Speech #1040271221

However. this funding does not negate this Congress responsibility to investigate charges of illegal drug sale moneyssold in our inner city communities in the 1980sused for funding the Contras by this Government. As a member of the Texas delegation. I have been active in efforts to reform our Nations immigration laws. The compromise on the immigration provisions was reached after much debate. As a result of this compromise. our Nations borders will be more secure. I am pleased that there is no provision that would allow States to deny free public education to the children of illegal aliens. I was concerned about the restrictions on income levels for sponsoring legal immigrants but at the least the final version of the bill requires immigrants to have incomes of 125 percent above the poverty level to sponsor immigrants instead of 140 percent above the poverty level. which was the original proposal. Additionally. the proposal to deport and deny naturalization for immigrants who used meanstested benefits was dropped from the bill. The original provision to make sponsors responsible for emergency Medicaid costs for immigrants was also deleted from the bill. The verification requirements for immigrants in this bill are not more stringent than the requirements that were contained in the welfare reform bill. Moreover. the bill exempts charitable organizations from the verification requirements in the new welfare reform law and exempts battered immigrants and indigent immigrants from some of the deeming restrictions in the welfare reform law. Finally. the provision of the bill that would have restricted HIV treatment for immigrants was deleted from the final version of the bill. During the 104th Congress. I have been very concerned about the issue of health care reform and providing adequate funding for many research programs.