Speech #1090097513

Madam Speaker. if only what my good friend. the chairman. said was accurate. we would not be here to ask that this measure be turned down and that we pass a 3month extension. as I have proposed and is in legislative form. so that the PATRIOT Act and intelligence reform would not be stymied. It is like coming to a meeting and we have forgotten all the things that most of the Members on my side of the aisle on the Judiciary Committee agreed with is wrong with the PATRIOT Act. but that we have ignored the fact that many other organizations are not for the PATRIOT Act. Now. what safeguards are being preserved is very interesting for me because the opponents of the PATRIOT Act. including seven States that have passed resolutions opposing parts of the PATRIOT Act and a number of communities that have done so. represent over 62 million Americans. 0i 1230 Additionally. numerous groups ranging across all parts of the political spectrum have come forward to oppose sections of the PATRIOT Act and demand that the Congress conduct more oversight. including the American Civil Liberties Union. the American Conservative Union. the American Immigration Lawyers Association. the American Library Association. the Center For Constitutional Rights. the Center For Democracy and Technology. Common Cause. Free Congress Foundation. Gun Owners of America. the Lawyers Committee For Civil Rights. the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. the Criminal Defense Lawyers. People for the American Way. and numerous other groups concerned about immigrants rights. And what about the more than six death penalty additions that have been put into this build with very. very few hearings. Is that something that somebody can hold forward as protecting the rights and improving the PATRIOT Act? I do not think so. And even worse has been the abuse of unilateral powers by the administration where since September 11 our government has detained and abused physically thousands of immigrants without time limits for unknown and unspecified reasons and targeted tens of thousands of Arab Americans for intensive interrogations. All this serves to accomplish. of course. is to alienate many of those Muslim and Arab Americans that would be working with us. So.