Speech #1100051917

MN. Our local law enforcement agencies are on the front lines of our communities and often know exactly what is happening on our streets. Sadly. in what is reminiscent of pre9/11 days. municipalities have identified a loophole in the lawor in many ways 1 dont even call it a loophole. they have simply circumvented Federal law and have banned the practice of officers inquiring about a suspects immigration status. allowing cities throughout the country to become what are called sanctuaries for illegal immigrants. My amendment seeks to end the practice of sanctuary cities. These are cities that seek to evade their obligations under section 642 of the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996. That law expressly prohibits any Federal. State. or local government entity from preventing a law enforcement officer from sharing information with the Federal Government regarding the immigration status of a person with whom they come in contact. The law is very clear. Section 642. subsection (b) states: no person or agency may prohibit. or in anly way restrictIn any way restricta Federal. State. or local government entity from doing any of the following with respect to information regarding the immigration status. lawful or unlawful. of any individual: It goes on to say. you cannot restrict "sending such information to. or requesting or receiving such information from. the Immigration and Naturalization Service." You cannot restrict. in any way. "maintaining such information." You cannot. in any way. restrict "exchanging such information with any other Federal. State. or local government entity." So that is what the law states. Several cities have passed ordinances or issued executive orders forbidding local law enforcement from even asking the question a~s to whether a person is in the United States lawfully. and thereby evading their legal responsibility to report their suspicions to the Federal Government. In other cases. police department policies forbid or severely restrict their officers from asking a person about immigration status. Essentially. the philosophy is "dont ask. dont tell -dont ask suspects about their immigration status. so then you dont have to follow the dietates of the Federal law. These cities have decided the rule of law does not apply to them. Scores of law enforcement officers have chafed at the gag order. I had a meeting last week with law enforcement officers from Minnesota in my office. and they mentioned this. They mentioned the frustration they have with what they think is their responsibility to report if they think somebody is not here legally. thatwho knows?this person could be somebody who had been deported before. and that is a felony. They are absolutely prohibited from even asking the question or having the conversation. Many say they routinely come in contact with dangerous persons they know have been deported alreadythey know ityet their local sanctuary policy is to prevent them from being able to do anything about it. Supporters say sanctuary policies are intended to be humanitarian because they allow illegal immigrants to cooperate with the police without fear of deportation. But the consequences of these policies are anything but for the lawabiding members of these communities: in some cases. dangerous criminal aliens remaining on the streets. muzzled law enforcement officers. and scarce local resources being wasted on noncitizens who should be turned over to the Federal authorities. Opening the channels of communication between local and Federal law enforcement will help prevent crimes against other members of the communities. Consider some recent examples. Two young women who were killed in an accident near Virginia Beach earlier this year were struck by a drunk driver who had three previous alcoholrelated convictions and an identity theft conviction. but because he had never been sent to prison. there had never been an examination of his immigration status. Reportedly. many area police officers knew the individual was in the United States illegally. Yet they never reported it to Federal immigration authorities. In Apiil 2005. a Denver police officer was shot and killed by an illegal immigrant who had been stopped three times for traffic violations and even appeared in court just 3 weeks before committing the murder. Strict rules in the police manual deterred officers from inquiring about his immigration status. so Federal immigration authorities were never notified. In June 2003. a 9yearold girl was kidnapped in San Jose. CA. by an illegal immigrant who had been arrested previously for auto theft. Because the San Jose Police Departments policy manual forbids officers from initiating police action intended to determine a persons immigration status. Federal authorities were never contacted. In December 2002. a 42yearold mother of two was raped in Queens by a group of men. Foui of them were illegal immigrants. and three had previously been arrested for such crimes as assault. attempted robbery in the second degree. criminal trespass. illegal gun possession. and drug offenses. but were later released. In May 2002. three women in Houston. TX. were raped and murdered by Walter Alexander Sorto. an illegal immigrant who had been ticketed several times for traffic violations. This is not to suggest all aliens are violent criminals or that all violent criminals are illegal aliens. We caught Al Capone on tax evasion. We can protect our communities by allowing police officers to find out whether a person has broken our immigration laws. Sanctuary city policies do not just leave their own citizens at risk. Mohammed Atta. the leader of the 911 hijackers. was stopped and ticketed for driving without a license in Broward County. FL. in early 2001. His visa was expired. Under these policies. no one would ever know that. Just this month. we saw a terror plot unfold in Fort Dix that might have been prevented sooner had the local officials. who pulled the suspects over on numerous traffic violations. inquired about their immigration status. Make no mistake. this is a national security issue. To address this problem. I am offering a simple amendment to make it clear a police officer has the right to ask immigrationrelated questions of a suspect. and to report his or her suspicions to Federal authorities. My amendment restores the original intent of the 1996 law. which 1 read before. by stating that Federal. State. and local governments may not prohibit law enforcement from acquiring information about immigration status where there is probable cause. That is what the 1996 law says. and yet cities have been able to circumvent this. Let us. then. go back to the original intent of that law. My amendment does not require local law enforcement to use their scarce resources enforcing immigration laws. It does not enable local law enforcement to conduct immigration raids or act as Federal agents. or even determine a persons immigration status. Instead. my amendment simply gives law enfoicement officers the ability to pursue a persons immigration status as part of their routine work. and thus to report any suspicions to the appropriate Federal authorities through already established channels. such as through the Law Enforcement Support Center at ICE. or ICEs Criminal Alien Program. In essence. sanctuaryj cities are thumbing their noses at Federal law. The Justice Department has concluded that States have the inherent soyereign right to make arrests for both criminal and civil immigration violations. Section 642 of the 1996 immigration reform bill expressly states local law enforcement officers must communicate with Federal authorities. Yet their leadership or their local government or their city council is actually preventing them fiom doing so. In this day and age. we cannot allow for such law enforcementfree zones. Finally. and perhaps most importantly. the bill before us today takes away the strongest argument that sanctuary city supporters have: namely. that illegal immigrants will be so frightened about being deported that they will never go to the police. As currently written. this bill will give a legal status to these aliens. Any alien participating in the program should not fear an encounter with a police officer. The only aliens who would fear contact with the police are those who have committed some crime. Sanctuary cities take away the ability of a police officer to use his or her own judgment in the course of their routine police work to inquire about a persons immigration status and share their concerns with the Federal Government for followup action. The reality is law enforcement officers ask a wide range of questions of suspects every day that touch upon many aspects of the persons behavior. But in sanctuary cities. they cannot ask about immigration. The artificial wall relative to immigration status is illogicaland I would suggest perhaps even unconstitutionaland in this day and age harmful to our national security. We ought to give this tool back to our local law enforcement. Finally. one other point. One of the challenges we have with the bill before usby the way. a bill where I would like to see us deal with the immigration issue. The system is broken. It needs to be changed. Clearly. we know that. We all know that. We have had a group of Senators on both sides of the aisle. from a broad political spectrum. come together to try to find some common ground. to try to deal with the issue of strengthened border security. which we must deal withto do those thingsto ensure greater employer responsibility. and then to figure out some way to deal with the 11 million who are here. to know who they are. have them learning English. have them pay taxes. and not to provide amnesty but to provide fines and a series of sanctions and a path before one can even consider proceeding to something like citizenship. But one of the problems we are havingI am having it now. I have gotten thousands of calls on this issue. most against this bill. even though people have not even read the bill yet.