Speech #1090135524

That whole approach. if you are going to have amnesty. is the way to do it. This doesnt meet the commonsense test. but someone has to explain to me actually how it works. This is important because at my town meetingsI had 19 town meetings In Iowa during the Easter breaksome of the most vociferous statements against amnesty were made by naturalized citizens who said: How come I had to go through all these things and stand in line for long periods of time to become a citizen or even be legally in this country and you are going to move all of these other people to the head of the line? The theory is that they are going to take care of that criticism in this bill. but it isnt very practical. How is the Citizenship and Immigration Service going to keep track of these people? They cant even count right because they give out more visas than the law requires. Besides. an alien on an amnesty track is getting the benefits that people in their home countries waiting in line to come here legally cant get. This whole process denigrates the value of legal immigration. While here. they get to travel. send their kids to school. open a business. and get health services. Is that really going to the back of the line? The work requirements also dont meet the commonsense test. The bill says that an illegal alien has to prove that they have worked in the United States for 3 of the last 5 years. It also says they have to work for 6 years after the date of enactment. However. there is no continuous work requirement through amnesty.