[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 159 (2013), Part 7]
[Senate]
[Pages 10451-10452]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                           IMMIGRATION REFORM

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I think it is appropriate that I say just a 
word or two about the eight Senators who have worked to get us to the 
point where we are now. I was thinking this morning that this is really 
America at its best. Each one of those eight Senators does not know, as 
I do not know, whether this work they have done is going to help them 
or hurt them in their political careers. But this is one of those 
opportunities where I am confident that they believe they are doing it 
for the right reasons no matter what the political consequences are.
  We have a broken immigration system. They have led us to a path to be 
able to fix it--but for them we would continue with this broken 
immigration system--which, as we know now from the reports we got from 
the Congressional Budget Office, is going to help tremendously reduce 
our deficit for the next two decades by $1 trillion--$1 trillion.
  When people came before this legislation and said: We have to do this 
legislation because it is good for the security of this Nation and good 
for the economy, people really did not know if they were speaking the 
truth. Well, we know now. That is absolutely true. It improves the 
security. We see what is going to happen with the border. We are going 
to have 40,000 Border Patrol agents. We are going to have all methods 
to make sure that border is secure and the northern border is secure. 
In addition to that, it is going to improve our economy significantly.
  I applaud and congratulate those eight Senators for the remarkably 
good work they have done.
  It was 6 a.m. when immigration officials came to take Maria 
Espinoza's husband away in handcuffs. She walked out the front door to 
hand her husband his lunch money and watched as he was loaded in a 
truck and carted to an immigration detention center. That is a fancy 
word for a jail. He was not a criminal. He works hard, pays his taxes, 
and he is a good father and a good husband. But Jorge is in the country 
without the proper immigration paperwork, so he spent a month in this 
jail. Maria, who is also an undocumented immigrant, was also set to be 
deported but was able to remain at home with her teenage daughter, who 
is, by the way, a U.S. citizen. Maria and Jorge were basically able to 
secure a stay of deportation, but they live with the fear that they 
will be torn away from their family and deported to a country they have 
not set foot in in 25 years.
  They came from Mexico. They have made their home in Las Vegas. They 
have been there for 25 years--almost as long as they have been married. 
In Nevada, Maria and Jorge have a large and vibrant family. They have 
two daughters and a son, and now they have an 8-month-old grandson as 
well. They have loving friends and a tight-knit community. In Mexico, 
the country where they were born, they do not know a single soul except 
a really old relative.
  Because Maria and Jorge are undocumented immigrants, they live with 
the fear every minute of every day--and sometimes as they awaken at 
night--that they will have to leave the country they love, the United 
States. Maria lives with the fear that she will have to say goodbye to 
their children and her grandson. Here is what she said yesterday:

       When you lose your mother or your father, you are an 
     orphan. When you lose your husband, you are a widow. What do 
     they call it when you lose a child, when you are separated 
     from a child? There is no name for that.

  Maria and Jorge's family members are all legally present in the 
United States. Maria and Jorge's youngest daughter, a freshman in 
college, was born in the United States. So was their grandson.
  A directive issued last year by President Obama allowed their two 
oldest children, both of whom are married to U.S. citizens, to obtain 
their legal residency. The President's directive suspended deportation 
for 800,000 DREAMers--young people brought to America illegally when 
they were children and in many instances just babies. But millions of 
family members of those young DREAMers do not qualify for legal status 
or an earned pathway to citizenship. Millions of mixed-status families 
worry every day that a loved one--a parent, a spouse, a sibling--will 
be torn away from them at any time. That is why it is crucial that 
Congress pass this bipartisan legislation.
  This is reform legislation that protects and preserves families. We 
need

[[Page 10452]]

to do it right now. I am happy the Senate will pass such a bill this 
week. A permanent, commonsense solution to our dysfunctional system is 
really in sight. It is my hope our colleagues in the House will follow 
the Senate's lead and work to pass bipartisan reform and do it now 
because whether we serve in the House or Senate, whether we hail from 
red States or blue States, we should all be able to agree that the 
current system is broken. We should all be able to agree that 
congressional action is necessary.
  I have seen firsthand the devastation caused by our broken system. 
But each time I have an opportunity to speak with Nevadans about the 
urgent need for action on immigration, I am reminded that this issue is 
personal to them also. It is personal, as I have indicated, to me, but 
it is just as personal to Maria and Jorge. It is personal to 11 million 
other undocumented immigrants and tens of millions of their U.S. 
citizen relatives, whose eyes are turned toward Washington and whose 
hearts are filled with hope.

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