[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 153 (2007), Part 10]
[Senate]
[Pages 14437-14444]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                           IMMIGRATION REFORM

  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, first, I thank my colleague from Alabama 
for his strong words and strong support for the amendments we offered a 
few weeks ago on the guest worker program. Let me thank my colleague 
from Alabama for his support particularly for that amendment 2 weeks 
ago.
  I want to take a few minutes in morning business today, before the 
Senate gets into its busiest period of the week--which we all know 
begins on Tuesday, usually--to talk about two other amendments I have 
filed to this bill, and I hope I will have a chance to have the Senate 
vote on before the bill is completed.
  Let me first talk about one of those amendments that is addressing a 
provision in the immigration bill that I think is impractical and I 
don't think makes any sense, the provision I am trying to correct.
  Before addressing the specific provision, let me once again put this 
in context. This bill, the underlying legislation, calls for three so-
called temporary worker programs. There is an agricultural temporary 
worker program, and I am not suggesting any change to that program. 
That is part of the underlying bill. There is a seasonal temporary 
worker program, where people can come in for up to 10 months and then 
have to leave the country for 2 months and then come back the next 
year. That one I do have a second amendment on, which I want to talk 
about in a minute. Then there is the new temporary worker program that 
was the subject of my amendment 2 weeks ago.
  Let me briefly describe how this third so-called temporary worker 
program works. It contemplates a new guest worker program. It says 
guest workers would be permitted to come to this country and work for 2 
years. At the end of the 2 years, they have to leave the country for a 
year. Then that same worker could come back for another 2 years and 
then leave the country again for another year; then come back and work 
2 more years and then have to leave the country permanently. So over a 
period of, I guess it would be 9 years--during that period the worker 
could be here up to 6 years, but there would have to be two periods of 
a year each during which the worker was outside the country.
  My amendment, which is cosponsored by Senator Obama, would remove the 
requirement that guest workers leave the United States before they 
renew their visas to work under this program. It would not modify the 
total period they could stay here, which would still be limited to 6 
years. It would not change the terms of their visa. But the amendment I 
am offering would provide that guest workers would be given a 2-year 
visa they could then renew twice and do their full 6 years of work and 
then their visa would no longer permit them to stay.
  Requiring these workers to leave the country for a lengthy period of 
time between each 2-year work period is a problem for several reasons. 
It is bad for the employers, first. It is also bad for American workers 
who might also want to have some of these jobs--and these are generally 
construction type jobs. These are not agricultural jobs. These are not 
jobs for teenagers in seasonal employment.
  Obviously, another problem with this provision is it is extremely 
difficult and costly to enforce. I doubt seriously if we have the 
capacity to enforce it at this point. It increases dramatically the 
likelihood that individuals are going to overstay their visas.
  First, let me talk about the employers. It would be very costly and 
burdensome to require that employers rehire and retrain new workers 
every 2 years. Employers are not going to give an employee a 1-year 
vacation. When one of these so-called guest workers leaves the job in 
order to comply with this provision of law, the employer will have no 
choice but to find somebody else to bring on. The 1-year leave 
provision would be especially harmful to small businesses, and it would 
cause enormous instability in the workforce if they actually depended 
upon guest workers for some of that work.
  Governor Napolitano from Arizona recently wrote a column in the New 
York Times. Let me quote a couple of sentences from that column.
  She says:

       The proposed notion that temporary workers stay here for 
     two years, return home for a year, then repeat that strange 
     cycle two more times makes no sense. No employer can afford 
     this schedule, hiring and training, only to have a worker who 
     soon will leave. It will only encourage employers and workers 
     to find new ways to break the rules.

  Now, that was on June 1 in the New York Times. In my view, Governor 
Napolitano is absolutely correct. The current bill is also bad for 
American

[[Page 14438]]

