Chairman. I thank the gentleman for yielding. I rise in strong support of the passage of H.R. 5879. the Refugee Assistance Amendments of 1982. In serving on this subcommittee for these 4 years. I think one of the things I have learned is that as soon as we think we have solved our problems in the area of refugees or immigration law. some event that we have not anticipated comes along and changes our minds. When we originally enacted the Refugee Act in 1980. we assumed that we had taken care of a number of contingencies and thought that the Refugee Act. therefore. would supply the guidelines for treatment of those people coming to our shores. Shortly after we had concluded consideration of that act. and that act had been signed into law. we had the Mariel boat situation in which Fidel Castro looked at our immigration policy. or nonpolicy. and viewed it as the Achilles heel of the United States and took advantage of it. In turn. what had been a tremendous propaganda coup for the United States turned into something that he could utilize for purposes of clearing out some of his jails of some of the people that he did not wish to be there. We then had to deal with that situation. Following that. of course. we had the Haitian situation. which did not fall into the context of the Refugee Act that we had created. Since then. of course. we have had the continuing problems of the Soviet Union and some of their client states in Eastern Europe. We have many refugees from Poland. We have refugees from Afghanistan. We have a continuing situation in Africa and. of course. we have the continuing situation in Southeast Asia. I think all this should tell us that we probably do not have a good handle on what may be coming down the line 2 or 3 years from now.
Keywords matched
Refugee immigration refugees