[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 153 (2007), Part 3]
[House]
[Pages 3426-3431]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




        FREE BORDER PATROL AGENTS IGNACIO RAMOS AND JOSE COMPEAN

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 18, 2007, the gentleman from California (Mr. Bilbray) is 
recognized for 60 minutes.
  Mr. BILBRAY. Mr. Speaker, tonight I am privileged to yield to the 
second best surfer in Congress, Mr. Dana Rohrabacher of the great State 
of California, and I yield to him whatever time he may consume.
  Mr. ROHRABACHER. Mr. Speaker, today we discuss a black mark on this 
administration, a vile crime against two law enforcement officers whose 
job has been protecting our families and communities and keeping 
control of America's borders. This sad episode started back on February 
17, 2005, just another routine day for Border Patrol agents Ignacio 
Ramos and Jose Compean. Both were Border Patrol veterans with 
unblemished service records. Agent Ramos, in fact, had been nominated 
for Border Patrol Agent of the Year.
  As they did their rounds that day 2 years ago, a trip sensor at the 
border was discovered, and Agent Compean then discovered footprints and 
drag marks, a usual indication of a drug load being smuggled across the 
river. He then spotted a vehicle and radioed the description and then 
followed the suspect. The suspect realized he had been made and turned 
around to rush back towards Mexico.
  Agent Ramos then spotted the van driving at a high rate of speed. 
After the driver ignored all commands to pull over, of course, Ramos 
gave chase.
  By the way, according to the prosecuting attorney, pursuing fleeing 
suspects without a supervisor's permission is against Border Patrol 
policy.
  This, in and of itself, is an insane policy. The drug smuggler who 
they were pursuing abandoned his vehicle and fled toward Mexico on foot 
but was intercepted by Agent Compean. Once again, ignoring several 
commands by Agent Compean to stop, a physical altercation ensued with 
Compean ending up in a ditch.
  While seeing his opportunity, the smuggler then ran toward the 
border, which was nearby. According to Agent Compean's sworn testimony, 
while running, the suspect turned and pointed with something shiny in 
his left hand. Believing his life was in danger, Agent Compean opened 
fire. Hearing gunshots, Agent Ramos came to his side, and he, too, 
shouted for the smuggler to stop.

                              {time}  1915

  But instead of obeying his command, the illegal drug smuggler once 
again turned as he ran and again pointed something shiny at the 
officers. Ramos, believing it to be a weapon, fired one shot. After 
disappearing into the banks of the Rio Grande, the smuggler reappeared 
on the Mexican side where he jumped into a waiting van. Unbeknownst to 
the officers, Ramos's bullet may have hit the illegal drug smuggler in 
the left buttocks.
  Minutes after the shooting, seven other agents were on the scene, 
including two supervisors. When the abandoned van was examined, 743 
pounds of marijuana were found. The payload was seized, and one would 
think congratulations would have been in order. Agent Ramos and Compean 
are heroes, right? They are responsible for taking off the streets $1 
million worth of drugs bound for our communities. Good job fellows, 
right? Wrong.
  At this moment Agents Ramos and Compean, not the illegal drug 
smuggler, are languishing in a Federal prison serving 11- and 12-year 
sentences. This is the worst miscarriage of justice that I have seen in 
my 25 years of public service. It is a nightmare for the two Border 
Patrol agents and their families, these Border Patrol agents who 
willingly risk their lives protecting us for 5 and 10 years.
  The whole rotten episode turned justice on its head. The book was 
thrown at our heroes who protect us, while the drug smugglers got 
immunity. According to the U.S. attorney, Johnny Sutton, a Bush 
appointee and a longtime friend of the President, Ramos and Compean are 
not heroes. In fact, he considers those two officers to be criminals, 
charging them with assault with serious bodily injury, assault with a 
deadly weapon, discharge of a firearm while committing a crime of 
violence, which carries, of course, a minimum mandatory sentence of 10 
years, and a civil rights violation.
  Sutton claims that he had no choice but to prosecute the two Border 
Patrol agents because, according to Sutton, they broke the law when 
they violated these procedures concerning the discharge of their 
weapons at this fleeing suspect.
  No. Even if procedures were not followed, Sutton could have granted 
immunity to the law enforcement officers and thrown the book at the 
drug smuggler. That was his choice. He chose the side of the drug 
smuggler and threw the book at the Border Patrol agents. This was an 
indefensible decision, and now Sutton lies to us and to the American 
people, suggesting that he did not have a choice, that he had to 
prosecute.
  Well, the facts don't back him up. And what happened after this man 
got away? After the incident the drug smuggler contacted Renee Sanchez, 
a childhood friend for advice.
  Now, why did she contact Renee Sanchez? Because Renee Sanchez happens 
to be a current Border Patrol agent in Arizona. And instead of turning 
in this drug smuggler, turning the