workers. American workers will be forced to compete with a constant 
flow of guest workers who would always be at the low end of the salary 
scale by virtue of the fact that they would have to leave every 2 
years.
  So if guest workers are kicked out of the country every 2 years, 
wages cannot increase, there will always be a justification to pay 
those workers the lowest possible wage. The requirement that these 
guest workers leave the country every 2 years would also result in an 
increase in the number of individuals who overstay their visas in order 
to avoid having to leave the United States for that lengthy period of 
time. It would also create additional costs in terms of tracking those 
individuals and ensuring that they, in fact, do leave the country. 
These costs, of course, would have to be borne by the taxpayer. It also 
assumes that we even have the administrative capacity to track all 
these people. Here we are talking about at least 1.2 million so-called 
guest workers under only this program. I am not talking about the other 
two so-called temporary guest worker programs. But under this so-called 
temporary guest worker program, we are talking about 1.2 million 
workers.
  So we are saying that we would then have administrative 
responsibilities somewhere lodged in the Federal Government to keep 
track of the comings and goings of these workers every year. I have 
real doubts about our ability to do that. Obviously, that is an 
assumption. It is assumed, as part of the underlying bill, that we do 
have the ability to do that. So if the program is designed in a manner 
that is bad for employers, it is bad for employees, it is difficult and 
costly to implement, it will lead to an increase in the number of 
individuals who overstay their visas, then obviously the question 
arises: What is the justification for keeping this provision in the 
bill?
  I think, unfortunately, the only justification I have been able to 
find is that it is being kept in the bill in order to fit this 
political mantra that we have been hearing now for months about 
``temporary means temporary,'' rather than to implement any sound 
policy.
  When you look at these guest worker programs, unlike the other 
existing guest worker programs, such as the H-2B seasonal program for 
nonagricultural workers, the H-2A agricultural program, which were 
designed to fill jobs that, in fact, are of a temporary nature, the new 
Y-1 program, which we are talking about here, is designed to fill jobs 
throughout the economy that are permanent jobs. These are jobs in the 
construction industry, primarily. The 2-1-2 requirement, which is in 
the underlying bill, artificially tries to turn these workers into 
temporary workers by kicking them out of the country every 2 years, 
even though they will be filling jobs that are not temporary, they are 
permanent jobs.
  Last year's immigration bill, S. 2611, allowed new guest workers to 
stay in the United States for a period of 3 years to renew that visa 
for a total of 6 years. There was no requirement that the individuals 
leave the country before they renewed that visa. I think that type of 
framework is much more sensible.
  One of the primary goals of comprehensive immigration reform is to 
create a new and workable system that would ensure that we are not in 
the situation we are in now once again 20 years from now. I do not 
believe the current framework of this so-called temporary worker 
program advances that goal.
  Let me also take a moment to address concerns that the adoption of 
this amendment will somehow kill the immigration bill. During debate on 
the immigration bill, questions keep arising about whether a particular 
amendment being offered by one Senator or another is consistent with 
the so-called ``grand bargain'' that has been reached.
  I commend the Senators who worked tirelessly to come up with an 
agreement on this difficult issue. This agreement was reached between a 
handful of Senators. That should not be considered, in my view, a 
substitute for deliberation by the full Senate. One of the first 
amendments I offered was the one the Senator from Alabama referred to, 
an amendment that reduced the number of guest workers under this 
program to 200,000 per year--the number of new guest workers, I should 
say.
  Despite the fact that amendment was adopted by or supported by 74 
Senators, I have heard repeated questions about whether this was a deal 
killer. It is interesting to me that a measure which garners the 
support of three-quarters of the Senate somehow is considered a threat 
to the prospects of passing the legislation. Frankly, I believe we are 
focused on the wrong set of issues. We ought to be trying to 
concentrate on getting a bill that has the broadest bipartisan support 
in the Senate. I think that each of those amendments, the one I offered 
2 weeks ago and this amendment I have been talking about, will help us 
to achieve that. I urge my colleagues to carefully consider the 
consequences of leaving the existing procedures in place for Y-1 guest 
workers.
  I strongly believe that if we keep this provision in its current 
form, we are going to create an expensive and unworkable program for 
employers, a system that harms American workers, and an incentive for 
guest workers to overstay their visas. For that reason, I hope, when 
the opportunity comes for a vote, my colleagues will support our 
amendment.
  Mr. President, how much time remains?
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The majority has 18 minutes.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I would then continue to speak as in 
morning business for another few minutes to talk about another 
amendment.
  I have also today filed an amendment on another part of the bill. The 
second amendment is aimed at addressing a different issue related to 
the Y-2 temporary worker program. Now, the Y-2 program is a temporary 
worker program, and it revises and incorporates the existing H-2B 
seasonal nonagricultural program.
  As I mentioned earlier, this amendment would address the problem of 
people whom we bring into the country for up to 10 months, allow them 
to work here, whether they are working at resorts or working at some 
kind of seasonal employment, nonagricultural seasonal employment, and 
then we require them to go home for 2 months. Then they can do that 
each year.
  As Senators have discussed this program, and as it has been discussed 
in the press, its been stated that the underlying substitute amendment 
provides for an annual allocation of visas from 100,000 initially to up 
to 200,000 each year, depending upon the market demand.
  I have a chart I can put up that I think will describe what the Y-2 
guest worker program--if, in fact, the 15 percent increase is triggered 
in the years, the first 4 years of the program, and how you get from 
100,000 up to 200,000.
  Well, that is the description. This chart is a fair description of 
this program as it has been reported in the paper. However, before the 
substitute amendment was filed, the underlying bill--I call it a 
substitute amendment because that is the technical, correct name for 
it--a provision was handwritten into the bill that provides that in any 
year from now on, the returning Y-2 workers who are present in the 
United States in any of the preceding 3 fiscal years would not count 
against the cap.
  So the whole idea of 200,000 is not right. The yellow represents the 
200,000, the increase from 100,000 to 200,000. But the red on the chart 
represents the potential pool of returning workers. You can see this is 
taken from an analysis that was done for me by the Congressional 
Research Service. We asked them to please look at the provision and 
give us their analysis of what is the size of the group that could come 
in under this program with this provision in it.
  They said: Well, it could be up to about 1.6, 1.7 million people over 
10 years; they would be eligible to come in every year. Now, that is 
not cumulative, that is every year that many people would be able to 
come in.
  The impact of this little-noticed provision is quite profound. 
Obviously,

[[Page 14439]]

