Speech #980217743

It is with a deep amount of sadness. really. that I stand up to oppose very strongly. the particular amendments people desire to put on the provision dealing with "amnesty" in 1982. I have listened to what I have called the CaliforniaTexasFlorida debate for quite some time. and I am very aware of the problems those States have. However. it seems to me that we in the Northeast can express some concerns about what is happening to the illegal aliens in our industrial cities. One of the biggest mockeries. and I have heard the term "biggest mockery" used quite often. is quite frankly to so distract the INS that they cannot in any fashion. because of the illegal alien problem. service those who are waiting legally. If you go into almost any immigration office in any big city in this country. you will find petitions. citizenship applications. and labor certifications. running at least a year to a year and a half behind. because the Immigration Service is in fact understaffed and underbudgeted. It is a mockery. ladies and gentlemen. when I have to turn to someone who is a constituent and say. "No. your family member. even though processed and even though acknowledged and even though granted cannot get in for another 1V2 years because the agency is totally distracted with the illegal immigrant issue." Now let us talk about this illegal immigrant. That is the second mockery. The illegal immigrant is not taking Federal funds except perhaps in a few mistaken cases. He is not on the public dole. he is not filling up the soup kitchen. What the illegal immigrant in the northeastern city. ladies and gentlemen. is going through is working in unsafe conditions. working below the minimum wage. getting no protection under the law for health insurance or anything else. God help the illegal immigrant workers who are hurt on the job because. that is when we will find out that they are illegal and start to move for deportation. That is a mockery of what this country stands for. We have a problem. We cannot solve the problem as it exists today. so let us face up to this reality. Let us in fact pick the date of 1982. get that problem behind us. Good God. let us not clutter up our immigration offices with a twotier system. We absolutely cannot handle what we now have. Let us take the focus of the Immigration Service and put it where it belongs. on stopping illegal entry. instead of encumbering INS even with a tiered system. Where are we going to get the personnel even if we triple the budget. and I have looked at it. to double certify? First we would need to certify on a temporary resident basis and then we would certify on a longterm basis. This would be certifying a great many people twice in a long and involved process. This is not "amnesty." it is not even legalizationthis is certification under scrutiny. Now look. most of these immigrants are here working. You know. I do not want to be a cornball. but what happened to our belief in that monument in New York Harbor and what it says?