[[Page 3427]]

drug smuggler over to the authorities for prosecution, this law 
enforcement officer, Agent Sanchez, he is sworn to uphold the laws of 
the United States, but he chose to personally intervene on behalf of 
his childhood friend who was a known mule for the drug cartels.
  He was also called as a character witness on the drug smuggler's 
behalf during the trial. Mr. Sanchez contacted the Department of 
Homeland Security, who in turn decided to open an investigation into 
the conduct of Ramos and Compean. What? What? You have got a drug 
smuggler with 750 pounds of narcotics who is being thwarted from making 
his delivery, and that he complains that he was shot at, and our 
Government decides to investigate the law enforcement officers.
  Mr. Sutton had every chance to focus his enormous prosecutorial 
powers on the drug dealer, but he chose to target the law enforcement 
officers. He chose to turn a procedural violation into a criminal act 
rather than prosecuting a career drug smuggler.
  As part of their investigation, the Department of Homeland Security 
Office of Inspector General sent a special agent to Mexico to offer the 
drug smuggler immunity in exchange for testimony against the Border 
Patrol officers. The smuggler was then brought back to the United 
States and given free medical care at all taxpayers' expense.
  Now, one has to wonder if Mr. Sutton, our U.S. attorney, would have 
even spent one-tenth of that effort trying to find this criminal 
himself and track him down in Mexico so that he could be extradited and 
punished for smuggling narcotics into our country. No. No effort was 
made to do that. Instead, an expensive Herculean effort was made to try 
to get the Border Patrol agents.
  Now the drug smuggler is being portrayed as a victim because he 
swears he was not armed. Our government takes the word of this 
nefarious character over two law enforcement officers. In short, the 
initial decision to prosecute the two Border Patrol agents instead of 
the drug smuggler was indefensible. Period.
  Sutton's only defense, to cover up this horrendous decision, has been 
to lie and to demonize the two Border Patrol agents. Well, it just does 
not jive.
  According to that investigative report, Agent Compean's sworn 
statement, in his sworn statements he repeatedly stated he believed the 
drug smuggler had a weapon and felt threatened. The Border Patrol 
training manuals allow for this type of deadly force to be used when an 
agent fears imminent bodily injury or death. Both of the officers say 
they saw this drug smuggler turn and point what they believed to be a 
weapon in their direction while he was running away. The wound created 
by the bullet corroborates their version of the events.
  So we have the prosecutor, even with the direction of the trajectory 
of the bullet as indicated by the wound, but the prosecutor is ignoring 
the fact that it backs up the Compean and Ramos position.
  During the trial an Army doctor, a prosecution witness I might add, 
testified that the drug smuggler's body was bladed away from the bullet 
that struck him. That is consistent with the motion of a left-handed 
person running away while pointing backwards, causing his body to 
twist.
  Once again, this corroborated Ramos's and Compean's belief that the 
smuggler had a weapon. And that was a reasonable belief considering the 
smuggler was transporting over $1 million of drugs that day. And I am 
sure, of course, drug dealers with $1 million worth of drugs are not 
armed.
  Now, it is important to understand that only three individuals were 
eyewitnesses to the crucial events of that day, the two accused Border 
Patrol agents and a self-admitted drug smuggler. Those are the only two 
people who saw what happened. The other Border Patrol agents who 
responded to the scene testified under immunity, and quite often 
contradicting themselves; however, the most important thing when 
thinking about their testimony is their view of the events was 
completely obscured by a levee at the road, which is about 12 feet 
