Speech #1040190314

Mr. Chairman. I thank the distinguished chairman of the Subcommittee on Immigration for yielding me time. and I am pleased to speak here on this very important issue. Mr. Chairman. immigration reform is one of the most important legislative priorities facing the 104th Congress. Today. undocumented aliens surreptitiously cross our border with impunity. Still others enter as nonimmigrants with temporary legal status. but often stay on indefinitely and illegally. The INS administrative and adjudicatory processes are a confusing. inefficient bureaucratic maze. resulting in crippling delays in decisionmaking. The easy availability of fraudulent documents frustrates honest employers. who seek to prevent the employment of persons not authorized to work in the United States. Unfortunately. the result of illicit job prospects only serves as a magnet to further illegal immigration. Clearly. we face a multifaceted breakdown of immigration law enforcement that requires our urgent attention. The 104th Congress can make an unprecedented contribution to the prevention of illegal immigration as long as we have the will to act. H.R. 2202 provides for substantially enhanced border and interior enforcement. greater deterrence to immigrationrelated crimes. more effective mechanisms for denying employment to undocumented aliens. broader prohibitions on the receipt of public benefits by individuals lacking legal status. and expeditious removal of persons not legally present in the United States. The Committee on the Judiciary. recognizing that issues involving illegal and legal migration are closely intertwined. approved a bill that takes a comprehensive approach to reforming immigration law. Today. we create unfulfillable expectations by accepting far more immigration applications than we can accommodateresulting in backlogs numbering in the millions and waiting periods of many years. We simply need to give greater priority to unifying nuclear families. which is a priority of H.R. 2202. In addressing family immigration. the Judiciary Committee recognized the need for changes in the bill as originally introduced. For example. the Committee adopted my amendment deleting an overly restrictive provision that would have denied familybased immigration opportunities to parents unless at least 50 percent of their sons and daughters resided in the United States. During our markup. we also modified provisions of the bill on employment related immigrationremoving potential impediments to international trade and protecting the access of American businesses to individuals with special qualifications who can help our economy. We recognized the critical importance of outstanding professors and researchers and multinational executives and managers by placing these two immigrant categories in a new high prioritysecond preferenceexempt from time consuming labor certification requirements. We restored a national interest waiver of labor certification requirements and delineated specific criteria for its exercise. In addition to adopting these two amendments which I sponsored. the committee also substantially modified new experience requirements for immigrants in the skilled worker and professional categories and deleted a provision potentially reducing available visas up to 50 percent. The net result of these various changes is that American competitiveness in international markets will be fosteredencouraging job creation here at home. Another noteworthy amendment to this bill restored a modified diversity immigrant program. Up to 27.000 numbersroughly half the figure under current lawwill be made available to nationals of countries that are not major sources of immigration to the United States but have high demand for diversity visas. The program will help to compensate for the fact that nationals of many countriessuch as Irelandgenerally have not been eligible to immigrate on the basis of family reunification. This week we have the opportunity to pass legislation that will give us needed tools to address illegal immigration and facilitate a more realistic approach to legal immigration. Our final work product should include an employment verification mechanism. because Americas businesses cannot effectively implement the bar against employing illegal aliens without some confirmation mechanism. H.R. 2202 appropriately gives expression to the utility of reviewing immigration levels periodically. but we need to adopt an amendment by the gentleman from Kansas and the gentleman from Illinois that deletes language in the bill imposing a sunset on immigrant admissions in the absence of reauthorization because such a provision can create serious potential hardships for families and major disruptions for American businesses. There are two other amendments I wish to comment on briefly at this time. An amendment by the gentleman from Florida will require that employmentbased immigrants and diversity immigrants demonstrate English language speaking and reading ability. I plan to support it because I believe that our common language is an essential unifying force in this pluralistic society and a key to success in the American work force. An amendment by the gentleman from Wisconsin