Speech #990275407

Mr. Chairman. the next amendment addresses a narrow but a very important issue. It has to do with illegal aliens who are convicted of drugrelated crimes. who under Federal law should be deported and who. under the policies of the Immigration and Naturalization Service. should be deported on an expedited basis. The policies require that deportation proceedings begin when a conviction takes place. the idea being that when the sentence is over. the person would be deported. Now. unfortunately. the very opposite is happening. These people are not being deported. the expedited procedure is not working. the local and State jails are jammed up. the Immigration and Naturalization Service has no incentive to give priority to these because the burden of inaction falls on State and local governments and not on the Federal system. This amendment provides three things. First. it provides that deportation proceedings will begin when there is a conviction. second. it provides that these people will be transferred into the Federal system. I would point out at this point this is a much narrower group of people than the group of people that was contemplated a few weeks ago by the Bennett amendment. This is less than a third that number of people. but it would provide they would be transferred into the Federal system. Third. it would require a study from the Department of Defense showing and listing the facilities that are available for the Bureau of Prisons that could be used to detain these people who should be deported. I believe that this amendment would be a long step in the right direction. I do not believe it would be unduly disruptive on the Federal system. If it is disruptive on the Federal system. that is where the disruption should be instead of where it is now. which is in the State systems. Let me tell you what is happening in California. 63 percent of the narcotics arrests in southern California are illegal aliens. These people are going into a system that is already overfilled. they are being released. they are committing further crimes and we have got a revolving door effect there. we have got that same effect in New York. in a very exaggerated fashion we have got it in Florida. in Texas. and everyplace where the drug problem and the immigration problem coincide. I believe this amendment would lead very quickly to a changing of priorities in INS. I think it would be one that would be very strongly supported by your State and local officials.