Speech #990259391

Mr. Speaker. having worked on immigration reform. I. too. regret that we take this up in the closing days of the session. But that is the case. Yesterday we dealt with tax reform. today we deal with immigration reform. There are some similarities. Like tax reform. if we are going to do immigration reform. it has to be comprehensive and deal with a broad number of areas to do it properly. Like tax reform. you cannot provide an open rule that allows every amendment to come in and destroy the careful compromises that have been put together. That is the reality of dealing with comprehensive legislation in this body if you want to enact it. On the compromise itself. let me say this: Today there are in the area of 300.000 to 350.000 undocumented who work in agriculture. The choice of this institution is either to allow the continuation of having illegals work in agriculture. to bring in another 300.000 to 350.000 guestworkers in this country to solve that issue. or to try to legalize and provide green cards to those who work in agriculture. Do the right thing. Support this compromise and support the rule.