Speech #1030135509

These 400.000 people in the asylum backlog are aliens who have already entered our country. Actually many have been here. as I say. for many years and they are in illegal status. These undocumented aliens. at some point apply for asylum. usually during deportation proceedings. The system is so laborious. so backlogged. so freighted with lawyers that the alien knows he can get additional months or years to work in America simply by saying the words. "political asylum." The immigration lawyers of America are really a special grouptough. tough. selfpreserving and. of course. always for the little guy if the little guy has enough to pay. They are very difficult. They will go bananas when they see these provisions. I hope we will recognize their special interest in keeping the immigration laws confused and obtuse. So we will proceed with that. We give the Attorney General the discretion to deny work authorization to asylum applicants until such time as they receive a grant of asylum. This alone should deter many frivolous claims. Another problem frequently raised by the Governors of our two largest immigrant receiving StatesCalifornia and Floridaboth who served in this body with me. both very able men. is the use of public welfare by legal and illegal aliens. This burden on the States. as I have mentioned. has given rise to calls for full Federal reimbursement for public assistance and educational costs attributable to immigrants. Under current law. aliens become deportable if they become a "public charge"-those are the words in the statute. But this provision is never enforced because of a difficult court decision that said you have to ask them to pay it back. and only if they refuse to pay it back. are they a public charge. How absurd. Many legal immigrants are granted admission only because their sponsors promised to support them. if necessary. That is what they promised when they brought them here. that they were paying for them. This bill will now make it very clear that any alien receiving public assistance for more than 1 year. except for causes occurring after his or her arrival here. will become deportable as a "public charge." Further. the sponsors income and resources will remain available to assist needy immigrants until such person becomes a citizen. rather than for only 3 years. as is the case under our current policy. A very important change. The legislation also provides for additional interior investigators. a pilot program to examine the use of closed military bases for the detention of illegal aliens. a pilot program to study the effectiveness of deporting aliens to the interior of their own country rather than simply returning them to the border: and a requirement that all federally funded agencies must communicate with the INS regarding the immigration status of any. and all. aliens in the United States. We will no longer allow that little luxury where a county says. "We do not tell anybody the alienage or the immigration status of anybody in our county regardless of what we are taking from the public Treasury." That is not good enough anymore. Finally. Mr. President. the bill would establish a bordercrossing fee. a user fee to provide funding for the programs contained in this measure. We must again reform our immigration laws. Much of the American public. with some very real Justification. views immigration to the United States as being excessive and plainly out of control. And the most heavily impacted States are demanding Federal moneys to pay the cost of legal and illegal immigrants. The provisions of this bill. Mr. President. will serve to address those concerns in a reasonable manner: A temporary reduction in immigration for 5 years. and with additional provisions to control illegal immigration. to reduce abuses of the legal immigration system. and to streamline procedures to deal with the massive backlogs in the asylum system. I urge my colleagues to support this measure. and I earnestly invite their cosponsorship. I ask unanimous consent that the cosponsors include Senator BYRD.