Speech #980213826

I move to strike the requisite number of words. Mr. Chairman. first. let me congratulate the distinguished chairman of the Immigration Subcommittee. the gentleman from Kentucky . for his outstanding and yeomans job on this legislation. ROM has worked for almost 4 years on this bill. and I am sure that there are many other endeavors directly affecting his district that would be more politically productive. I want to also commend the ranking minority member. the gentleman from California . for his excellent work. and the chairman of the full committee. the gentleman from New Jersey . and the gentleman from New York who have worked for years on immigration reform. Even though I sit next to my colleague. the gentleman from Kentucky. and work with him on a number of initiatives. I could not support the final product when it came out of committee. for any number of reasons. not the least of which is that I do not think this administration and this Congress is really serious about doing something about the enforcement problems that exist in America today. Our borders are absolutely unprotected. violated every day of the week. with a border patrol that is terribly undermanned. We have less than one border patrolman for several hundred miles. and let us face it. it is an absolutely open border. Mr. Chairman. when this legislation was considered in the 97th Congress. I attempted on numerous occasions in committee and on the floor to point out that action on any immigration reform and control measure must be preceded by a serious commitment on the part of this administration to provide the necessary funds to the Immigration and Naturalization Service to carry out its enforcement responsibilities. At that time I offered an amendment to the then pending bill setting certain appropriation target levels for INS enforcement activities for 3 successive fiscal years. tying employer sanctions and registry data updating provisions directly to those appropriations. I have noted that section 404 of H.R. 510 authorizes substantial funds for fiscal years 1984. 1985. and 1986 to the INS for carrying out the provisions of the bill. and I commend my colleague. the gentleman from Kentucky.