[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 42, Number 31 (Monday, August 7, 2006)]
[Pages 1430-1434]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Remarks on Immigration Reform in McAllen, Texas

August 3, 2006

    Thank you all very much. It's good to be home. Thank you for coming. 
Please be seated. You know, when I left the Governor's office, I knew I 
would leave it in capable hands with Rick Perry. And I'm proud of the 
job he's done as Governor of the State of Texas, and I'm proud to have 
been introduced by the Governor of my State.
    I want to thank you all for the warm welcome. It's nice to get out 
of Washington. [Laughter] It's even better to come down to Texas. And 
I'm proud to be with my fellow Texans.
    I learned a lot growing up here; I learned a lot as your Governor. 
And as Rick said, I understand this border, and I want to talk to you 
today about border policy. We have an obligation to secure our border, 
and we have an obligation to treat people with decency and respect. And 
we're going to do both in the United States of America.
    I just traveled and met some of the fine men and women of the 
National Guard and Border Patrol who are working long hours to do the--
to keep this border secure. And I first--I want to say thanks to all the 
Border Patrol agents and the Guard men and women who are here. You've 
got a tough job, and the role of the Federal Government is to give you 
the tools necessary to do your job.
    So we landed, and we saw choppers with all kinds of new equipment on 
it--airplanes that can interdict people flying in drugs, fast boats to 
stop the people trying to bring drugs or people up and down the coast of 
Texas. One of the things that you'll hear me talk about is the need to 
modernize the technology along this border. And that's what we're going 
to do.
    I also recognized we needed more people to help the Guard and to 
help the Border Patrol do its job. And so last May, I said, we'll deploy 
up to 6,000 National Guard members to assist the Border Patrol. And I 
said we'd get it done by August 1st. Well, we got it done by August 1st. 
And I want to thank those in the National Guard who have joined us.
    It's good to look out in the crowd and see a lot of folks that I got 
to know over the years. And most of the folks that I got to know over 
the years realize that I married well. And so Laura sends her deep 
affection to the people of south Texas and our friends here in the 
audience. She's doing just fine, by the way. She's a great First Lady.

