Speech #1090120279

President. at the outset. I recognize my friend from Connecticut and agree with his comments and applaud his voice of moderation and centrist views. Those are the kinds of views that are bringing together the coalition that ultimately will allow us to succeed in passing comprehensive immigration reform in the Senate. I want to speak about two issues today. One is about the law and order aspects of this bill. and the second is to refer to the nature of this debate we are seeing around the country on immigration. The first point I want to make is that the Judiciary Committee bill which was produced with great work on the part of both Democrats and Republicans is. in fact. a law and order bill. For those people who have said it is not. they are wrong. This is a law and order bill because what it does is it takes the immigration issues we are facing in this country and addresses the strengthening of our borders. It also addresses the enforcement of our immigration laws within the interior of the United States. And finally. it applies penalties and registration to those who are here illegally in our country. So I believe the appropriate characterization we should be giving this legislation is that it is a law and order bill. I want to review some of the aspects of border security which are very important. All of us know that today we are involved in this debate because we have broken borders. both to the South and to the North. It is not just the border between the United States and Mexico we are addressing today. but it also is the border with Canada. It is a system of broken borders we have in this country today. What this legislation does is toughen border security in ways we have not done for the last 20 years. In this post9/11 world. it seems to me there can be no higher imperative for our Nations calling than to make sure we are doing everything we can to protect the Nation and protect our homeland. How can we do that if we have porous borders? That is what this legislation. the Judiciary Committee bill. before the Senate does. It addresses that issue of border security. It adds 12.000 new Border Patrol agents. These officers will help double the number of law enforcement officials we have working on the borders to make sure we have secure borders. It creates additional border fences in places that are vulnerable. where we see significant crossings in some of the major cities between the North and the South. but we know with these additional fences in vulnerable areas that we can increase border security. It provides new criminal penalties for a whole range of activities. including the construction of tunnels which have been found in California and other places so that those who are involved in the construction of the tunnels will be subject to some very heavy criminal penalties. It adds new checkpoints and points of entry so we can make sure the flow of people from one country to another is. in fact. being checked and that we can. in fact. make sure they are legal entrants into our country. It expands the security system at all land borders as well as our airports. AXpril 4. 2006 One of the law and order legs of this stool is the fact that we will have much more strengthened border security if we are able to get this immigration reform package through the Senate. The second aspect of this legislation. which I think stands tall for law and order. is the enforcement of our immigration laws. For far too long we have turned and looked the other way when our immigration laws have been broken. This immigration bill produced by the Judiciary Committee will have us look in the right direction. It will have us stand tall and say: We are going to enforce our immigration laws. It adds 5.000 new investigators within the interior of this country to make sure we are enforcing those immigration laws. That more than doubles the capacity of our interior enforcement with respect to immigration. It establishes 20 new detention facilities so we can process those who are caught here illegally for violation of our immigration laws. It reimburses the States that now have the responsibility. in many cases. of apprehending and detaining aliens. This legislation will provide assistance to the States for that detention. It requires a faster deportation process so that once there is someone who is caught illegally. they are subject to deportation in a prompt process. It creates additional criminal penalties for gang members. for money laundering. and for those who are involved in human trafficking. We go after that lawlessness which has been created by the broken borders we have today.