Furthermore, our leadership position in the world is not sustained on
blood and treasure and diplomacy alone. It is the values that we live
out each and every day in our homes, in our communities, and, yes, here
in our government, in the United States Congress. Values that include
taking in the world's refugees. After screening, ensuring the security and safety of the communities
into which they will come, which we have always done--and no one is
vetted or screened more thoroughly than a refugee from another country
trying to enter the United States--most will not be able to make it,
even under previous administrations. But after that screening has taken
place, when they come to this country, those refugees, those asylum
seekers, and those immigrants are the ones who have helped to build
this success story, this exceptional country, this indispensable
Nation, the United States. And when we turn off the lamp of liberty, when we no longer shine as
a beacon to the refugees, the aspirational people around the world who
are looking for a better life, who were called to our shores by our
values and what we represent around the world, and what we have always
fought for and proved in actions beyond our words, when that lamp goes
out, when we begin religious tests for the kinds of immigrants who we
will bring into this country, when we do things that are immediately
politically popular but are not in the best traditions of this country,
we lose that place of prominence around the world, not just to the
countries and the decisionmakers within those countries--the kings and
queens and presidents and prime ministers--we lose that place of
prominence with the people around the world who have always looked to
the United States for example and for leadership. And so I ask my colleagues to join me in ensuring that, as troubling
as this course has been in the first few weeks of this administration,
we remember that we still have time to correct it and that we have an
obligation to offer an alternative, one that has served this country so
well for so long and is a source of so much of our strength, our
exceptionalism, and our greatness. I call on my colleagues to move
beyond Presidential fiat, beyond executive order, beyond the whims of a
new administration, and to set in law our values and our priorities. Ultimately, we must be able to reform our system of immigration laws. But short of that, we must at least be able to honor the ones who are
already on the books. We have to do more to ensure that those who need
us most in the world can find a home in this country, not solely for
their benefit.
Keywords matched
immigration refugee immigrants refugees