Congressman SCHUMER is introducing the House comparison bill. with a number of other Congressmen. The problem of criminal aliens crowding our prisons grows worse by the day. According to the Immigration and Naturalization Service [INS]. more than 41.000 foreignborn criminals are now incarcerated in State prisons. I ask unanimous consent that the full text of the Criminal Alien and Prison Overcrowding Act. together with a copy of INS StatebyState breakdown of foreignborn State prison inmates. be printed in their entirety immediately following my remarks. In hearings before the House Subcommittee on Immigration. Refugees. and International Law in 1989. the General Accounting Office (GAO] testified that over 72.000 aliens will be arrested yearly on felony drug charges. GAO added that about 20 percent of the total prison population--600.000--or about 120.000 prisoners are deportable. The Criminal Alien and Prison Overcrowding Act has two basic provisions: First. it provides for the transfer of three closed military bases to the Justice Department for the detention of criminal and excludable aliens. and second. it authorizes $100 million annually in grants to State and local governments to help them cope with the enormous cost of housing criminal aliens in their prisons and Jails. The Federal Governments failure to shoulder its responsibility in this area has had a totally predictable result. Again and again. deportable criminal aliens are released on bond. fail to appear for their deportation hearings. and abscond onto our streets. where they add to the Nations drug and violent crime epidemic. This is nothing less than a public safety emergency. the response to which must include expanded Federal. State. and local prison and jail capacity.
Identified stereotypes
Generalizes that foreign-born individuals are criminals and a threat to public safety.