this is the high end of the approximation because we would not expect 
that every single worker who came here to work for 10 months during 1 
year, or for some period during 1 year, would choose to come back the 
next year. But I think a reasonably high percentage of them might 
choose to come back.
  Today, we have about 135,000. This year, in 2007, we have about 
135,000 workers in the country or connected in this country this year 
under this seasonal temporary worker program. I have no problem seeing 
that increased to 200,000. That is what the initial draft of the bill 
contemplated. I do have a problem when it might increase by well over a 
million. I think that is not what many Members of the Senate understand 
is going to happen under this bill. I do not think it is what should 
happen under this bill. I think it is reasonable to require that the 
numerical limitation already in the bill actually means something; that 
is, the 200,000 limit.
  The amendment I am offering does not eliminate the returning worker 
provisions, not by any means. It says: If you want to change the number 
from the current law, which is 66,000 up to 100,000, fine. If you want 
to then say it can grow from 100,000 to 200,000 per year, fine. But 
let's not also say that anyone who has worked here in any of the 3 
preceding years can come in on top of that because that is when your 
numbers get totally out of control.
  The amendment is aimed at ensuring the bill does what I believe a 
majority of Senators believe it does; that is, it would allow the 
issuance of up to 200,000 Y-2 visas each year for these seasonal 
workers. I think that is something which I can support as a matter of 
policy.
  Again, my amendment merely brings the underlying language of the bill 
into line with what I believe most Senators think the bill now 
provides; that is, keeps it under 200,000.
  That is a description of the two amendments I have filed today. I 
think they are both meritorious amendments. I urge my colleagues to 
look at them, to consider them. I hope very much that I have an 
opportunity to get votes on those amendments this week before we 
conclude action on the bill because I think both amendments would--each 
of the two amendments would improve the bill and make it much better 
public policy.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Alabama.
  Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I thank the Senator for his work on 
this. It is obvious he has read the legislation and attempted to see 
what it actually means, which is a good thing, and done too little in 
this Senate, but it is important especially in this legislation where 
it is so critical.
  Let me say what I understood the whole deal was supposed about. It 
was put very simply to me how we were going to have a new immigration 
system, in this new legislation that was going to be better than last 
year's bill. The way I understood it, from the talking points that were 
suggested and floated around and that we were briefed with, there would 
be a temporary worker program that would actually be temporary. To me 
that means a person would come for less than a year but could come back 
repeatedly after that, as long as their employer is happy and they have 
work to come to and they have not gotten in any trouble. And, they 
would not bring their families with them.
  That is what I thought we were talking about. Then we were told that 
there would be a separate second flow for people who enter America 
permanently, coming into America to go on a citizenship track. And we 
were told that track would be evaluated using a different system, it 
would be more skill based.
  In other words, a person would apply, and they would compete for the 
slots based on the skills they had and that we have in the United 
States. So I am concerned and share the concern of Senator Bingaman 
that the temporary worker program which allows 2 years' entry, then 
says go home and come back 1 year from now for another 2 years and then 
go home for a year, and come back for the final 2 years and never come 
back again seems less workable than the temporary seasonal worker 
program we have today. I am concerned about that.
  Remember, we are still going to have the constant flow of people who 
come in on the citizenship track and get a green card and become 
permanent citizens. They will also be workers, their family members 
will also be workers. We are not stopping that. But this bill creates a 
separate temporary worker program. I believe a system of temporary 
workers needs to work, needs to make sense, needs to be consistent with 
common sense, and ought to be in a way that is practical. I am not sure 
the legislation as introduced does that.
  Senator Grassley spoke before we recessed and asked this question: 
Why is it nobody has said this time, as they did in 1986, that there 
would be no more amnesties? He said he was here in 1986. He remembered 
what they said. It was admitted that they were having amnesty and they 
made a promise we wouldn't have amnesty anymore. People said: If we do 
it this one time, we won't do it again. He asked why we weren't hearing 
it said again. Of course, he answered his own question. The answer is, 
because bill sponsors can not make that promise. How can we say we are 
not going to have it anymore, after having said we would not do it 
again, and doing it again, and presumably we would be doing it again 
after that?
  I mentioned the enforcement trigger. This was designed to make sure 
if we give amnesty, enforcement would occur. We put some things in the 
trigger that had to be done before some of the benefits of this program 
would accrue, but a lot of things were left out, and the things left 
out were quite troubling. They make you wonder how serious we are about 
creating a lawful system in the future, for example. The enforcement 
trigger that has the requirements that must be met before the new 
temporary worker program begins does not require the exit portion of 
the US-VISIT system, that is the biometric border check-in, checkout 
system first required by the Congress in 1996, be working. That is a 
cause for concern because it is already well past the year 2005, when 
this bill required that the U.S. visa exit system be in effect.
  In other words, in 1996, we said: OK, we are passing a law, and we 
are going to have an exit-entry visa system at the border that will 
clock you in when you come in with a biometric card, and it will clock 
you out when you go out, just as you do when you are working at a job. 
Just like a lot of employment agencies and businesses have those kind 
of things. OK? It was due to be completed in 2005. Without the U.S. 
visa exit portion, the United States has no method to ensure that the 
workers or their visiting families, who are allowed under certain 
circumstances to visit them, do not overstay their visas.
  Senator Bingaman has been talking about his concern over the 
temporary worker program. Let me ask this: How do we know they are 
going to go home when their time is expired if the exit portion of the 
US-VISIT system is not up and working? We don't know. It is a 
fundamental loophole of monumental proportions, and I am surprised it 
is not in there. Once again, it suggests those promoting this 
legislation may not be serious about creating an immigration system 
that works. They may like a system that allows virtually anyone 
determined to come here to come here.
  There is another matter I wanted to mention in the trigger 
requirement. If it is not in the trigger, there is no way to say the 
bills sponsor really intend for it to happen. The example of the U.S. 
VISIT system indicates something about the nature of the Senate. 
Remember, in 1996, this Senate passed legislation that required the US-
VISIT exit system be in effect by 2005. Then 2005 came and went. That 
did not occur. What does that mean? It means you can pass any law here 
and say you are going to do something in the future, but if you don't 
fund it or future Congresses don't fund it or future Presidents don't 
fight for it, it may not ever occur. That is all I am saying. That is 
why the American people need to be concerned about amnesty coming 
before all of the needed enforcement items.

