Speech #1140002360

People didnt then. The INS developed a new form"Declaration. Ineligible Family Member of Legalized Alien"-precisely for the purpose of allowing undocumented persons who did not qualify for legalization under IRCA to affirmatively request relief from the threat of deportation and authorization to work lawfully. According to reports at the time. INS Commissioner McNary contemplated that the program could have affected as many as 1.5 million undocumented immigrants. Explaining the rationale for expanding the earlier program. McNary stated: It is vital that we enforce the law against illegal entry. However. we can enforce the law humanely. To split families encourages further violations of the law as they reunite. In the end. only a fraction of the people eligible for relief under the Family Fairness program obtained such protection. but that is only because the Immigration Act of 1990 was enacted less than 1 year after the program was expanded by President Bush. Section 301 of that bill contained a family unity program that largely codified the executive actions taken by President Reagan and President Bush. The parallels between the ReaganBush Family Fairness program and what is being proposed at the present time are uncanny. There are several lessons that can be drawn from this past precedent. First. the authority to provide temporary relief from removal to a large percentage of the undocumented population has long existed. and past Presidents have exercised such authority. Second. such authority existed even when the Executives authority would seem to be at its weakestwhere Congress specifically declined to legislatively provide the relief granted administratively. The President is now being asked to take administrative action in the face of historic intransigence on the part of House Republicans after the Senate overwhelmingly passed a bipartisan comprehensive immigration reform bill buoyed by popular support. overwhelmingly supported in a bipartisan way in the Senate. but nothing happening in the House. By contrast. the Reagan administration adopted the Family Fairness program less than 1 year after Congress enacted the last comprehensive immigration reform bill that contains specific criteria for legalization and knowingly excluded from protection the very people affected by the administration action. Just as I said before. even when Congress acted. President Reagan said we can do better.