Speech #1140044803

Okay. But here we are on the floor of the House passing a bill to jump on the Trump bandwagon. cynically exploiting a familys tragedy in San Francisco to score political points. I have been very clear from day one. despite efforts to spear me by hardline advocates. that the person. this LopezSanchez. who pulled the trigger in San Francisco should have been deported and never turned over. I have no sympathy for him. I have said it on this floor. and I will say it again today: murderers should rot in hell. The breakdown by the Federal Governmentthe Federal Governmentto deport a known criminal. as they have done before. to keep them in jail. is what led to an American woman losing her life. She was just about the age of my daughters when she was killed. A tragedy. and a preventable tragedy. if the Federal Government had done what it is supposed to do. and preventable if this Congress had done what it was supposed to do and address immigration years ago. as my side of the aisle has been pleading for you to do. But this Republican proposal is not a serious attempt at fixing the problem. Instead of piecemeal measures aimed at maximizing deportation. the long overdue solution is for Congress to enact comprehensive immigration reform that combines smart enforcement at the border and in the interior with a clear plan for reducing the size of the undocumented population in America. We do this by having a modern visa system so people can come with visas and background checks. not with smugglers or overstaying visas and just blending in. We do this by telling millions of people who have never committed crimes: Come forward. admit you are here illegally. go through a background check. and work your way to the right side of the law. Get the millions of immigrants inside the system and on the books so they no longer need to worry about their local police working with or without the deportation system. If you get millions and millions of immigrants inside the law. then the ones who are criminals cant qualify to get inside the law. They will stick out like sore thumbs. not blend in to our communities across America and cause havoc. as they did in San Francisco. But this is very specifically the approach the Republican majority refused to touch with a 10foot pole because they see demagogues like Donald Trump.