Speech #1100053847

My hope is that we can. when we return on Mondayactually. I guess it will be Tuesday. June 5--that we will have an opportunity for an early vote on this amendment as well as the pending amendment I have that will prevent rewarding those who have abused our laws and who have really thumbed their nose at our legal system. who have been ordered deported and who have simply gone on the lam. melted into the American landscape and defied the lawful orders of our courts. These are people who have been ordered deported. have actually been deported. but then they returned to the United States in violation of our immigration laws. both of which constitute felonies. It is my hope that I can get a vote on that amendment. which has been pendIng now for several days. soon after we return. It is my understanding our colleagues are working on some sidebyside agreement to provide some cover for those who dont vote for my amendment. but I think we will have to evaluate that when we see it. I regret the fact that we have not been able to get votes on our amendments because of objections primarily on the other side. There is a major flaw in this legislation. and that flaw is that it will. unless corrected. repeat a fundamental mistake that was made by Congress when Congress last passed massive legalization of undocumented immigrants in 1986. The American people do not expect too much of us. but they do expect that we will not repeat past mistakes. I remember the definition of "insanity" once offered was that you do the same thing over and over again expecting a different outcome. That is the definition of "insanity." This would be a terrible mistake if we pass this legislation without correcting a major flaw in the 1986 amnesty bill that was passed by Congress. after having learned from experience what the conseqluences of that flaw are. Under this bill. anyone in the United States in violation of our immigration laws can come forward and apply for legal status with impunity. Quite simply. the Department of Homeland Security is prohibited from using internally all of the information from the Z applications as well as sharing information with relevant law enforcement authorities. For example. if an applicant comes forward and is denied legalization because of some disqualifying feature. this legislation. as currently written without my amendment. will prevent Immigration and Customs Enforcement. the immigration enforcement authorities. from using the information from that application to apprehend that person. What we learned from the 1986 amnesty was what the New York Times saidthat it created the largest immigration fraud in the history of the United States. That is the mistake my amendment will attempt to correct. As we know from the general counsel of the Immigration and Naturalization Service under President Clinton. the statutory restrictions on sharing information and providing confidentiality of the applications of those who apply for amnesty contributed enormously to that fraud. The population that will benefit from this legislation should be treated with no more confidentiality than any other classes of immigrants. We dont afford this robust confidentiality protection to other immigrant classes. such as asylees or battered women or those applying for temporary protected status. so I ask: Why the double standard? When an asylum seeker applies for legal status. that asylum seeker must submit an application and return at a later date for a decision. If that asylum seeker is denied. he or she is taken into custody or provided a notice to appear on the spot based on the information provided by the applicant. The proponents of this legislation will tell us that without these guarantees of confidentiality. those who are already in the United States in violation of our immigration laws will not come forward and seek legal status. But I must ask: Are we not granting the biggest benefit that can ever be conferred to an immigrant population. that is. legal status after they have violated our immigration laws? And to be clear. we are talking about those who cannot even establish that they meet the minimum requirements to get this valuable benefit and. even worse. have flouted our immigration and criminal laws. Why should we treat individuals who are denied a Z visa with broad privacy protections by the mere filing of an application for that status? Why should they be treated differently from everybody else? The proponents will say they do exempt from confidentiality those individuals who commit fraud or who are part of some other scheme in connection with their application. Of course. this is the very least we should be doing. But this bill does not go nearly far enough to effectively enforce our immigration laws and protect the American people from criminals and others who might do us harm. For example. at page 311 of this bill. in section 604(b) labeled "Exceptions to Confidentiality." the drafters of the compromise have chosen to protect aliens who are criminal absconders who have not been removed from the United States. You may be asking: What is an absconder? Quite simply. an absconder is someone who has ignored a final courtordered deportation and can be prosecuted for a separate felony offense which is punishable by up to 4 years in prison. So the drafters of this underlying bill have chosen to protect that class of people who have not been removed from the United States. We all know that hundreds of thousands of immigrants come across our borders each year. many legally. a lot more illegally. But what most Americans would be shocked to hear is that according to recent estimates. almost 700.000 of those who have been ordered deported have simply failed to comply with that court order. How many Americans think it is OK to ignore the lawful order of one of our courts? How many Americans. after receiving a subpoena from a court. ignore it and simply skip the court date?