Speech #1040203048

And. because of a phenomenon which I will discuss in a moment. the net result is that there really is no cap at all. So let us speak very plain English here. Nobody is trying to cut off legal immigration. Nobody is trying to cut it in half. Nobody is trying to cut it even by 25 percent. But what we are saying is that there should be some limit on it. as opposed to the bill. which will enable it to escalate substantially. Those who favor basically open. legal immigration. will say. "Oh. no. the bill actually has a cap in it." That is true. But. as I will point out in a minute. the cap does not mean anything. It can be pierced and it will be pierced because of the large number of people who are awaiting their turn to become legal citizens. just precisely as Senator ALAN SiMPsoN pointed out during his remarks about an hour ago. Let me return to a point that I made Just a second ago and actually cite some numbers. A recent ABC poll showed that 73 percent of the people in the country want reduced immigration. A recent Roper poll showed that only 2 percent of the respondents supported the current levels of immigration. only 4 percent of blacks and Hispanics supported the current level. There is overwhelming view in our country that immigration numbers should be somewhat reduced. If I look at the actual survey numbers. as was pointed out before. most of our citizens would reduce those numbers far below what any of us are talking about doing here today. We ought to be responding to what our constituents are asking. but as happens so much here inside the beltway. with various lobby groups putting pressures on Members. we are not even going to come close to what the majority of the people in this country are asking. We are not going to reduce the number of legal immigrants in the country to 100.000 per year. as a majority of Americans would like to see. We are not going to call a time out on any legal immigration. We. are not going to reduce it to 200.000 or 300.000 or 400.000. The most that we are going to do is to get it about at the level that it was 10 years ago. somewhere in the neighborhood of 480.000. So all of the great speeches about how we are shutting off Immigration and we are keeping people from coming to this country obscures the fact that we would be allowing about onehalf million legal immigrants into the country every year. Of course. this bill applies only to 5 years. and then we go back to the levels that exist today. The Simpson amendment is just a temporary 5year breathing space to establish a true priority system for family immigration. As Senator SIMPSON pointed out. one of two things has to happen here. Either we have to change the priorities so that instead of spouses and minor children. the two groups that we want to grant the top priority tothat is existing law. I think that is what all of us would agree towe are either going to have to change that priority so that brothes and sisters or others could come in ahead of them or. if we are going to do what the proponents of more immigrants want. we are going to have to increase the total numbers. because the current priority system will result in far more people coming in than the current numbers allow. That is why this plerceable capit is only a cap in name. because the fact is the proponents of more immigration understand that if you leave the priority system as it is. inevitably there will be far more legal immigrants than there are today. The goal with the Simpson amendment Is reunification of the nuclear family to ensure that the spouses can come in. that they have a top priority and that the minor children have a top priority. One of my colleagues made this argument. "Well.