[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 159 (2013), Part 12]
[House]
[Page 17990]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                              IMMIGRATION

  (Mr. DOGGETT asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute.)
  Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, this Thanksgiving as our family gathered 
joyfully for dinner, we thought not only of our happiness, but of the 
many families that can be torn apart by our broken immigration system. 
We gave thought to those who were gathered at that very moment here on 
The National Mall going without food, fasting for justice. And they 
have been doing that now for weeks.
  Thanksgiving is about the first immigrants in this land, this land of 
opportunity. But today, we find too many of our neighbors are denied 
opportunity because of their immigration status. They can't board a 
plane. They can't come out of the shadows. They don't know when they go 
to work in the morning if they will find their family members there at 
night. This is not right, and the time to fix that is right now.
  The only thing preventing a bipartisan response to the immigration 
problems we have in this country is the unwillingness of the Speaker to 
permit a bipartisan vote on reform legislation.
  And to those who are not moved by their heart, they should be moved 
by their pocketbook because of the economic potential of permitting 
these individuals, two-thirds of which, in Mexican families in Texas 
without documents, have been here for at least a decade. Let them 
contribute to America.

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