[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 160 (2014), Part 4]
[House]
[Pages 4852-4853]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                           IMMIGRATION REFORM

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Michigan (Mr. Kildee) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. KILDEE. Madam Speaker, as I have mentioned a few times when I 
have come to the floor in the last 14 months now, I am a member of the 
freshman class, elected in 2012. I am proud of that fact. I am proud of 
it for several reasons, but one of the things that is significant about 
this class, particularly on our side of the aisle here as Democrats, is 
that it is the most diverse group of individuals ever elected to the 
United States Congress in a single class. In fact, its diversity is 
such that it is made up of a majority of minorities, women, and LGBT 
members--a majority minority class. Its diversity gives us tremendous 
strength. As I sit with my colleagues, it is amazing to me the vast 
perspectives that we bring, and I think it has brought to us much 
better opportunity and a much better ability to see the needs of this 
country and to address them.
  It is the diversity of this Congress, and especially of this Congress 
elected in 2012, that is its principal strength. I say that because it 
is my view that it is the diversity of our Nation that is our greatest 
strength. What makes America exceptional is its diversity, and that 
diversity is the result of a culture and of values that have been 
welcoming to people from all corners of the world to come here and make 
the U.S. home--to build businesses, to bring their families, to invest 
in community--and to be a part of something that we have never seen 
before on the face of the planet, which is a nation of immigrants.
  For far too long, however, the need to reform our obsolete 
immigration system has been a low priority for the

[[Page 4853]]

House leadership. It has been, essentially, on the back burner. 
Americans have said loud and clear that they want Congress to act on 
comprehensive immigration reform, and it doesn't seem to matter whom we 
talk to. For people on the left and the right, across the different 
regions of this country, the need for immigration reform is 
increasingly clear, not just because it reflects our values, but 
because many see it as in our vital economic interest that we reform 
our obsolete immigration policies and return to the values that made 
this country so great. It is that welcoming value, that value that 
says: Come here. Be a part of this Nation. Help grow it. Help build it, 
and help contribute to its productivity.
  Last year, when immigration reform was, obviously, coming before us 
because so many Members were expressing the need for it, we heard the 
Speaker say that the Senate should act first and that he would await 
Senate action before bringing comprehensive immigration reform to the 
floor of the House of Representatives. Last year, the Senate acted. The 
Senate acted in a bipartisan fashion by a vote of 68-32 and passed 
comprehensive immigration reform. It was not a perfect piece of 
legislation--none of them are--but they passed comprehensive 
immigration reform, which is something that people in this country have 
been asking for for a long time.
  But nothing. Nothing was brought to the House. In fact, while we had 
immigration reform ready to go--we have a bipartisan bill here in the 
House of Representatives--silence from the leadership on the Republican 
side.
  Then earlier this year, in January, the Speaker said that, once he 
had been able to present to his Conference the principles by which the 
Republican Conference would pursue comprehensive immigration reform, we 
would be able to then turn to this question and move forward on what 
the American people have been asking for for a long time. That was in 
January. Next week, it is April, and the House and the American people 
still wait.
  There is overwhelming support for comprehensive immigration reform. 
It comes from labor. It comes from our business community. It comes 
from the agriculture community. It is so rare that we have an issue 
like this that is number one fundamental to who we are as Americans, 
and it is so rare that we have an issue that unites the people who very 
often on this very floor have their differences manifest in the debates 
of Congress. Now we have an issue that is consistent with our history, 
that is consistent with our values, and that is supported by big and 
small businesses, by agriculture interests, by organized labor, by 
Democrats and Republicans.
  It is long overdue. It is time for us to get about the business of 
the American people and to take immigration reform up now.

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