Yet that highly charged word is often used. To
suggest that anyone pursuing a bipartisan solution is proposing amnesty
I think is misleading, and it sets back the cause of trying to fix the
situation. A proposal that we are drafting--this bipartisan group--offers a
pathway to citizenship for only a specific group of young immigrants--
as I mentioned, those who were brought here through no fault of their
own. These are immigrants who are serving in the military, who are
seeking education, who are holding good jobs. They will be required to
continue to do so before they
can have a chance to earn citizenship. As for the parents of these
young immigrants, nobody can deny the fact that they did break the law,
and any bipartisan proposal on DACA cannot and will not reward them for
this behavior. I agree with the President when he said that dealing with DACA is a
very difficult subject but that we must do so with heart. I believe
that has been the case for those in this Chamber who have tried for 16
years to get a solution for these kids. We have to prioritize border security measures, obviously, to
determine which ones are sensible to include in a DACA measure. We will
go beyond simply dealing with these DACA kids with some border security
measures, but we have to find out which ones are sensible and make
sense to include in this limited measure and table those that should be
considered for the future. I have been part of comprehensive immigration reform efforts in the
past. I look forward to being part of comprehensive immigration reform
efforts later this year, but this is not that. We have a very specific
purpose to achieve before the 5th of March. The commitment we got was
to have a bipartisan bill on the Senate floor by January 31. I believe
we need to have that in order to have enough runway to get this done by
March 5. The White House, after much urging on our part, finally sent a list
over as to what should be considered part of the border security plan. As I mentioned, many of these items need to be addressed. Maybe all of
the items need to be addressed, but they need to be addressed as part
of a larger, more comprehensive effort, not the limited fix we are
going to do before March 5. I am all in when it comes to comprehensive
immigration reform. I look forward to that debate. But we have to
understand that we can't do it all before March 5 if we are going to
protect these kids. Some will say: Well, we get to March 5, if we can't do it, then we
just kick the can down the road again with some other protection. I think the courts have made it clear that what was done prior to
this--the DACA Program itself--was not constitutional, and should we
simply say we are going to extend that program now, it would be found
unconstitutional by the courts. This is a real deadline, and we have to
meet it. We have to focus specifically on protecting these DACA
recipients. I think Republicans, Democrats, and the President all want
this. The question is, Are we going to, just over the next couple of
weeks, talk about bigger, broader issues that need to be dealt with but
have no chance of being part of legislation?
Keywords matched
DACA border security immigration immigrants