On Thursday. when I sat down with my family over Thanksgiving dinner. I thought about our history and how my grandparents came to Vermont from Italy. my greatgrandparents from Ireland. and my wifes family from the Province of Quebec in Canada. We. similar to most Americans. are a family of immigrants. It is that rich meltingpot history that makes our country so special. so strong. Thanksgiving is a good time to celebrate and honor that strength. Far too many immigrant families today. however. live in fearfear of being torn apart. of losing a mother or father or sister or brother. to deportation. Bringing peace to those families is one of the things that most motivated me last year during the long debate on immigration reform. Both Democrats and Republicans in this Chamber praised the fair and thorough process that we had in the Judiciary Committee on the immigration bill. We had 6 hearings featuring 42 witnesses. We debated bipartisan legislation a total of 37 hours over a 3week period.
Keywords matched
immigration deportation immigrant immigrants