higher than the road on which they stood, and about 8 feet higher from 
the spot on the other side of the levee where Ramos and Compean stood 
and where they fired their pistols.
  So let me make it very clear what I just said. None of the other 
agents could possibly have seen what transpired between Ramos and 
Compean and this drug smuggler, even if they climbed on top of their 
vehicles. It was physically impossible for them to see. Yet these 
agents were threatened with prosecution if they did not testify against 
Ramos and Compean. They agreed to testify. If they agreed, they would 
be granted immunity. It begs the question why these agents need to be 
granted immunity if they were not involved in the incident, and this 
whole thing calls into question what effect that this threat that was 
held over their head had on the truthfulness of their testimony.
  The U.S. attorney's version of what happened that day relies almost 
exclusively on the testimony of the drug smuggler. Despite the fact 
that there were seven other agents, including two supervisors on scene 
within minutes, no report of the shooting was ever filed, even though 
the Border Patrol regulations require the supervisors to file the 
report.
  Agents are only required to orally notify their supervisors, and 
Ramos and Compean justifiably believed that their supervisors were 
totally aware that there was a shooting. They were within about 50 feet 
or 100 feet of what was going on. So, as a matter of fact, the agents, 
those agents are prohibited from actually filing a written report, as 
in INS firearms policy, section 12B, 1G states: Ensure that supervisory 
personnel or investigative officers are aware that employees involved 
in a shooting incident shall not be required or allowed to submit a 
written statement of the circumstances surrounding the incident. All 
written statements regarding the incident shall be prepared by the 
local investigative officers and shall be based on an interview of the 
employee. That is what their regulations state.
  Yet U.S. Attorney Johnny Sutton continues to claim that the officers 
filed a false report to cover up their crime. They are not even 
permitted to file a report, much less a false report. And they were not 
asked by their supervisors who heard the shots.
  So the supervisors decided not to ask questions about it, probably 
because had they then officially known about the incident, they would 
have had to fill out about 5 hours' worth of paperwork. This is about 
bureaucratic requirements of the people at the border. If one shot is 
fired, on their own time they end up having to work about 5 hours.
  Because it looked like the incident was over, all of them, including 
the supervisors, decided to just close the book. Was that a good 
decision? Well, probably not, considering that you have an out-of-
control prosecutor trying to find something to prosecute our defenders 
about.
  By no means did their actions rise to the level of criminality, what 
might be considered an unauthorized discharge of their weapons, 
because, of course, they could not absolutely prove they knew that the 
drug dealer had a weapon. Well, if they could not absolutely prove it, 
then according to the U.S. Attorney, they are guilty of attempted 
murder.
  Again, let me note, the agents thought the drug dealer was aiming 
something at them. He had just been in a physical altercation with one 
of the officers. Of course, when it came to the details about that, our 
U.S. attorney believed the drug dealer, who swears that Compean, for 
example, in the altercation just fell down.
  You know, you would be surprised how many police officers just fall 
down in the middle of trying to enforce the law when dealing with 
professional criminals like the ones that Compean and Ramos were 
dealing with. Just fell down. Yeah.
  You believe that, but you do not believe these guys with an 
unblemished record of 5 and 10 years of protecting the American people. 
So even though this investigation determined that all seven officers on 
the scene knew about

