Speech #1030115750

Mr. President. I offered with Senator SIMPSON an amendment to the crime bill to stem the flow of aliens seeking political asylum and to return to the original intent of the asylum law. I appreciate my colleagues adoption of this amendment and their future support of these reforms. The flood of asylum claims has swamped the system. The backlog of asylum cases is increasing at the average rate of 10.000 to 12.000 per month. Last March. the total backlog of cases was close to 200.000. Today. only 7 months later. the total is an astounding 340.000. Who are the people that are seeking asylum? In about 14.000 cases last year. asylum was sought immediately upon arrival at airports and other ports of entry. However. this compares to over 100.000 applications last year from persons who had lived and worked in the United States for some time. Often. they were here illegally and sought asylum only to avoid deportation. In fact. political asylum is the magic phrase for hundreds of thousands of aliens whose claims are simply not meritorious. Yet. these aliens are given a work permit and. due to the backlog of cases and the many layers of appeal. they can plan on years of residency in the United States. This practice distorts the original intent of the asylum law and is unfair to American workers and taxpayers. It is difficult to explain to constituents why this abuse Is allowed to continue. My amendment. which was the result of discussions with the Department of Justice. the Department of State. Senator SIMPSON. and other members of the Judiciary Committee. declared that our asylum policy today should be what the law originally intended. When the Refugee Act of 1980 was written. the intent was to protect aliens who. because of events occurring after their arrival here. could not safely return home. The amendment declared further that persons outside their country of nationality who have a wellfounded fear of persecution if they return should apply for refugee status at one of our refugee processing offices abroad. Finally. the amendment called for reform of our Immigration. refugee. and asylum laws to correct the current problems. We are faced with an enormous backlog of cases and a whole process that is in disarray. The current abuse mocks and perverts the intent of the Refugee Act of 1980. Returning to the original intent of the law is the logical way to address this problem.