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    I'm proud to be here with Congressman Ralph Hall, right out of the 
Dallas area. Thanks for coming, Congressman. He's a fine Texan who cares 
deeply about the people along the border here. I'm traveling today with 
the Commissioner of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Ralph 
Basham. Ralph, thank you for joining us.
    So, what happens when the President sets policy in Washington, like 
on the Guard policy--I said, ``We need to get 6,000 members of the Guard 
down to help the Border Patrol.'' And then that order goes down the 
chain of command, and the first person whose desk it landed on in the 
chain of command after Secretary Rumsfeld was Lieutenant General Steve 
Blum of the Guard Bureau. General Blum said, ``Mr. President, we're 
going to get the job done.'' I said, ``That's good, General Blum, 
because come August 1st, I'm going to come down to the area and take a 
look-see.'' And he did. Thank you, General Blum, for a job well done.
    David Aguilar is the Chief of the U.S. Border Patrol. I don't know 
if you know this or not, but David's mother lives here in the area. And 
he made sure the first person I met when I got off the airplane, as far 
as he is concerned, was his mother. [Laughter] One reason he's advanced 
so highly in the Border Patrol, like the head of the whole thing, is 
because he has listened to his mother--[laughter]--just like I have 
listened to mine. So thank you for being here, David. Thanks for 
serving.
    Major General Chuck Rodriguez, adjutant general of the Texas 
National Guard, very instrumental in making sure we've got the troops 
here to help the Border Patrol. General, thank you very much. General 
Allen Dehnert who's the adjutant general for the Texas Air National 
Guard; General Dehnert, thank you very much as well. General Mike 
Kostelnik who's the Assistant Commissioner, Office of CBP Air and 
Marine, U.S. Customs and Border Patrol; look, he's the guy in charge of 
airplanes and boats. [Laughter]
    We're here as well, with Lieutenant Colonel Jose Carrillo. He is the 
Rio Grande Valley Texas National Guard Task Force commander. See, in 
other words, when you got to bring people down from other States to help 
the Border Patrol do their job, you have to have an organization. You 
just can't send people down here. And one thing the Guard has done well 
is, they've organized this effort. I'm also proud to be here with Chief 
Lynne Underdown. She is the Rio Grande Valley Border Patrol Sector 
chairman. Chief, thank you for being here. Thanks for serving.
    I want to thank Mayor Salinas of Mission who's with us today. Mayor, 
thank you for joining us. Proud you're here. Mayor Cortez of McAllen is 
with us. Mayor, good to see you. Thank you very much. [Applause] Yes, 
that's a good sign, Mayor; it's a good sign.
    Finally, one of my dear friends, I've known him for a long time, and 
that's Mayor John David Franz of Hidalgo. Mayor, it's good to see you. 
John David told me just as I got off the airplane--I said, ``How is your 
family?'' He said, ``My son has just enrolled in West Point.'' And you 
tell him thank you, John David, on behalf of a grateful nation.
    And for those of you who have got a loved one in the United States 
military, you tell them the Commander in Chief is incredibly proud of 
the job they're doing to help secure this Nation and bring peace to this 
world. We've got a fantastic military, and it's a military that will 
have the full support--[applause].
    I'm going to talk today about comprehensive immigration reform. I 
say ``comprehensive'' because unless you have all five pieces working 
together, it's not going to work at all. This is an important debate 
facing our Nation, and the debate is, can we secure this border and, at 
the same time, honor our history of being a land of immigrants? And the 
answer is, absolutely, we can do both. And we will do both.
    First, we've got to secure the border. We will keep it open to 
lawful trade and commerce, and we will work to secure the border to 
prevent people and goods and weapons from being brought illegally here. 
That's our job. It's the job of the Federal Government--it's the job of 
the--working with the State government to get the job done. That's what 
the American people expect.
    All this strategy has got to start with more money, and so we've 
increased funding for border security from $4.6 billion in 2001 to more 
than 7.6 billion in 2006. In other words, you can't say the American 
people are going to make a commitment to secure the

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border, unless you spend money to secure the border, and we're doing 
just that. And I recently signed an emergency supplemental spending bill 
that provides an additional $1.9 billion in immediate funding for border 
security. And what does that mean? Well, it means we're going to give 
the Border Patrol, the people on the frontlines of securing this border, 
better technology, and we're going to expand the number of Border Patrol 
agents that will be able to use that technology. That's the strategy.
    We put new resources in people's hands. And as a result of the hard 
work of Border Patrol since 2001, Federal agents have apprehended and 
sent home more than 6 million people entering America illegally.
    I mean, people are working hard. There's people doing their job, but 
we could do more. There's more work to be done. And so we've called for 
increases in manpower and technology. We're going to train 6,000 
additional agents so that you've got more people to help you do the job. 
And in the meantime, the reason we brought the Guard down here was 
because we knew we had an immediate need to enforce the border. And so 
until those 6,000 are trained, we're going to be using National Guard 
units from over 30 States here. And the plan is working. It makes sense. 
If we need more manpower and the need for manpower is immediate, it 
makes sense to call upon our Guard troops to come and help the Border 
Patrol do the job.
    We're going to help build a virtual border by using infrared and 
motion sensors. We'll deploy unmanned aerial vehicles. In other words, 
we're going to leverage the manpower we have. It's amazing, the new 
technologies that are arriving. People are--these Border Patrol agents 
will tell you that they're seeing more and better equipment. You got 
heat sensors on guard stations that will enable people to detect 
movement. We got choppers that are able to send real-time video streams 
back to Border Patrol command centers that will then enable a dispatcher 
to help an agent catch somebody who's smuggling people or drugs in a 
near real-time basis.
    This border is changing, and it needs to change so the Border Patrol 
can do its job. We call this, by the way, this operation when we moved 
the Guard down here, Operation Jump Start. So when you hear about 
Operation Jump Start, that means Guard.
    And the Guard has helped a lot. You know, it's interesting that--and 
by the way, the Guard is not just in Texas. It's in New Mexico, Arizona, 
and California as well. In other words, Border Patrol agents all up and 
down thissouthern border are getting help from our Guard men and women. 
And the Guards are doing--look, they're not arresting people. We're not 
going to militarize this border. The job of arresting people is up to 
the Border Patrol. That's your job. That's what you're trained to do. 
That's what your skill level is. Their job is to help the Border Patrol 
by, you know, surveillance and construction, logistics. I mean, if 
you've got a Guard person dispatching, it means there's more--one more 
Border Patrol agent out on the frontline. And so we're going to use this 
Guard until we get 6,000 more people trained.
    For the people who wonder whether the Guard could be effective down 
here, when we deployed Operation Jump Start--since we've deployed it, 
our agents have seen 17,000 pounds of illegal drugs and apprehended 
2,500 illegal immigrants. In other words, the Guard is leveraging--
giving the Border Patrol more opportunity.
    Last month, Border Patrol agents in this sector confiscated more 
than 4,200 pounds of marijuana that was hidden in a tractor-trailer. And 
the support of the Guard was important in making this seizure happen. So 
for those of you in the Guard, I want to thank you for coming down here 
and helping these good folks in the Border Patrol, and your presence is 
making a difference.
    In order to make sure the Border Patrol is effective, we've got to 
stop what's called catch-and-release. For the veterans down here, they 
know what catch-and-release means. And it had to have been discouraging 
for you--risk your life, or you're spending long hours, and all of a 
sudden, you apprehend people who are sneaking here illegally. But we 
didn't have enough detention space to hold people. And so the people 
were given a court date. And they said, you check back in when your 
court date comes up. But a lot of folks didn't want to check in when 
their

