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IMMIGRATION IN THE NATIONAL INTEREST ACT
(House of Representatives - March 19, 1996)
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IMMIGRATION IN THE NATIONAL INTEREST ACT
Mr. SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to House Resolution 384 and rule
XXIII, the Chair declares the House in the Committee of the Whole House
on the State of the Union for the consideration of the bill,
H.R. 2202.
{time} 1813
in the committee of the whole
Accordingly the House resolved itself into the Committee of the Whole
House on the State of the Union for the consideration of the bill (
H.R.
2202) to amend the Immigration and Nationality Act to improve
deterrence of illegal immigration to the United States by increasing
border patrol and investigative personnel, by increasing penalties for
alien smuggling and for document fraud, by reforming exclusion and
deportation law and procedures, by improving the verification system
for eligibility for employment, and through other measures, to reform
the legal immigration system and facilitate legal entries into the
United States, and for other purposes with Mr. Bonilla in the chair.
The Clerk read the title of the bill.
The CHAIRMAN. Pursuant to the rule, the bill is considered as having
been read the first time.
Under the rule, the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Smith] will be
recognized for 60 minutes, and the gentleman from Michigan [Mr.
Conyers] will be recognized for 60 minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Smith].
Mr. SMITH of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I might
consume.
Mr. Chairman, I would like first to thank the chairman of the
Committee on the Judiciary, the gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Hyde], for
his generous support along the way. It is he who has been captain of
the ship, and it is his steady hand at the helm who has brought us to
these shores tonight.
{time} 1815
Mr. Chairman, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman
from Illinois [Mr. Hyde], the chairman of the Committee on the
Judiciary.
(Mr. HYDE asked and was given permission to revise and extend his
remarks.)
Mr. HYDE. Mr. Chairman, I thank the distinguished chairman of the
Subcommittee on Immigration for yielding me time, and I am pleased to
speak here on this very important issue.
Mr. Chairman, immigration reform is one of the most important
legislative priorities facing the 104th Congress. Today, undocumented
aliens surreptitiously cross our border with impunity. Still others
enter as nonimmigrants with temporary legal status, but often stay on
indefinitely and illegally. The INS administrative and adjudicatory
processes are a confusing, inefficient bureaucratic maze, resulting in
crippling delays in decisionmaking. The easy availability of fraudulent
documents frustrates honest employers, who seek to prevent the
employment of persons not authorized to work in the United States.
Unfortunately, the result of illicit job prospects only serves as a
magnet to further illegal immigration. Clearly, we face a multifaceted
breakdown of immigration law enforcement that requires our urgent
attention.
The 104th Congress can make an unprecedented contribution to the
prevention of illegal immigration as long as we have the will to act.
H.R. 2202 provides for substantially enhanced border and interior
enforcement, greater deterrence to immigration-related crimes, more
effective mechanisms for denying employment to undocumented aliens,
broader prohibitions on the receipt of public benefits by individuals
lacking legal status, and expeditious removal of persons not legally
present in the United States.
The Committee on the Judiciary, recognizing that issues involving
illegal and legal migration are closely intertwined, approved a bill
that takes a comprehensive approach to reforming immigration law.
Today, we create unfulfillable expectations by accepting far more
immigration applications than we can accommodate--resulting in backlogs
numbering in the millions and waiting periods of many years. We simply
need to give greater priority to unifying nuclear families, which is a
priority of
H.R. 2202.
In addressing family immigration, the Judiciary Committee recognized
[[Page
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the need for changes in the bill as originally introduced. For example,
the Committee adopted my amendment deleting an overly restrictive
provision that would have denied family-based immigration opportunities
to parents unless at least 50 percent of their sons and daughters
resided in the United States.
During our markup, we also modified provisions of the bill on
employment related immigration--removing potential impediments to
international trade and protecting the access of American businesses to
individuals with special qualifications who can help our economy. We
recognized the critical importance of outstanding professors and
researchers and multinational executives and managers by placing these
two immigrant categories in a new high priority--second preference--
exempt from time consuming labor certification requirements. We
restored a national interest waiver of labor certification requirements
and delineated specific criteria for its exercise. In addition to
adopting these two amendments which I sponsored, the committee also
substantially modified new experience requirements for immigrants in
the skilled worker and professional categories and deleted a provision
potentially reducing available visas up to 50 percent. The net result
of these various changes is that American competitiveness in
international markets will be fostered--encouraging job creation here
at home.
