Speech #1090138992

Mr. President. I rise to speak about why I will vote against the immigration reform bill now before the Senate. This is the worst piece of legislation that I have seen in my 20 years in Congress. It grants amnesty to 11 million or more illegal immigrants. It puts American workers at risk. It does little to enforce our immigration laws in the interior of the country. and worst of all. it does not even secure our border. It ignores the will of the majority of the American people. I cannot vote for such a dangerous bill. In 1986. the year before I first joined the House of Representatives. Congress passed the immigration reform bill that got us into the situation we are in now. Ed Meese. who was President Reagans Attorney General at the time. called it what it wasan amnesty for 3 million illegal aliens. Unfortunately. after that amnesty little attention was paid to securing our borders and interior enforcement. and the illegal immigrant population grew to over 11 million. The 1986 amnesty was a signal to illegal immigrants that if they came here and kept their heads down. eventually they would have their crimes forgiven. The amnesty told them there was no reason to wait in line. no reason to follow our laws. just sneak into the United States. do not get caught. and eventually Congress would make them a citizen. Well. that is exactly what happened. Earlier this week. former Attorney General Meese pointed out that Congress did not learn the lesson of 1986 and we are poised to repeat that mistake by passing a new amnesty. I suspect that 20 years from now a future Congress will talk about yet another amnesty. A few weeks ago I came to the floor to talk about what kind of immigration reform I support. I support. first and foremost. securing our borders. If we cannot control our borders. we might as well give up on stopping the next terrorist attack. I support strong enforcement of our immigration laws inside the country. That means punishing employers who hire illegal immigrants. We must provide employers the tools they need to make sure workers are legal and hold them responsible when they turn a blind eye to who they are hiring. I support an immigration reform bill that protects American workers. That means a temporary worker program for when we need more workers. such as in our current rapidly expanding economy. But any worker program must make sure Americans are not being denied jobs in favor of cheap foreign labor. If there is a real need we should fill it. but foreign labor should never be a substitute for American workers. Finally. I support continuing our long tradition of welcoming new immigrants to America. Within reasonable limits. we should continue to welcome people from around the world who want to become Americans. We should not lock the doors to new immigrants. but anyone who wants to become an American must learn our language and assimilate into our society. Because this bill does not follow those principles. I will not support it. The bill will not secure our border. It ties the hands of law enforcement inside the country to catch illegal immigrants. It is an amnesty for illegal immigrants that not only puts them ahead of the millions who are already waiting in line. but in some ways it also treats them better than American workers. Finally. the bill does not protect American jobs. instead it encourages businesses to use cheap foreign labor. I have heard a lot of talk the last few weeks from my colleagues supporting this bill that say we must choose from either blanket amnesty or mass deportation. That is wrong. If we passed a real border security bill with tough interior enforcement. the illegal population would shrink through attrition. in other words. the illegal immigrants would deport themselves. After we secure our borders. we can put in place a temporary worker program that protects American workers. But that is not the path the Senate will choose today.