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court date came up, so they just didn't show up. And one of the things I 
learned early on was how discouraging that can be for the people on the 
frontline of securing this border.
    You can imagine what it must feel like to work hard and chase 
somebody down, treat them humanely, send them in for their court date, 
and then they don't show up. It seemed like wasted effort, didn't it? So 
this Government is committed to ending this unacceptable practice. Step 
one is to add detention beds. If you didn't have enough detention space 
in the first place, the way you solve the problem is, you add beds. And 
here in the Rio Grande Valley, we're going to add 1,500 beds in short 
order.
    We're also accelerating the deportation process, particularly for 
people who are not from Mexico that we catch coming across the border. 
Last year, for example, we put together what was called Operation Texas 
Hold 'Em. We cut through redtape so we could quickly return Brazilians 
who we caught illegally crossing this border. And we sent a clear 
message: When we catch you, there will be immediate deportation. And 
guess what happened? As a result of that clear message, the number of 
illegal immigrants from Brazil has dropped significantly across the 
whole region.
    That's the message we must continually send over and over again to 
people who feel like they can come from Central America, for example, 
and if caught, be let back into society, and if not caught, they're able 
to escape the Border Patrol. We want to send a clear message: We will 
enforce our border.
    But in order to make sure these Border Patrol agents can do their 
job, we must have a temporary-worker program. You got to understand 
here, and I know you do, there are people doing jobs Americans aren't 
doing. There are people who have come across this border to do work 
Americans are not doing. And it makes sense to let them come on a 
temporary basis in a legal way.
    Wouldn't you rather have people who are doing work Americans are not 
doing, not trying to sneak across the border? I know the Border Patrol 
agents would rather not have people try to sneak across the border. It 
makes sense to me, to say to somebody, if you're going to do a job 
Americans aren't doing, you can come for a period of time--say, 3 
years--and do that work and support your family back home, and then you 
go home after your time is up. That's the way to treat people humanely.
    I don't like a system that's not working and a system that forces 
people who want to work, in the back of 18-wheelers. I don't like a 
system that encourages smuggling. I don't like a system that encourages 
people to walk across the desert to risk their life. I think we need to 
have a system that is orderly and fair and transparent.
    We've got to enforce our immigration laws at the worksite. But as a 
result of illegal activities in trying to get people into this country, 
there's a lot of document forgery. Our employers cannot be document 
verifiers. They don't know whether they've got a real document to look 
at or a fake document to look at. One of the temporary--parts of a 
temporary-worker program would be to give people a tamper-proof 
temporary-worker card, that they could say, I'm legal, see; I'm here to 
do the job; I'm going to work for a period of time, and then I'm going 
to go home after I work a period of time; I can be here legally. That 
will make it easier for us to have worksite enforcement.
    Listen, we will hold people to account. It's against the law in the 
United States to employ somebody who is here illegally. And a nation of 
laws is a nation that upholds its laws. But we've got to be wise about 
the policy that we enforce. We've got to give people something that 
document forgers can't tamper with so our employers know whether or not 
they're hiring somebody who's here illegally or not.
    Fourthly, we've got to make sure that we resolve the status of 
illegal immigrants who are already in this country. It's an interesting 
debate taking place in America. I'll give you my position: One, I do not 
think we ought to grant amnesty to people who are here illegally. And 
the reason I don't is, I think that will encourage a whole other bunch 
of people to come. But I know you cannot deport 10 million people who 
have been here working. It's unrealistic. It may sound good in certain 
circles and political circles. It's not going to work.