[[Page 3428]]

or heard the shooting, the U.S. attorney granted those officers 
immunity even though it was their job to report the incident.
  But of course they did not think it was an incident, they thought it 
was closed, the guns went off. They did not want to spend 5 hours 
filling out paperwork. Well, guess what? It was their job to do it. 
Actually one of them was actually promoted after all of this.
  But the U.S. attorney decided to prosecute the Border Patrol agents, 
and in doing so, he had to intimidate these supervisors by saying that 
he was going to charge them and giving them immunity unless they went 
along with this legal lynching of Ramos and Compean.

                              {time}  1930

  If this incident would have been kept in perspective, all seven 
supervisors and agents who were failing to report a shooting that may 
or may not have been consistent with regulations governing the 
discharge of weapons, but just keep this all in perspective, they might 
have deserved a disciplinary action, maybe a week without pay or some 
mark on their record; that would have been the end of it. But the 
penalty for not reporting a shooting is a 5-day suspension. That is the 
maximum penalty. This was an issue of a procedural violation, not 
criminality, and there is a serious question about the viability of 
those procedures which are mandated by the policy. This, of course, 
flows directly from the insane border policy, and it led directly to 
this unconscionable situation.
  Over 78 Members of Congress have expressed concern, if not outrage, 
at the troubling aspects of this case. Our repeated attempts for 
Presidential intervention or even to communicate with the President 
have been ignored. Our pleas to keep the officers out of jail on bond 
pending their appeal have been denied. The President could have just 
had the prosecutor go to the judge and say, please, let these guys stay 
out at least until their appeal. No, no. It was the opposite. They 
insisted on the maximum. They wanted their pound of flesh. The maximum 
penalty, the maximum message to other Border Patrol agents: Don't you 
dare ever to even think about firing your weapon at the border.
  Instead, the President, after we appealed to try to get him to look 
at this, the President dug in his heels, sent Tony Snow out to chastise 
us, you know. We were trying to save Ramos and Compean, and then we 
were told by Tony Snow to take a closer look at the facts.
  Well, we have taken a closer look at the facts. We also know what 
happened. There has been a publicity campaign that has been put out to 
destroy and demonize Ramos and Compean even as they languish in prison, 
because the Federal prosecutor knows he is the one who made the 
mistake. He made the initial decision to grant immunity to the drug 
dealer, rather than for a procedural mistake by the Border Patrol 
agents. He made that decision. It is a horrendous decision, and he is 
trying to cover it up and destroying the lives of these two Border 
Patrol agents in the process. That is what he has to do. So he has gone 
on the air waves and lied to the public to discredit these agents.
  We found out today, for example, that the Department of Homeland 
Security lied to Congress trying to cover up for their lies to 
Congress. What happened is five Members of Congress were briefed. We 
will hear about this later on tonight from another Member of Congress. 
They were told that Compean had claimed he was going to go out and 
shoot a Mexican. Now, here is Compean, Jose Compean, right? These are 
two Mexican American, proud Hispanics, and they were going to go out 
and shoot a Mexican. And this is from five or six areas that were just 
total lies given to Members of Congress looking into this. And then 
they were questioned, when the Department of Homeland Security 
investigators were questioned, they said, oh, yes, we have all of this 
proved in various reports. And so they asked for them, those reports. 
And today it was just determined that for 4 months the Department of 
Homeland Security has been lying to Members of Congress because those 
reports never existed. There was nothing to substantiate the charges, 
the horrendous charges that were made against Compean and Ramos.
  Well, what we hear now is, well, you have got to just forget it 
because the jury has spoken. That is what Mr. Sutton and the prosecutor 
want to say. That is the end of it. That is the last word.
  Well, let's look at what the jury knew about and whether or not this 
was a fair trial. The drug dealer we are talking about, in between the 
time he was shot and all of this was going on, and Ramos and Compean 
are waiting to be tried, he was caught again, this time with 1,000 
pounds of marijuana that he was trying to smuggle into our country. But 
that information was kept from the jury. That information never made it 
to the jury.
  Now, was that important for the jury to know? The prosecution told 
the judge that this would in some way jeopardize other prosecutions or 
investigations, so the jury was kept from that information. And, in 
fact, that information has been expunged from the record, so we can't 
get that information. But we know it happened. And they play word games 
with us to say, well, he really wasn't arrested. He was apprehended. 
No, this man was caught again with 1,000 pounds of drugs. Do you think 
the jury should have known that? Would that have been something 
important for the jury to know when they are deciding on the lives of 
these two brave Americans? Well, it is something that the jury never 
knew.
  The jury also never knew that the drug dealer, after the bullet 
fragment was removed from his body, he was taken by an investigator, 
and the bullet was taken by the investigator and spent the night at the 
home of this agent.
  Well, let me tell you something. You don't take evidence and break 
the chain of custody of evidence. He took the bullet into his home, and 
he took this witness into his home. Any lawyer will tell you that this 
is the type of sloppiness that taints the evidence and disqualifies a 
prosecution.
  It is also significant to mention that of those 12 jurors, three of 
them later submitted sworn affidavits alleging that they had been 
misled by the jury foreman into believing that, if the majority of 
people wanted to vote guilty, they had to also vote guilty, that a hung 
jury was not going to be allowed by the judge. They felt pressured to 
vote guilty, and they have since signed affidavits and made statements 
that they would have changed their vote. They believed these men to be 
innocent, and some of them actually broke down in tears when they heard 
that they could have actually saved these men had they stuck to their 
guns. But they were told that the judge, these are not lawyers, these 
are simple people; they were told they had to go along with the 
majority.
  And when the judge heard this, and the judge heard that there was 
evidence, he knew that this evidence had been kept from the jury, he, 
even after knowing this, denied the request that the two agents be 
permitted to stay out on bond until their appeal was made.
  Well, let's look at this. There is no doubt that Johnny Sutton had a 
choice. This U.S. attorney decided to prosecute the good guys and gave 
immunity to the bad guys when he could have done it the other way 
around. But he chose not to. And now he is engaged in this propaganda 
campaign against these two men.
  Well, the prosecution's only witness of course, the major witness 
testified that, of course, this drug smuggler was hit in the buttocks, 
not from the back. And even with that, we hear the U.S. attorney 
claiming that the essence of this case is these corrupt agents shot an 
unarmed man in the back. That is what he says.
  Well, of course, this was not an unarmed man. You know, we are not 
talking about a nun or some tourist who happened to stray across the 
border. This was a professional drug smuggler who works for a drug 
cartel, a delivery man to deliver vile drugs into

