a threat to any environment. It is not a threat to 
creatures. In fact, in the gulf, the best fishing is where we produce 
both oil and gas, and all the fishermen will tell you that.
  I keep hearing about all this potential pollution. And then someone 
said the other day in a debate it would be 7 to 10 years before we 
could get production. It will take a few years, but it will not take 7 
to 10 years. That was a very inaccurate statement.

                              {time}  2215

  Now, what is interesting about Florida, which is really the 
opposition here, they use 233 times more natural gas, they are huge 
users, than they produce; and they sit in the best, most fertile fields 
of the country. All around them are huge fields of natural gas and some 
of the best natural gas, and they are not only not wanting us to 
produce it, but they have actually prevented us from leasing tract 181, 
which was not under moratorium and that was scheduled to be released 
under the Clinton administration to be leased and has not been leased 
today due to much of the protesting of Florida. And that is unfair to 
the rest of this country.
  I love my friends from Florida who are here. They are great people. 
But the Florida government leadership, the Florida State government 
leadership, in my view, has been very wrong on this issue and has not 
only prevented production off their shores but has really prevented 
production that was very vital to this country's economic future and 
prevented us from having the gas reserves we need so that prices could 
be normal. If natural gas prices were normal, we could be expanding the 
use of it.
  I have a bus system in State College, Pennsylvania that is all 
natural gas. Today they are paying a premium to do that. In all the 
cities all of our buses, all of our school buses, our transit systems, 
all of our taxi cabs, our short-haul vehicles, our service trucks could 
all be on natural gas, and we would have cleaner air in the cities, and 
some of those cities could reach clean air attainment.
  Natural gas can be the bridge to our future. It can be the bridge to 
renewables or a bigger part of our energy portfolio. There are so many 
ways natural gas can displace other fuels, especially oil and our need 
for oil. It can displace the need for more refineries if we fuel part 
of our transportation system with clean burning natural gas.
  And one other fact on Florida, 75 percent of the electricity they use 
is generated by natural gas, and that is because just recently they 
tore down their coal plants and went to natural gas.
  I want to share with the Members, though the Florida delegation and 
the Florida State government is vehemently against any change, here is 
what the Associated Industries of Florida said recently in a letter to 
MMS, the Mineral Management Service: ``We appreciate that MMS is going 
to be reviewing all of the current OCS areas, including the areas that 
have until now been off limits due to the moratorium, which include the 
Atlantic, Pacific, and Eastern Gulf of Mexico regions. Research 
documents that these areas hold substantial undiscovered but 
technically recoverable energy resources that will be absolutely 
critical to America's national security and to the continued growth of 
our economy and to securing jobs for virtually every sector of our 
economy.''
  Now, the Associated Industries of Florida gets it. They go on to say: 
``If America doesn't look to expanding exploration and drilling in 
these OCSs, then America will unnecessarily pay a high price,'' like we 
are today, ``and incur a heavy burden. The U.S. Energy Information 
Administration forecasts that by 2025 petroleum demand will increase by 
39 percent and natural gas demand will increase by 34 percent.
  Higher energy prices have exacted a toll on our economy already by 
slowing our growth from between .5 percent to 1 percent based on pre-
hurricane prices. Farmers have paid $6 billion more for energy in the 
last 2 years. Natural gas costs for the chemical industry in America 
have increased by $10 billion since 2003. And of the 120 chemical 
plants being built around the world with price tags of $1 billion or 
more each, only one is being built in the United States.
  ``As a result, Associated Industries of Florida recommends to the MMS 
that expanded lease sales are important to our country, to our 
citizens, and to our way of life. To not utilize all of our available 
energy resources, when it can be accomplished in an environmentally 
sensitive way, would be a disservice to our country. We need to ensure 
that we have a bright future by adopting an expansive OCS leasing 
program.''
  Osram Sylvania, a big company that owns a lot of plants in this 
country, here is what they said: ``In the past 5 years, we have seen 
natural gas prices escalate from $3 per MCF to well over $10 on the 
spot market. As compared to natural gas costs in 2000, our bills in 
2005 will be $24 million higher.''
  Mr. Speaker, again, I thank the gentleman for yielding to me.

                          ____________________