[[Page 14440]]

  Another matter that involves what we are doing here involves having 
enough bedspace to end catch and release at the border. We passed a law 
in 2004 that requires 43,000 beds to be in place by the end of 2007. 
This is to end the catch-and-release section of the bill. Those beds 
have not been completed. In this legislation, it only required 27,000 
beds. We had already required 43,000, but as I said, we are going to 
have to have 27,500. Then Senator Gregg offered an amendment to 
increase that to 31,500. We passed legislation in 2004, as part of the 
Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004, to require much more bed space than 
this, and they have not been completed. Because we pass legislation 
doesn't mean it is going to happen.
  There is another loophole I will mention. I have 25. I should have 
added the problem Senator Bingaman just mentioned. I could have added 
many more than 25. Let's look at No. 4. Aliens who broke into this 
country a mere 5 months ago are provided permanent legal status in our 
country and are treated better than foreign nationals who legally 
applied to come to the United States more than 2 years ago. Aliens who 
can prove they were here illegally in the United States on January 1 of 
this year are immediately eligible to apply from inside the United 
States for amnesty benefits, while foreign nationals who filed 
applications to come to the United States after May 1 of 2005, over 2 
years ago, must start the application process all over again from their 
home countries.
  The bill sponsors continue to claim this bill is necessary because 
illegal aliens have deep roots in the United States and are, therefore, 
impossible to remove. They claim that they have families here. They 
have been working here for many years. They can't be asked to leave. 
There is some truth in some of those situations, for sure, but it 
simply is not true in all cases. It is simply not true in many cases. 
The young man who ran past the National Guard out at the border 
somewhere last December is going to be given amnesty here in this 
country.
  The American people want us to treat the illegal alien population 
compassionately, I do believe, but there is no reason to lump all 
illegal aliens, regardless of when and how they got here or how deep 
their roots are, into the same amnesty program. Last year's Senate bill 
would have given illegal aliens amnesty if they could prove they had 
been in the United States since January 7, 2004. A lot of people want 
us to believe that this is a tougher bill than last year's bill. At 
least last year they said you had to have been in the country by 
January 7, 2004. This year the bill expanded the amnesty window by 3 
years to 2007. Under this year's bill, illegal aliens who have rushed 
across the border in the last few years, including those who came 5 
months ago, will be given all the amnesty benefits as those who have 
been living here for decades, have U.S. citizens in schools, and have 
been good workers.
  The January 7, 2004 date, why was that date selected last year as a 
cutoff date? It was important because that was when President Bush 
first gave his speech saying we needed a lawful system of comprehensive 
reform of immigration in America. We knew that when he gave that 
speech--and he was talking about amnesty for people here illegally--
that that would encourage more people to try to come into the country 
so they could be provided amnesty too. So they cut off the dates and 
said: If you came in after the President's speech, you can't get the 
advantage of the amnesty. That makes sense, I think.
  Then even more significantly, last year, in May 2006, President Bush 
announced the beginning of Operation Jump Start. Do you remember that? 
That was the program to put the National Guard at the border. He called 
out the National Guard. So this bill says if you ignored our 
announcement that we are going to make a lawful system of comprehensive 
reform, if you ignored the announcement that the border is closed, if 
you ignored and ran past the National Guard we put on the border to 
create a lawful system there, as long as you got here by December 31 of 
last year, you get to apply for full amnesty. You are home free. You 
are in.
  I don't think that is required. I don't think that is good policy.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The time of the minority has 
expired.
  Mr. SESSIONS. I ask unanimous consent to speak for 2 additional 
minutes.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. SESSIONS. The bill's drafters say amnesty applicants will be at 
the back of the line and will not be treated preferentially to those 
who have followed the law. That is not true in a number of cases and in 
this case. The bill allows the illegal aliens who got here 5 months ago 
to cut in line in front of people in the family green card backlog who 
filed their applications after May 1, 2005, 2 years after. Illegal 
aliens who came to the United States 5 months ago will get probationary 
Z visa status 1 day after filing a Z visa application. I suppose those 
who followed the law, who made their application properly, who waited 
in line may wonder why they didn't come illegally also. Isn't that the 
message we are sending? So this provision in the bill does not restore 
respect for the rule of law. It erodes it. At a minimum, no illegal 
alien should be treated better than a foreign national who applied to 
come legally. The amnesty date should be moved back to May 1, 2005. I 
will have an amendment to that effect.
  I see my colleague here, Senator Dorgan. I appreciate his insight 
into these issues and his willingness to ask some tough questions about 
the system and the bill before us and to point out some of the 
weaknesses in it. That has been helpful to the debate.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from North Dakota.
  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I be allowed 
to speak in morning business for such time as I may consume, and to the 
extent that exceeds the limit of the majority in morning business, I 
would ask that the minority be accorded the same amount of time if they 
so desire.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. SESSIONS. I am not sure I quite understand that.
  Mr. DORGAN. How much morning business remains on our side?
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. There is 11\1/2\ minutes.
  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I ask to be recognized in morning business 
for as much time as I may consume. My understanding is we will be going 
to the bill as soon as I finish speaking.
  Mr. SESSIONS. I wondered if the Senator was going to continue and how 
long he might speak.
  Mr. DORGAN. It is my intention to speak for perhaps 20 minutes.
  Mr. SESSIONS. I have no objection, Mr. President.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, this issue of immigration is a very 
passionate issue and raises the passions in this country in a 
significant way. I understand all of that. I have described often on 
the floor of the Senate the circumstances of what has brought us to 
this point.
  This country we live in is a remarkable country. If you have a globe 
in front of you, and spin the globe, and take a look at all the land 
that exists on your globe, you will see there is just one little spot 
called the United States of America, but it is a very different spot 
than much of the rest of the world.
  We have raised incomes in this country, expanded the middle class, 
created a standard and a scale of living that is pretty unusual and 
pretty remarkable. Because of that, because we have dramatically 
expanded the middle class and have created a country that is very 
different than many other countries on this Earth, there are many who 
live on this planet who want to come here.
  Last week, I described being in a helicopter, flying between Honduras 
and Nicaragua, up in the mountainous jungle areas some long while ago, 
and we ran out of gas. I discovered on a helicopter when you run out of 
gas, you are