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    The best plan is to say to somebody who has been here illegally, if 
you've been paying your taxes, and you've got a good criminal record, 
that you can pay a fine for being here illegally, and you can learn 
English, like the rest of us have done, and you can get in a citizenship 
line to apply for citizenship. You don't get to get in the front; you 
get to get in the back of the line.
    But this idea of deporting people is just not--it doesn't make any 
sense to me, and it doesn't make any sense to a lot of people who 
understand this issue. So here's a reasonable way to treat people with 
respect and accomplish what we want to accomplish, which is to be a 
country of law and a country of decency and respect.
    And finally, in order to make a comprehensive immigration plan work, 
we've got to help folks assimilate into our society. And what does that 
mean? It means, help people learn English, to help people understand the 
traditions and history of the United States of America.
    One of the fabulous things about our country is that our soul has 
constantly been renewed by people seeking the American Dream, people 
coming here to work to realize their dream, people wanting to raise a 
family in the United States of America. And we come from different 
backgrounds, but we're all united by the great ideal of being an 
American citizen. That's why we say, we're one Nation under God. And to 
help people assimilate will help us keep that in place.
    And so it's good to be down here on our border. It's an exciting 
part of the United States of America. It's amazing how this country has 
grown and how vital the valley is of the State of Texas. It's got to be 
exciting for people to grow up in this part of the world and see the new 
prosperity. Gosh, it wasn't all that long ago that--I know these mayors 
can remember--the economy was tough down here. It was, kind of, farming, 
and that was all. And now there's economic vitality. People are making a 
living, and the schools are improving. It's a great place to raise a 
family.
    It's a great place to also come and honor those who wear the uniform 
of the United States of America, whether it be local law enforcement or 
the sheriff's departments or the Border Patrol or the United States 
military. We're a blessed country. We're a great country because we've 
got people who stand up and say, I want to serve. And it's the service 
of the men and women in uniform that are doing the job down here that 
the American people expect.
    I can't tell you how proud I am to be the Commander in Chief of the 
military and to be the President of the United States, full of such 
decent and honorable people. I'm honored to be back in this part of the 
world. I want to thank you for coming out and giving me a chance to talk 
about a comprehensive immigration plan. I expect the United States 
Congress to do its duty and pass comprehensive immigration reform.
    God bless.

Note: The President spoke at 2:40 p.m. at Anzalduas Park. In his 
remarks, he referred to Gov. Rick Perry of Texas; Mayor Norberto 
``Beto'' Salinas of Mission, TX; Mayor Richard F. Cortez of McAllen, TX; 
and John David Franz, Jr., son of Mayor John David Franz of Hidalgo, TX.