[[Page 3429]]

our communities to corrupt our children and destroy the lives of our 
families. These Border Patrol agents were up against this man, not just 
a man, a criminal of this level. And of course, they didn't, as I just 
said, they didn't shoot him in the back. One bullet, we think, maybe 
from the gun of one of these officers, actually shot him in the 
buttocks, but the medical officer said that he was turned around. So it 
was like he had something that he was pointing with his hand, which 
could well have been a gun. So it wasn't in the back. It was in the 
buttocks, and it confirms what the law enforcement officers were 
saying.
  Now, let me say, remember this, this is really important. There is no 
way to know that this drug dealer, whether he was armed or not. Mr. 
Sutton chose to believe the drug dealer, but how do we know he wasn't 
armed that day? The two agents claimed they said they saw something in 
his hand. They have to take the word of the drug smuggler. Now, he has 
been smuggling drugs since he was 14, and his family in an interview 
said he always was armed. There is no question. He was a member of the 
drug cartel.
  But Mr. Sutton, our U.S. attorney, takes his word over the word of 
our defenders. He has turned reality on its head. He has sided with a 
drug smuggler over two men who risk their lives every day to protect 
us, and now he must destroy them and vilify them in order to protect 
this horrendous decision that he made to go with the bad guys rather 
than the good guys.
  There is no evidence, for example, that Mr. Sutton claims they were 
corrupt. The Wall Street Journal printed an editorial saying these are 
corrupt law enforcement officers. Corrupt. The Wall Street Journal 
vilified these two men. Of course the Wall Street Journal, of course, 
has a policy, an editorial policy of an open border policy. But now, to 
back up their guy, their open borders guy, they vilify these officers 
with a total falsehood. There has never been a charge of corruption 
against either one of these two agents. They have never been charged 
with corruption. They have, in fact, a totally clean work record.
  And, yes, Ramos had some family problems a few years ago. And let's 
make it clear what has happened. Another part of this vilification 
campaign is that Mr. Sutton, even though he was not permitted to bring 
this up in the court because it is totally irrelevant, brought up a 
family problem that Officer Ramos had many years ago. This is a 
despicable tactic on the part of the U.S. attorney. Indefensible. 
Except it does illuminate what this U.S. attorney is all about.
  The family situation for Mr. Ramos was recognized as an aberration. 
The fact is, Ramos has been recognized as a solid and respected 
officer, and this is why he was nominated for Border Patrol agent of 
the year.
  And of course the U.S. attorney says, oh, well, that is not true. He 
never became Border Patrol agent of the year. That is the type of 
dishonest communication that calls into question his entire decision-
making process. No one has ever claimed he was Border Patrol agent of 
the year. But he was nominated for that, and that means something.
  So our U.S. attorney has found that he is just compelled to vilify 
these people. So what is the real significance of this case? The U.S. 
attorney's despicable prosecution of these border agents has put all of 
our border agents on notice: Any use of force to protect America, to 
secure our borders, if you do that, use any force, you will go to 
prison and your life will be destroyed and you will be shown no mercy.
  The consequences of the Ramos and Compean case extend far beyond the 
destruction of these two men and their families. And yes, it is 
horrible that these families are being driven into destitution. The 
Compeans have lost their home. Their kids and the family, all their 
family is shattered. They have no health insurance.
  But what are the consequences for us? What does it mean for our 
families? I will tell you what it means: It means that our southern 
border is now open, not just to an invading army of illegal immigrants 
but to drug dealers and to terrorists.
  Let's ask ourselves this question: What if that van that they found 
all the drugs in, what if it turned out to be a dirty bomb that they 
discovered, a dirty bomb headed towards a major city that would have 
destroyed the lives of hundreds of thousands if not millions of 
Americans? Instead of 750 pounds of drugs, which is bad enough, what if 
it was a dirty bomb? And what if the drug dealer turned out to be a 
terrorist instead of a Mexican national?
  Well, those two men would have been invited to the White House to be 
congratulated. It is clear there is a larger and a hidden agenda at 
play here. And Ramos and Compean simply are pawns who got in the way.
  Johnny Sutton is a dishonest and overzealous prosecutor who has lied 
to us about this case. And he is on the wrong side of the law by siding 
with drug smugglers, letting them go free while he is prosecuting two 
men for criminal activity when it may just well have been a procedural 
matter.
  His claim of not being able to prosecute the drug smuggler is 
ludicrous. Both his office and the investigation have no trouble in 
tracking down the drug smuggler, yet he chose to turn a blind eye to 
the drug smuggler's offenses. And according to the investigation, there 
were lots of prints, sets of prints that he could have used on that 
van. Plus we had agents Ramos and Compean who identified him as the guy 
who jumped out of that van. They could have prosecuted the drug 
smuggler. But they chose to prosecute our heroes, our defenders.
  Well, did Ramos and Compean make mistakes? Well, maybe they did. 
Should they have been punished and reprimanded for them? Maybe. Should 
they have been charged with a crime? Absolutely not. And by doing so, 
the Justice Department has demoralized our Nation's defenders. And what 
does that mean to us? That means that our defenders cannot now count on 
their government to support them even when they are up against a drug 
smuggler who may very well be armed.

