Speech #1100044685

Mr. President. I now intend to take some of the time allocated for the judicial issue to talk very biefly about the immigration question which is front and center in the Congress today. It is second only to the concerns about the Iraq war and the current funding impasse which we have in the constitutional confrontation between the Congress and the President. and the sustaining of a veto and our efforts to try to work that out. I believe there is a universal agreement that the immigration situation in the United States today is an unmitigated disaster. Strong language. but not strong enough for what is going on with immigration. We have a porous border and undocumented immigrants are coming into the United States. They pose a security risk. Terrorists are free to wander across our borders and come into our country and pose potentially grave threats to our national security. We find a significant number of incidents of crime among undocumented immigrants. Crime does not have a sole source. but it is a problem. We definitely need to get a handle on immigration. We worked very hard in the 109th Congress in the Senate. I give my colleagues in the House of Representatives credit for working very hard too. We produced a bill out of the Judiciary Committee. It was reported to the floor. and it passed the Senate. It was comprehensive reform. which is what was called for by the President. a bill which would deal with the 11 million undocumented immigrants. would provide for a Guest Worker Program. and would. as a preliminary to secure our borders. provide for employer sanctions if employers hired illegal immigrants. The House of Representatives chose a different course to provide only for border security. and it was embarrassing. in my judgment. that we were unable to have a conference and pass an immigration bill last year with both Housesthe Senate and House of Representatives--controlled by the Republicans and President Bush. a Republican in the White House. But we find ourselves this year with the unmitigated disaster of immigration. worse now than ever. There have been major efforts to try to find consensus legislation to present to the Senate for consideration. The first meeting was held on February 13 of this year. and the meetings have been held continuously right up to the present time. almost 3 laborious months.