President. let me address a number of the contentious issues that arose during our debate on this bill. First and foremost. I am pleased that we kept separate the illegal and legal immigration measures. Simply put. Illegal and legal immigration are fundamentally different issues. And Congress must not let our common frustration with illegal immigrants unfairly color the circumstances of legal immigrants: The risk of injustice is too great. Mr. President. we put our minds to it and effectively debated the provisions of S. 1664. and we can do the same with regard to the legal immigration bill. If the majority of the Senate agrees that problems exist in both areas. then combining legal and illegal reform packages would only have impeded fair and deliberative treatment of either issue. Second. we should be pleased that we maintained the guts of this bill: The proposed verification pilot projects. Those who oppose the pilot projects have legitimate concerns about the accuracy of data. the uses to which that data is put. and whether it will really decrease employment discrimination and the employment of illegal aliens. But the response to these concerns should not be to throw out the idea altogether. I am pleased that the Senate voted to uphold the reasonable compromise adopted by the committee.
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illegal aliens illegal immigrants immigrants immigration