Speech #1020136096

We had a hearing and we introduced a bill last November. It did not get called to the floor. but I think it had a very beneficial effect. I believe it led almost directly to the institution of a refugee program. We now have a refugee program with the nation of Haiti. a program we have never had before. I really believe and attribute the introduction of our bill to that fact. to the enactment of that refugee program. After the hearing. as I mentioned. we introduced the bill. It was given number H.R. 3844. and despite the fact that Congress entered its 1991 session before action was taken on that. it did produce. as I have said. the enactment of a refugee program. Now. utilizing these new asylum screening programs. we now have a very formal process to decide which people who are in Guantanamo are in fact refugees under the classic definition of political refugees and which are economic migrants and therefore have to go back eventually to their homeland. In 1987. we began hearings and worked on a bill that was then called the safe harbor bill. It was a bill designed to fill a gap. That gap was ultimately filled in 1990 by the Immigration Act which passed the bill which is called temporary protected status. The gap is this. If you are a political refugee. then the law says you have a chance to come into the United States and you have a chance to have your claim for asylum adjudicated and quite a few legal processes give you protection. If you are an economic migrant. you have none of those protections and you must go back to your homeland. However. there are times when the homeland is in the middle of some upheaval because of natural problems. because of political trouble. because of wars or rumors of wars. and that is the gap that we filled in 1990. and that is what we are trying to do with this bill. Very simply. Mr. Chairman. we say that even those Haitians who are on Guantanamo who are not political refugees and do not have the opportunity under the law to be brought into the United States for furtherance of their asylum hearings. even the people who do not pass that screening ought to be protected from going back to Haiti when their lives. when their health. when their wellbeing could be in any jeopardy. and we think that is the case today. I am not sure whether I believe all the reports of all the human rights groups about all the possible troubles in Haiti. but I think it is very clear. as I said in the committee the other day. trouble is afoot in that land. Difficulties are clearly facing the returnees in that land. So what this bill does. Mr. Chairman. is not grant any particular refugee benefits or any particular immigration benefits to any of these people. It does not require that they be brought into the United States. It simply says that they shall not be returned to Haiti until 180 days or earlier if there is aon.a solution to the problem. very simple. It simply protects these people from being returned to a land where that return might cause them some difficulty. The bill began as a temporary protected status bill. It was changed by the wisdom of our committee into a nonreturn bill. That is the bill before this committee. a nonreturn bill. I believe it is a very eminently supportable piece of legislation. It does good for good people and at the same time it does not cause any unnecessary precedents. There has been some talk tonight about creating a precedent or maybe doing something which will interfere with our refugee policy in the future. This creates no precedent. We have on the books this situation. so all we are doing is protecting those people from being returned. On November 20. the Subcommittee on International Law. Immigration. and Refugees held a hearing on the issue of Haitian immigration to the United States. Witnesses from the Departments of State and Justice presented the administrations position forcefully and even eloquently. Yet. in the end. most of the members of the subcommittee felt that not all the Haitians who fled their nation were economic refugees. but that some were political refugees fleeing persecution and entitled to protection. Following these hearings. and with the support of several of my colleagues on the subcommittee. I Introduced H.R. 3844. designed to give temporary safe harbor to Haitians who had left their nation. Despite the fact that Congress ended its 1991 session before action could be taken on H.R. 3844. it had the salutary effects of producing a more formal procedure. using trained Immigration Service personnel. of evaluating asylum claims of those Haitians who have wound up at Guantanamo Naval Base. and of producing. for the first time ever. a formal refugee program with Haiti. This program will soon be evaluating. screening. and adjudicating asylum applicants in PortauPrince. Utilizing the new asylum screening procedures and trained evaluators. the Immigration and Naturalization Service has determined that some 35 percent of those it has interviewed on Guantanamo have plausible claims for asylum. and those persons either have been brought in or will be brought In to the United States to pursue those asylum claims. Whether that 35percent number accurately reflects the number of Haitians who do in fact have a wellfounded fear of persecution Is not the central issue. Even the most ardent advocafes for the Haitians do not claim that 100 percent of those on Guantanamo have a wellfounded fear of persecution. In 1987. I introduced legislation to fill that gap in our refugee and asylum law. In those days. we called it the safe haven bill. Today. we call it temporary protected status. and it has been on the books since 1990. The theory of safe haven. or temporary proected status. is that in some instances conditons in an aliens home country may have degenerated to such an extent that it is not safe for anyone to be returned there. This law. therefore. provides for a kind of coolingoff period while we wait to see what happens in the home country. Since 1960. 21 nationality groups have been granted either temporary protected status. or as it used to be known. extended voluntary departure. Currently. nearly 200.000 Salvadorans and thousands of Lebanese. Lberlans. and Somalians hold temporary protected status. The subcommittee marked up H.R. 3844 on February 5the eve of the Presidents birthday recessand approved an amendment In the nature of a substitute to H.R. 3844. With one additional amendment. the subcommittees bill was approved by the full Judiciary Committee last week by a vote of 21 to 12. H.R. 3844 directs the President to set aside at least 2.000 refugee numbers for Haitians in fiscal year 1992. The refugee numbers are to be taken from the existing fiscal year 1992 worldwide ceiling of 132.000 funded refugee numbers. Of that total. the President. In his October 9. 1991.