Speech #960270658

Mr. Chairman. I rise in opposition to the Fish amendment but in support of the Burgener amendment to provide funding for 160 border patrol positions to strengthen the enforcement of our immigration laws at our immediate borders. I do so in the clear recognition that adding border patrolmen not only will not solve our problem but may not even help if history repeats itself. More patrol positions do not tighten up our borders if they go unfilled as they have in the past. True. our allwise Office of Management and Budget told the Immigration and Naturalization Service that it could hire all the 495 new enforcement officers Congress provided for in this years budget. Then. in its zest to cut costs next year. OMB told INS it would have to shrink the patrol by 160 positions in fiscal year The OMB action was rationalized by saying that maybe more border patrol would not reduce the number of illegal aliens entering the United States. even though INS data show that more enforcement officers mean more apprehensions. Of course. if the officers are limited. as they have been at least part of this year. to using 3 gallons of gas per shift per vehicle. enforcement is seriously hampered. There is obviously more than one way to cripple increased law enforcement. I agree with efforts to control and reduce Federal Government energy consumption. But. relief from general conservation rules ought to be granted activities where mobility is essential to successfully carrying out assigned responsibilities. In proposing to cut border patrol positions. the administration said new resources which may increase arrests of illegal aliens do not address the cause of illegal immigration. I agree. So long as illegal aliens can come into the United States. take up good jobs earning enough to support themselves here. send home money amounting to an estimated $3 billion annually. and do so at the risk of only getting themselves sent home. with the United States paying the fare. we have not taken the profit out of illegal immigration. So long as Americans in business. industry. and farming can repeatedly hire illegal aliens. get caught and receive little more than a slap on the wrist from law enforcement agencies we have not taken the profit out of illegal immigration. Waiting for the recommendations of the Select Commission on Immigration and Refugee Policy. as the administration has recommended. before we increase our law enforcement resources is pennywise and pound foolish. The Commissions report is needed. True. But. the hundreds of thousands of illegal aliens pouring across our borders while we wait for that report are not needed. Their action and our inaction simply encourages further lawbreaking. Long. heated. emotional battles inside and outside Government have been waged every time we have attempted to change our immigration laws. Honesty forces us to admit that months. even years. could elapse before recommenaations of the Commission or other proposals that have long been under consideration become law. The need for the Commissions report in no way justifies our continued inaction. Our present knowledge. laws and resource potential give us the capability of doing something now. I do not now and have never supported closing our borders to legal immigrants. I have insisted and will continue to insist that we do our best to close our borders to illegal aliens who first break our laws to get into our land and then demand the protection of our laws to support and keep themselves here. I urge the aaministration to be done with muddling through the morrass of contradictions and conflicting actions encouraged by our lack of comprehensive enforceable immigration policy. We have immigration laws and immigration control resources as well as other general laws which if fully used by the administration in a strict. fair and uncompromising manner would deter the hordes of illegal immigrants pouring into our country. We would have a breathing space in which to revise our laws free of the crisis atmosphere that is building in this Nation.