[[Page 14441]]

going to be landing very soon. We were not hurt, of course, but the red 
lights and the alarm bells were ringing and going off, and our pilots 
put us down in a clearing.
  While we were there, I heard from some campesinos who came up to see 
who had landed in these helicopters. Through an interpreter, I visited 
with the campesinos. I heard from them what I have heard in virtually 
every part of the world in which I have traveled. I spoke with a young 
woman in her early twenties. She had three children with her. I asked 
her--after we visited--through an interpreter: What do you want for you 
and your children?
  She said: Oh, I want to come to the United States of America.
  That is not unusual. I have heard that all over the world: I want to 
come to the United States of America. I asked her why.
  She said: Well, there is opportunity there--an opportunity for a 
better life for me and my children.
  We have built something quite unusual in this country, and many from 
around this planet would like to come here. I understand that. Let me 
give you an example of why.
  If you live in China, the average hourly wage for factory workers is 
33 cents an hour. If you are in Bangladesh, 33 cents an hour is the 
average annual hourly wage, if you can find a factory job. If you are 
in Nicaragua, 37 cents an hour is the average annual hourly wage. In 
India, 11 cents an hour is the average wage. In Haiti, it is 30 cents 
an hour, if you can find a job. In Russia, it is 51 cents an hour. I 
could go on.
  But my point is, there are people living in countries where, if they 
can find a job, they are going to be paid 30 cents an hour, 20 cents an 
hour, 11 cents an hour, and they take a look at this country, and they 
evaluate: Perhaps I need to go to the United States and be a part of 
that great country.
  Well, because so many want to come here, we have immigration laws and 
quotas. We actually allow into this country, under legal quotas, a good 
many immigrants every single year. Well over 1 million people come into 
this country every single year legally as part of our immigration quota 
system. We have quotas for various countries and regions of the world, 
and we accept legal immigration from those countries. We would have had 
last year over 2 million people come into this country legally, with 
both agricultural workers and also under the legal immigration system.
  But think for a moment if we decided to do it differently, after what 
we have spent well over the last century building in this country to 
expand opportunity, expand the middle class, and create an economy that 
is the wonder of the world--the real economic engine of the world is 
this economic engine of ours. Think of the consequences if, in fact, we 
said this: We have a new policy on immigration. Our policy is that 
anybody in this world who wants to come here--to stay here, to live 
here, to work here, to be part of the American experience--come right 
ahead, with no restrictions. Come into this country and be a part of 
our great Nation.
  If we said that, if, in fact, that were our country's policy, we 
would be literally overrun by those who wish to come to be a part of 
this American experience--an America with opportunity, an America that 
offers hope to people living in squalid poverty, people working for 11 
cents an hour. We would be overrun. As a result, what we do have is a 
series of immigration laws that provide for legal immigration. It 
restricts numbers who come in, but we still have a pretty substantial 
number who come in legally into this country.
  Now, we are told we have a new immigration proposal put together by a 
group of Senators in the Senate with, I understand, the assistance of 
the White House--or at least the involvement of the White House--and 
brought to the floor of the Senate saying: Here is a new plan. It is 20 
years after the last plan, which was in 1986. It was called Simpson-
Mazzoli. It was the immigration plan of 1986. That was a plan that, 
back then, promised it would end the problem of illegal immigration by 
choking off the demand for illegal labor through tough enforcement and 
guest worker programs and also through amnesty of people who were then 
in the country at that point in time.
  Let me read some quotes for what was done in 1986. Here are quotes in 
the Congressional Record. Quote:

       The guts of immigration reform are here. All of it. 
     Employer sanctions, increased enforcement, worker 
     authorization system, verification systems, and legalization 
     is [all] there. . . .

  That is what was promised 20 years ago. One Senator said:

       This bill also . . . should help the Immigration and 
     Naturalization Service to increase Border Patrol personnel by 
     50 percent.

  Border enforcement, employer sanctions--well, they said: We are going 
to ramp up border security, provide employer sanctions, so you don't 
have the lure of a job and, therefore, we, at the same time, will 
provide amnesty--this is 1986--to about 1 million illegal immigrants. 
When amnesty was in fact granted following that, it turns out there 
were 3 million or so. Everyone was pretty stunned to learn there was so 
little control over the borders then. But now, today--fast-forward 20 
years--we have a bill on the floor of the Senate that promises almost 
exactly the same thing: tougher border enforcement, employer sanctions, 
guest workers, temporary workers--except now, 20 years later, after we 
solved the problem 20 years ago, we have 12 million--it is estimated 12 
million--people who came here without legal authorization. We do not 
know that for sure. We think it is somewhere around 12 million people. 
So we have ``comprehensive immigration reform.''
  Well, let me go back for a moment and show you that this issue of 
border enforcement and employer sanctions is all a matter of 
enforcement and will. I have just taken the period from 1999 to 2004. 
The current administration, as you can see, has had almost no worksite 
enforcement. In fact, in 2004 there were three cases in the entire 
Nation brought against employers who hired illegal aliens. Think of 
that. In the year 2000 there were 213 cases out of all of this country; 
out of the millions and millions of employers in this country, there 
were 213 cases. In 2004, it dropped to three, which meant there was no 
enforcement at all--no will, no interest, nothing.
  Is it surprising, then, that the employers in this country would 
decide: Why don't I just risk it, just hire illegal aliens because 
nobody is checking?
  Here on this chart are the fines that have been levied with respect 
to employer sanctions. As you can see, $118,000 for the entire country. 
You can see what has happened under this administration. They 
apparently decided: We are not going to enforce this at all. The result 
is a dramatic increase across the border of illegal immigrants.
  Now, I know some do not like the term, and I do not mean the term as 
a pejorative term, but it is what it is. We have immigrants who come 
into this country--some legally and some illegally. That is just a 
fact. So there has been virtually no enforcement by this administration 
or really any administration, although the previous administration did 
much better.
  But now we are told this new plan has an ability to solve this 
problem. We are going to have employer sanctions, we are going to have 
border enforcement--sound familiar? Yes, it was 20 years ago that was 
promised--and we are going to have temporary workers. They now call 
them guest workers, but they are temporary workers.
  Last week I was interested that some of my colleagues, when they 
defeated an amendment I had by a one-vote margin--an amendment I had 
that would deal with the temporary worker issue. First, I wanted to 
abolish it. That lost by a broader margin. Then I wanted to at least 
subset it, and that lost by one vote. Incidentally, there was a lot of 
arm twisting to get that vote. I have not seen any casts or anything on 
arms, but I know there was a lot of arm twisting.
  We were told during the debate on the guest worker provision the 
following: The manager of the bill and the manager on the minority side 
said the