                              {time}  1945

  What does that mean for the rest of us? That means we have absolutely 
lost control of our border. Border agents are put in a situation on a 
daily basis that they must make a split-second decision.
  By the way, this is the first time Compean has ever used his weapon 
in the 5 years of service. He is being portrayed as some trigger-happy 
Border Patrol agent? Well, these agents don't have a second chance when 
someone aims something at them. So this policy that you can't fire 
until you are in the sights of a drug smuggler's gun is a death warrant 
to our defenders. Ironically, Ramos and Compean thought that the drug 
smuggler was aiming at them. Interestingly, as I say, Compean had never 
fired his weapon before.
  These are the facts. These are the facts that have enraged the 
public, causing Americans to wonder what in God's name is their 
government doing? What is their President thinking? How can our 
President be so mean-spirited and arrogant not to hear the pleas from 
so many of our citizens, even from Members of Congress, for some type 
of mercy for Ramos and Compean, who had risked their lives to defend us 
for so long?
  Well, there is a hidden agenda here. That is what this is all about. 
Very powerful economic interests in this country want cheap labor. They 
want open borders. They want cheap labor from illegals to come here so 
they can depress the wages of working Americans.
  Well, the out-of-control flow of illegal immigrants is a nightmare to 
regular Americans, not this one group of elitists. But the policymakers 
here in Washington and their elite corporate interests are so arrogant 
and so smug that they do not care about the suffering of the American 
people. They don't care. These elites don't care that illegal 
immigrants are shutting down the emergency rooms so if your children in 
California have a car accident, they will die. They are overcrowding 
our classrooms so our kids aren't getting the education they deserve. 
They

[[Page 3430]]

