Speech #1050174073

Madam President. I rise today in support of the Graham/Mack immigration amendment to the Treasury/Postal Appropriations bill. I strongly believe that this amendment is the right thing to do for the Haitian community and that it is consistent with our treatment of similarlysituated immigrant groups. I would like to provide the Senate with some background information on what has led Senator GRAHAM and me to introduce this amendment. a brief explanation of the amendment. and the policy rationale behind the amendment. First of all. some legislative history on events leading up to the introduction of this amendment. Last year. Senator GRAHAM and I introduced legislation which was intended to ease the transition into implementation of the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996. otherwise known as IRAIRA. Our bill simply clarified that immigrants who were in the administrative pipeline for suspension of deportation when IRAIRA was enacted would have their cases for suspension considered under the rules in place when they applied for suspension. not the new rules contemplated by IRAIRA. I was concerned with the unfairness of changing the rules on people midstream. While this bill was under consideration in the Senate. an agreement was reached in the House of Representatives which gave even greater relief to the Nicaraguan communitythe ability to adjust to legal permanent resident status.