[[Page 14442]]

same thing. They said: Look, if you do not have a temporary worker 
provision to allow those who are not now in this country--even as we 
legalize 12 million who are here with a work permit immediately--if you 
do not allow millions more to come in--600,000 a year; now 200,000 a 
year--if you do not allow additional people to come into this country, 
they will come anyway. They will come as illegals across the border.
  So I asked the question: Wait a second. You are saying we have to 
have a temporary worker program to bring people into this country who 
are not now here and declare them legal to take American jobs because 
if we don't have a temporary worker program, they will come anyway? I 
thought you said you had border enforcement. What you appear to be 
saying is, you do not have border enforcement, so for those who would 
come illegally, let's just see if we can label them as legal under 
temporary workers.
  You cannot have it both ways. There either is border enforcement or 
there is not. You cannot say to me we must put in a temporary worker 
program because if it is not there we will have illegal immigration, 
and then in the next breath--while thumbing your suspenders--say, and 
by the way, we really have effective border control. If you have 
effective border control, why then would you have illegal immigration 
that necessitates you to say there are millions who live outside this 
country who now must be allowed in? That is on top of the 12 million 
people who, under this underlying bill, will be declared legal, to have 
legal status.
  Anyone who came across by December 31 of last year--across an ocean 
or across a river or across any border--anyone who entered this country 
by December 31 of last year would be told: You now have legal status in 
this country and will be able to work.
  My colleague, a while ago, asked a very important question: What 
about the people in other parts of the world who thought this was all 
on the level and there was an immigration system and they applied 
through the quota system and have waited now 8 years to see if they 
would be allowed to come to this country and they are near the top of 
the list, but now they discover something that makes them feel as if 
they made a big mistake? What they discovered is, while they waited all 
of those years to get toward the top of the list under the legal 
immigration system we have, with the quotas we have, they should have 
snuck across the border on December 31 because those who did will have 
been declared, by this piece of legislation, as legal. And those who 
went through the process and have waited years--7 years, 8 years--and 
are near the top of the list are told: You are just out of luck.
  That does not make any sense to me. It just does not make any sense. 
Let me describe some quotes from the week before last.

     . . . this legislation has tough border security and tough 
     interior enforcement provisions.
       Even if you have a secure border--we are hopeful of having 
     secure borders--it won't stop illegal immigration.

  That is from a Senator on the floor of the Senate 2 weeks ago in 
support of this bill.

       The fact of the matter is, some workers will come here 
     illegally, or legally, one way or the other they come in.
       That is where the temporary worker program comes in . . . 
     if we eliminate this program, you will have those individuals 
     that will crawl across the desert . . . or you can say, come 
     through the front door and you will be given the opportunity 
     to work. . . .