are driving down wages. And our criminal justice system is breaking 
down in California. We have American citizens who are being victimized. 
They are being murdered and raped and robbed by criminal illegal 
immigrants every day. But these elitists don't care, and our President 
doesn't seem to care.
  The only heroes in this entire immigration mess, the only heroes are 
the thin green line of the Border Patrol. And the elites now have 
decided they have to brutally smash two of them in order to warn the 
others not to get in the way of their open border policy.
  The public has every right to be angry about this case, and I join 
them in this outrage. Let me note that today I received 304,000 
petitions that were signed by citizens of this country for the 
President of the United States asking for pardon. As we know, Officer 
Ramos was attacked last night or the night before. He was brutally 
attacked in prison. And this should do nothing but ask for another 
plea. This man's life is in danger. Compean's life was in danger. We 
knew that. That is why they should have been out until their appeal is 
heard.
  We are pleading with the President. The American people are asking 
the President to pay attention. Please pardon these men. Give them a 
chance. If they are murdered in prison, the President will be held 
accountable. The President is accountable of the fact that Ramos was 
beaten up.
  This case shows the insanity of this administration's border policy 
and perhaps the hidden agenda of this border policy. No guest worker 
program, no amnesty program is going to be feasible if we cannot 
control our borders. If this country cannot stop an illegal alien drug 
smuggler, this country has no border controls whatsoever.
  And let me end my comments by this following statement: Our job is to 
watch out for the interests of the people of the United States. The 
people of the United States and many of these illegals who stream 
across our border are wonderful people. The vast majority are wonderful 
people. But we have to be concerned about the interests of our people 
who are suffering because of this out-of-control illegal immigration 
flow.
  United States, who is it? It is us, U.S. Who are we? We are Mexican 
American people just like Ramos and Compean. We are Irish Americans. We 
are black Americans. We are people who came here from every corner of 
the world. And if we don't have a consideration for Americans over and 
above what we care about people in other countries, then we will not 
have an America that our Founding Fathers dreamed about. We are losing 
our country. And if we lose control of the southern border, the 
terrorists and the drug dealers and the invading armies of illegals 
will make it so that within a short period of time, maybe 10 years from 
now, maybe 20, we will have lost America.
  The American people are crying out in a rage. The President should 
listen. The President has to listen.
  Mr. BILBRAY. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the gentleman from California.
  And at this time, Mr. Speaker, I would like to yield to the gentleman 
from the great State of North Carolina (Mr. Jones).
  Mr. JONES of North Carolina. Mr. Bilbray, I want to thank you very 
much for yielding. You will soon be the leading the Immigration Caucus 
here in Washington, D.C., that is involved with many Members from both 
parties and who are concerned about the future of this great Nation.
  To my friend Mr. Rohrabacher, I want to thank him for his passionate 
feelings tonight. The American people had to feel that.
  I want to say to you, Mr. Bilbray and Mr. Rohrabacher, that we have 
for the last 7 months, a large number of us, have been fighting for 
these two border agents.
  I am not going to try to repeat anything that has been said. I want 
to be short in my time because of the limited time that is left 
tonight. But I want to say that, as Mr. Rohrabacher articulated every 
aspect of this case, there is nothing I could add to it except this: We 
have written, at least myself alone, four letters to the President of 
the United States going back to August 21 of 2006. We have a letter 
today, which will be the fifth letter. Many of these letters by me 
personally have been signed by at least 30 to 40 Members of Congress. 
Mr. Rohrabacher had one back in December signed by 50 Members. And I 
want to join him very briefly. Why will this administration not listen 
to the truth?
  And I am not going to try to articulate anything that has already 
been said, but these men are heroes in this country. I don't know how 
these Hispanic Americans, and that is what they are, a great part of 
America, Hispanic Americans, Compean and Ramos, how their families 
could believe in America tonight, with their loved ones who tried to 
fight drug traffickers in this country. Their husbands tonight, Ramos 
and Compean, are in the Federal prisons. And as was said by Mr. 
Rohrabacher, Mr. Ramos last Saturday night was beaten up by Mexican 
nationals.
  I close my brief comments tonight by saying to the President of the 
United States, please listen to the Members of Congress. But more 
important than the Members of Congress, listen to the American people. 
For the last 8 months they have been calling talk shows throughout this 
great Nation and saying to the President of the United States please 
pardon these men.
  And when I heard Tony Snow answer the question a month ago and said 
that this is nonsensical, Mr. Snow, wake up yourself. Awaken the 
President to what has happened. These men deserve to be heroes, not to 
be crucified by this government.
  If we believe in justice, Mr. President, and I hope and believe that 
you do believe in justice, then soon, in the next few days, you will 
grant a pardon to these two men.
  And with that, Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my friend for this brief 
time. And that is all I needed was this brief time.
  Mr. BILBRAY. I appreciate the gentleman from North Carolina.
  And at this time I yield to the gentleman from the Volunteer State, 
the great State of Tennessee, Chattanooga's favorite son, Congressman 
Wamp.
  Mr. WAMP. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the gentleman's yielding to me.
  I came to the Capitol tonight to actually take the eighth-graders 
from Silverdale Baptist Church on a Capitol tour here, which I am going 
to do downstairs in a few minutes. But this is a very important issue 
that really strikes to the heart of what our priorities are in this 
country today.
  My responsibilities here in Washington and in this Congress are, as 
the ranking member of the Appropriations Committee, charged with 
resourcing the legislative branch. We ask Capitol Police officers and 
the Sergeant at Arms personnel to stand in harm's way on our behalf. I 
have got to tell you all across the country we are asking men and women 
of all ethnic backgrounds, all religions, all cultures who are proud to 
be called Americans to stand in harm's way on behalf of our civilian 
population and, in this case, our elected leadership in this country. 
And you can't ask them to do that and then send the wrong signals by 
not standing with them when they are doing their job. And I know that 
people are entitled to due process, but this is one of those obvious 
cases where the President needs to get involved and take decisive 
action.
  My district director in Chattanooga's son works for Border Patrol on 
the southern border. It is a difficult job. These people are harassed. 
Their lives are on the line all the time. It is a tough, nasty 
business. It does not always go perfectly, but if we are ever going to 
recruit new people to serve and to stand in the gap on behalf of our 
country, we have to stand behind the people that do. I don't think we 
have done that. I do not think due process has, frankly, been served 
here. And I think the President should take action, and I was proud to 
join on the letters asking the President to do this.
  Thoughtful people from all across the country are saying what in the 
world is going on? How could this happen? And I want that next 
generation of Border Patrol agents to be recruited and know