Another noteworthy amendment to this bill restored a modified
diversity immigrant program. Up to 27,000 numbers--roughly half the
figure under current law--will be made available to nationals of
countries that are not major sources of immigration to the United
States but have high demand for diversity visas. The program will help
to compensate for the fact that nationals of many countries--such as
Ireland--generally have not been eligible to immigrate on the basis of
family reunification.
This week we have the opportunity to pass legislation that will give
us needed tools to address illegal immigration and facilitate a more
realistic approach to legal immigration. Our final work product should
include an employment verification mechanism, because America's
businesses cannot effectively implement the bar against employing
illegal aliens without some confirmation mechanism.
H.R. 2202
appropriately gives expression to the utility of reviewing immigration
levels periodically, but we need to adopt an amendment by the gentleman
from Kansas [Mr. Brownback] and the gentleman from Illinois [Mr.
Gutierrez] that deletes language in the bill imposing a sunset on
immigrant admissions in the absence of reauthorization because such a
provision can create serious potential hardships for families and major
disruptions for American businesses.
There are two other amendments I wish to comment on briefly at this
time. An amendment by the gentleman from Florida [Mr. Canady] will
require that employment-based immigrants and diversity immigrants
demonstrate English language speaking and reading ability. I plan to
support it because I believe that our common language is an essential
unifying force in this pluralistic society and a key to success in the
American work force. An amendment by the gentleman from Wisconsin [Mr.
Kleczka] reimburses fees to Polish nationals who applied for the 1995
diversity immigrant program without being selected. Such recompense is
entirely appropriate because the State Department erred in its handling
of applications from nationals of Poland.
This omnibus immigration reform legislation, introduced by the
gentleman from Texas, Lamar Smith, chairman of the Subcommittee on
Immigration and Claims, makes major needed changes in the Immigration
and Nationality Act. A number of the bill's provisions are consistent
with recommendations made by the Congressional Task Force on
Immigration Reform, chaired by the gentleman from California, Elton
Gallegly, as well as by the U.S. Commission on Immigration Reform,
chaired by our former colleague, the late Barbara Jordan. I also note
that the administration finds itself in agreement with significant
portions of the bill before us. The extent of bipartisan interest in
achieving immigration reform must not be overlooked as Members debate
this legislation.
The Committee on the Judiciary, during a long markup on nine
different days, improved provisions on both illegal and legal
immigration. We favorably reported
H.R. 2202 as amended by a recorded
vote of 23 to 10.
Immigration reform is very high on the list of national concerns--
underscoring the importance of our task this week. I fully recognize
the complexity of this issue--socially, economically, and emotionally.
These are problems that generate strongly held views. Nevertheless, I
am confident that this House will debate these matters with civility,
patience and good will. The 104th Congress can make a major
contribution toward solving our nation's immigration problems and
active consideration of
H.R. 2202 represents a forward step in that
direction.
Mr. SMITH of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I might
consume.
Mr. Chairman, on the other side of the aisle from me is the ranking
minority member of the Subcommittee on Immigration, my friend and
colleague, the gentleman from Texas, [Mr. John Bryant]. He has been an
equal partner in this effort to reform our immigration laws, and I want
to thank him as well.
Mr. Chairman, we now begin consideration of immigration legislation
that reduces crime, unites families, protects jobs, and eases the
burden on taxpayers. A sovereign country has a profound responsibility
to secure its borders, to know who enters for how long and why.
Citizens rightfully expect Congress to put the national interest first.
In approving the Immigration in the National Interest Act, Congress
will provide a better future for millions of Americans and for millions
of others who live in foreign lands and have yet to come to America.
This pro-family, pro-worker, pro-taxpayer bill reaffirms the dreams of
a nation of immigrants that has chosen to govern itself by law.
Immigration reform of this scope has been enacted by only three
Congresses this century. The consideration of this bill is a momentous
time for us all.