  That is unbelievable. This is from the architects of the proposal 
before the Senate who come here boasting it has real security on 
America's borders, and then say: By the way, if we do not allow--in 
addition to legalizing 12 million people who came here illegally--a 
substantial additional number of people who do not now live here to 
come and take American jobs, they will come anyway because they will 
come as illegal immigrants--which suggests to me, at least, there is 
not meaningful border protection or border security in this 
legislation.
  Let me describe for a moment the guest worker provision. These are 
temporary workers--I do not know why you call them guests--but these 
are temporary workers who would come in and take jobs at the low end of 
the economic scale and, by and large, put downward pressure on income 
for American workers. But here is how it would work.
  It seems to me, you could not sit down and think of what kind of an 
approach we could use to put together a guest worker provision and come 
up with this sort of Rube Goldberg scheme. There is just no way you 
could possibly put this together and believe it to be serious. Here is 
what they say. In the case of the original proposal, which was 600,000 
a year, and now it is going to be 200,000 a year, it will amount to 1.2 
million over the first 10 years, and here is what they say: You can 
come for the first 2 years; you can bring your family if you come for 
the first 2 years. Then you have to go home for a year and take your 
family with you, then come back for 2 more years. Then you leave again. 
If you never brought your family to begin with, you can then come back 
for 2 more years. So you can be here for a total of 6 years and you can 
only have your family here for 2 years and you all have to leave this 
country twice. That is unbelievable. Who on Earth can sit in a room and 
construct that sort of nonsense?
  Aside from the fact that we shouldn't have that provision in the 
bill, we are told, this is the way it will work. How many believe you 
will have 1,200,000 people come for 2 years, with their families, if 
they wish, and then all of them will go home? Let's assume they all 
went home, they get to go home for a year and come back for 2 years and 
then again go home for a year and then come back for 2 years, how many 
of you believe they are all going to leave? They are not.
  Let me emphasize that the guest worker program has nothing to do with 
agricultural work. These are nonagricultural workers. These will be in 
manufacturing and in other areas.
  Also, the guest worker program applies in sectors of our economy 
where the vast majority of the jobs are done by U.S. citizens. That is 
a fact. They say this is necessary because you can't find U.S. workers 
to take these jobs. That is not the case. These jobs are not picking 
strawberries. Those jobs are in the agricultural worker provisions. But 
these temporary workers are in construction, manufacturing, 
transportation, all of which have a wide majority of U.S. workers--80, 
90 percent of the workers are U.S. workers. So don't tell me you can't 
find U.S. workers to fill these jobs. In all of these cases--
construction, transportation, manufacturing--80 to 90 percent of them 
are already U.S. workers.
  What does immigration do to American workers? One of the points I 
have made is this is a way of putting downward pressure on wages in our 
country. This is from Professor George Borjas, John F. Kennedy School 
of Government at Harvard. He says, on average, the impact of 1980 
through 2000 immigration on U.S. wages, on average, it has reduced 
wages by about 3.7 percent. I don't think there is much question that 
if you bring in a lot of people through the back door to compete for 
low-wage jobs, you are going to put downward pressure on wages. That is 
a fact.
  Here is an example of my concern and one of the things that persuades 
me we ought to do better. Hurricane Katrina hit on the gulf coast and 
we had a lot of cleanup to do. When Hurricane Katrina devastated that 
gulf coast, FEMA and others began to let contracts to try to see how we 
could create this cleanup, and here is what happened October 22, 2005: 
Sam Smith was an electrician. He lost his house. He lost a lot during 
the hurricane. His house was in the ninth ward. It was destroyed by 
Hurricane Katrina. He was an electrician, age 55, who returned to the 
city for the cleanup, the promise of a $22-an-hour wage, and guaranteed 
work for 1 year, a qualified electrician. He lost his job within 3 
weeks--within 3 weeks. Let me show you why these folks--Sam Smith lost 
his house, lost his job, and here is who the subcontractor brings in. 
Take a look at the barracks: Illegal workers brought in living in these 
squalid conditions. Can

[[Page 14443]]

you get them to work for less? Sure, you can. Is it the right thing to 
do? No, of course, it is not because an American worker who lost his 
house and then lost his job--Sam Smith--deserves better. But that is a 
small example of what we face with respect to the downward pressure on 
income for those who work at the bottom of the economic ladder.
  Now, the Wall Street Journal ran a very interesting story in January 
of this year. It showed that in an area where there is a sudden drop in 
the availability of illegal immigrants, the wages for U.S. workers then 
rise. There was a series of raids by Federal immigration agents in 
Stillmore, GA, and this is again quoting from the Wall Street Journal:

       A local poultry processing company called Crider Inc. lost 
     75 percent of its 900 member work force when they were found 
     to be illegal aliens--

  Illegal workers. The company apparently, according to the story, had 
a pretty good idea that a good number of its workers had been illegal.

       One worker--

  It says in the story--

     arrived at the plant in 2004. As she filled out an 
     application, she tried to use the Social Security number, a 
     tax payer identification number that started with the numeral 
     9. The company clerk stopped her and said valid Social 
     Security numbers never begin with a 9.