[[Page 3431]]

that their country is not going to leave them hanging and leave them in 
Federal prison for doing their job. It is dangerous. Our country needs 
to stand behind them. And these are difficult days. Our generation is 
going to be called to enormous sacrifice. We have got to make difficult 
decisions on whether or not we are going to stick together, because if 
we do not hang together, we will indeed hang separately.
  Mr. BILBRAY. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the chance to be able to 
present this issue before this body. I think that, as the Congressional 
Immigration Caucus has pointed out, there is an issue here that 
obviously the American people are interested in and we were able to 
present tonight.
  I just have to close with a few comments. One is the fact that the 
White House has discussed that there are procedures they have to go 
through. I think it is quite clear to anyone who reads the Constitution 
that the White House, the President, does not have to go through any 
procedure except to the decide either to pardon or not to pardon.
  We hear a lot over the years of Executive privilege. Executive 
privilege. And every White House since George Washington has loved to 
discuss the concept of Executive privilege. But with that privilege 
goes Executive responsibility. And the White House bears the 
responsibility and the sole responsibility to issue pardons where there 
has been a miscarriage of justice. And I think the consensus is among 
many of us that this is exactly the kind of situation that the Founding 
Fathers had in mind when they proposed that the Executive and only the 
Executive would have this power, and this unencumbered power, separate 
from other procedures, to be able to right a wrong when the justice 
system has failed. I think that this is a chance that we can talk 
about.
  But the thing that concerns me, Mr. Speaker, as being a Member who 
was born and raised on the border, I think that what has happened in 
Texas with this case reflects the total lack of understanding of just 
how out of control our borders are.
  I hear people again and again in the Federal Government say that 
there are not the resources down at the border to be able to enforce 
the laws against drug smugglers, that there just isn't enough money and 
manpower to be able to address the problem, that we must allow these 
people to go free.
  Well, Mr. Speaker, if there was enough money to go down into Mexico, 
find a drug smuggler, negotiate a back-room deal with this drug 
smuggler, bring the drug smuggler back, and give them amnesty not just 
once but twice, if there were enough resources to cut this kind of deal 
and make this kind of effort to make sure that two Border Patrol agents 
get convicted, my God, aren't there enough resources to use the same 
effort to go after the drug smugglers? And I really ask that we 
consider that.
  I would just like to say that tonight we were able to spend almost an 
hour discussing an issue that is very near and dear to those who are 
concerned about the fact that our borders are out of control, that this 
incident happened in an area where Border Patrol agents had a firefight 
with smugglers with automatic weapons a few months ago, if you 
remember. And we wanted to remind the American people how out of 
control and absurd the situation has become in a lot of ways.
  We hope, as the Congressional Immigration Caucus, Mr. Speaker, that 
over the next few months that Wednesday night will be spent as a night 
where those of us who are concerned about the illegal immigration issue 
and the out-of-control border will spend an hour every Wednesday night 
reporting to the American people of what is going on, on this most 
critical issue that Democrats and Republicans both care about.

                              {time}  2000

  If there was ever a situation and ever an issue where partisanship 
should be put aside and being an American should be first, it is time 
that we find a way to work together on the immigration issue. I call on 
you and everyone that has the honor of working in this House of the 
people to join together to address that. I invite you and every Member 
of the House to join the Immigration Caucus, so that we can work 
together for the good of all Americans.

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