Speech #1100006521

This is an issue this Senate visited 9 months ago in the month of May. Nine months ago. the Senate tackled what I submit is the most important domestic issue in the United States of America and in every State. That is the issue of legal immigration and illegal immigration. In that debate of what became known as a comprehensive immigration reform bill. I submitted an amendment that ended up being amendment No. 1. The amendment simply said that before any provision of this act that grants legal status to someone who is in America illegally takes effect. the Secretary of Homeland Security will certify to the Congress that all of the provisions of border security contained in the bill were funded. in place. and operational. It become known as a triggerand it was a triggerbecause the immigration issue is not like when you can never figure what is the chicken. what is the egg. and what came first. There is no way to reform illegal immigration unless you first stop the porous borders we have and the flow of illegal immigrants. But to do only one without the other is a terrible mistake. The result of last years debate was the Senate passed a bill without the trigger that granted new legal statuses. Although it provided for the authorization of border security. it did not provide for the guarantee of border security. The House reaction was. we want border security only. and the debate to this day between the House and the Senate has been the Senate is for comprehensive reform and the House is for border security only and never the twain will meet. The twain must meet. It is the No. 1 domestic issue. I come to the Senate today to introduce a major immigration reform bill that is the bridge from where we are to where we must go. For a moment. I will discuss the provisions of that proposal. First of all. it contains the trigger. It predicates any reform of immigration that grants legal status to someone here illegally to be noneffective until we have first closed the doors to the south and to the north. It provides for all the security measures the Senate passed last yearand they are 2.500 new portofentry inspectors. 14.000 border inspectors. trained and ready to deploy. $454 million for unmanned aerial vehicles to give us the 24/7 eyes in the sky essential to enforcement on our border. authorization and ultimate appropriation for those barriers and those fences and those roads that are necessary for our agents to patrol. 20.000 beds for detention. to end the practice of cash and release. When I came to the Senate 2 years ago as a Georgian and one who loves the outdoors.