  The clerk kept saying: Maybe you want to put down a 4 or a 6. So the 
illegal immigrant wrote down a 6, and of course the application was 
accepted.
  After the raid, almost 75 percent of the workers were determined to 
have been illegal immigrants and the company decided it needed to find 
workers, so they decided to raise wages. An advertisement in the weekly 
newspaper titled ``Increased Wages'' at Crider, starting at $7 to $9 an 
hour. That was more than a dollar an hour above what the company had 
paid many immigrant workers. It began offering free transportation from 
nearby towns, free rooms in company-owned dormitories near the plant, 
and for the first time in years, the company aggressively sought 
workers from the area State-funded employment office, which is a key 
avenue for low-skilled workers to find jobs.
  Continuing again to describe the Wall Street Journal article, it 
said: Hundreds of local workers, many of them minorities, accepted the 
higher wages and were happy to take these jobs. Pretty soon this 
Georgia company was apparently hiring back some additional illegal 
immigrant workers who had been previously caught up in the raid. They 
turned to a ``temporary labor provider'' who began to provide the 
company with the same illegal immigrant workers who had been caught in 
the first raid. So the immigration officials conducted a second raid 
and the company then finally agreed to stop working with temporary 
labor.
  The point of this story is very simple: If you have substantial 
amounts of illegal immigrant labor coming in, it puts downward pressure 
on wages. Eliminate that illegal labor from the marketplace, and what 
happens is you raise wages at the bottom of the economic ladder.
  Robert Samuelson wrote an editorial in the Washington Post some while 
ago. He said: It is simply a myth that the U.S. economy needs more poor 
immigrants. He pointed out that in March the unemployment rate for 
college graduates in this country was 1.8 percent. The unemployment 
rate for the 13 million U.S. workers without a high school diploma is 
over 7 percent. Those 13 million U.S. workers without a high school 
diploma compete directly with the immigrant workers who come here 
illegally and who do not have a high school diploma. That is what puts 
downward pressure on wages in this country.
  This is, as I indicated earlier, a very difficult issue, filled with 
passion, and I understand that. I think there are a lot of immigrant 
families living in this country, perhaps many who came here without 
legal authorization, and many came here 5 years ago, 10, 15 years ago, 
20 years ago. They have lived model lives. They have gone to school 
here. They have gotten jobs. I understand all that. I think we should 
deal with that in a sensitive way. There are many who should not be 
expelled from this country. We are not going to round up 12 million 
people and deport them. We are not going to do that. So we need to find 
a way to deal appropriately with these issues. But that appropriate way 
does not say anyone who came across illegally into this country on 
December 31 of last year is deemed to have come here legally. That is 
not the right approach. You can't do that.
  Second, you should not be oblivious to the needs in this country of 
the low-income workers. We have a whole lot of people today who got up 
this morning who are going to work hard all day long and come home with 
very little to show for it, in many cases two and three jobs. You know 
the people. They are the ones who know about being second. The people 
who know about secondhand, second mortgage, second job, second shift. 
They are always in second place. They are the ones who have the least 
opportunity in this country to get a decent wage because their 
productivity goes up and their wage does not. As long as there are 
employers who are able to bring in across the border--a border that 
leaks like a sieve when it comes to illegal immigrants--as long as 
there are employers who are willing to put downward pressure on income 
for American workers, we are going to see people at the bottom of the 
economic ladder in this country continuing to struggle. That is a fact.
  The question is: Are we going to do something about it? When we deal 
with immigration, we ought to do 2 things. First and foremost, we ought 
to have a bill on the floor of the Senate that deals with border 
security. You can't deal with this issue without stopping illegal 
immigration. After all, we allow nearly a couple million people in this 
country every single year under a legal system. But if you don't stop 
at the border this unbelievable avalanche of illegal immigrants, you 
don't have any hope of dealing with this issue. First and foremost, you 
have to deal with border security. That ought to be the bill on the 
floor of the Senate. Then, after we have dealt with border security, we 
ought to deal with the question of the 12 million people who are here 
without legal authorization. I would be the first to join those who say 
let's be sensitive and let's be thoughtful about that. We are not going 
to round up 12 million people. There are some who have been here a long 
while and raised families here who have contributed to this country and 
we need to understand that. That is a different issue than the issue of 
border security. If we don't do border security and do it right, this 
is another way to say: Let's provide amnesty this time for 12 million 
people; we did it for 3 million people 12 years ago. By the way, let's 
meet again. In fact, let's set a date right now. We will meet again in 
10 years, if, in fact, those who wrote this bill were telling me what 
they believe 2 weeks ago and that is if you don't have a temporary 
worker program, you are going to have people come here illegally 
anyway. What that means is they don't have real border security or the 
least bit of confidence in the border security and their bill. That is 
a fact.
  There is a generous amount of discussion on the floor of this Senate 
about issues that are completely devoid of the well-being and the best 
interests of people in this country who work very hard and show very 
little for it. I would love to see a long discussion on the floor of 
this Senate about international trade and the $830 billion trade 
deficit, and American companies being given a tax break by this 
Congress and previous Congresses, American companies who shut their 
manufacturing plant, fire all their workers, and ship their jobs to 
Chinese or Bangladesh or Sri Lanka or Indonesia. They actually get a 
tax break for doing it. I have tried four times to shut it down. I have 
been unsuccessful. I would love to have a debate about that. In fact, 
it is the same coin, just the reverse side. Shipping American jobs 
overseas is the reverse side of the coin of bringing cheap labor 
through the back door. That is a fact.
  I understand where the impulse comes from. It comes from many large 
enterprises, many big businesses who have convinced this Congress--or 
too many in this Congress--that you can't fill jobs with Americans, you 
have to bring in people from across the border

[[Page 14444]]

or from around the world. There aren't enough Americans to assume these 
jobs.
  I don't believe that. I believe as long as you keep a constant supply 
of cheap labor coming into this country, you keep downward pressure on 
wages, and the person across the convenience store counter, the person 
who made the bed in your hotel room where you stayed last night, the 
person who works in all of those jobs at the lower end of the economic 
ladder, they will never, ever see a better income.
  It took us nearly 10 years to pass an increase in the minimum wage in 
this Congress. One of the reasons for that is the same influence in 
this Chamber that exists in support of this bill. The biggest 
businesses in this country didn't want an increase in the minimum wage 
and they blocked it for nearly 10 years. The biggest interests in this 
country that want to shift jobs overseas, want to continue to bring 
cheap labor through the back door, and that is the genesis of this kind 
of legislation.
  I am not averse to resolving the status of the 12 million who are 
here without legal authorization, but I wouldn't do it this way. I 
certainly wouldn't point to December 31 and say: By the way, if you got 
here last December 31, good for you, we declare you to be legal. That 
is a thoughtless approach, not a thoughtful approach, to dealing with 
these issues.
  Mr. President, one final point: It is the case that I come to the 
floor of the Senate on this issue concerned about a lot of people in 
this country who work hard and get little for it. We have seen a 
dramatic increase in the largesse of this country going to the top 1 
percent of the income in this country--the top 1 percent, I should say, 
of the people who earn income in this country have seen dramatic 
increases in their income. Yet the bottom 20, bottom 40 percent, in 
many cases, have seen that they have not been able to increase their 
income at all.
  I think an aggressive debate about how we improve the lot of all 
Americans would be helpful. But we don't improve the lot of Americans 
who have done the work they wanted to do, to go find a job and get 
educated, we don't do their bidding and help them by deciding we are 
going to keep downward pressure on their wages. This is exactly the 
wrong approach.
  I know the Chair and the ranking member are here. They wish to get to 
the bill. I know there will be many amendments this week. Let me say 
this. I would be very interested in voting for a piece of legislation 
that I thought was on the level, that will provide real border 
security. That is the first and most important need in dealing with 
immigration. But 2 weeks ago, the very people who wrote this bill said 
if we don't have temporary workers coming in under the temporary worker 
program, they will come in illegally anyway.
  I think that unmasks the fallacy of this bill. There is not border 
protection here that will work. There has not been a will to enforce it 
in the past. This legislation will continue to put downward pressure on 
the income for American workers. That is exactly the wrong thing for us 
to do.
  I yield the floor.

                          ____________________