As the debate goes forward, my hope is that the discussion on the
House floor will mirror the high level of debate evident when the
Committee on the Judiciary considered this legislation earlier this
year. Even though there were disagreements over many issues, the
complex and sensitive subject of immigration reform was dealt with
rationally and with mutual respect for each others positions. This is
not to say that feelings about immigration do not run high. But it
would be just as unfair, for example, to call someone who wanted to
reform immigration laws anti-immigrant as it would be to call someone
who opposed immigration reform anti-American.
The Immigration in the National Interest Act addresses both illegal
and legal immigration. As a bipartisan Commission on Immigration Reform
and the administration also have concluded, both are broken and both
must be fixed. To wait any longer would put us on the wrong side of the
strong feelings of the American people, on the wrong side of common
sense, and on the wrong side of our responsibility as legislators.
Illegal immigration forces us to confront the understandable desire
of people to improve their economic situation. Illegal aliens are not
the enemy. I have talked with them in detention facilities along our
southern border. Most have good intentions. But we cannot allow the
human faces to mask the very real crisis in illegal immigration.
For example, illegal aliens account for 40 percent of the births in
the public hospitals of our largest State, California. These families
then are eligible to plug into our very generous government benefit
system. Hospitals around the country report more and more births to
illegal aliens at greater and greater cost to the taxpayer.
I would like to refer now to a chart and draw my colleagues'
attention to the one that is being put on the easel right now. Over
one-quarter of all Federal prisoners are foreign born, up from just 4
percent in 1980. Most are illegal aliens that have been convicted of
drug trafficking. Others, like those who bombed the World Trade Center
in New York City or murdered the CIA employees in Virginia, have
committed particularly heinous acts of violence.
[[Page
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Illegal aliens are 10 times more likely than Americans as a whole to
have been convicted of a Federal crime. Think about the cost to the
criminal justice system, including incarceration. But most of all,
think about the cost in pain and suffering to the innocent victims and
their families.
Every 3 years enough illegal aliens currently enter the United States
to populate a city the size of Dallas or Boston or San Francisco. Yet
less than 1 percent of all illegal aliens are deported each year.
Fraudulent documents that enable illegal aliens to become citizens can
be bought for as little as $30. Half of the four million illegal aliens
in the country today use fraudulent documents to wrongly obtain jobs
and government benefits.
To remedy these problems, this legislation doubles the number of
border patrol agents, increases interior enforcement, expedites the
deportation of illegal aliens, and strengthens penalties. The goal is
to reduce illegal immigration by at least half in 5 years.
As for legal immigration, the crisis is no less real. In its report
to Congress, the Commission on Immigration Reform said, ``Our current
immigration system must undergo major reform to ensure that admission
continue to serve our national interest.''
Before citing why major reform is needed, let me acknowledge the
obvious. Immigrants have helped make our country great. Most immigrants
come to work, to produce, to contribute to our communities. My home
State of Texas has thousands of legal immigrants from Mexico. The
service station where I pump gas is operated by a couple originally
from Iran. The cleaners where I take my shirts is owned by immigrants
from Korea. My daughter's college roommate is from Israel. These are
wonderful people and the kind of immigrants we want. To know them is to
appreciate them.
As for those individuals in other countries who desire to come to our
land of hope and opportunity, how could our hearts not go out to them?
Still, America cannot absorb everyone who wants to journey here as much
as our humanitarian instincts might argue otherwise. Immigration is not
an entitlement. It is a distinct privilege to be conferred, keeping the
interests of American families, workers, and taxpayers in mind.
Unfortunately, that is not the case with our immigration policy
today. The huge backlogs and long waits for legal immigrants drive
illegal immigration. When a brother or sister from the Philippines, for
example, is told they have to wait 40 years to be admitted, it does not
take long for them to find another way. Almost half of the illegal
aliens in the country came in on a tourist visa, overstayed their visa,
and then failed to return home. This flagrant abuse of the immigration
system destroys its credibility.
Husbands and wives who are legal immigrants must wait up to 10 years
to be united with their spouses and little children. This is inhumane
and contrary to what we know is good for families. A record high 20
percent of all legal immigrants now are receiving cash and noncash
welfare benefits.
The chart I refer to now shows that the number of immigrants applying
for supplemental security income, which is a form of welfare, has
increased 580 percent over 12 years. The cost of immigrants using just
this one program plus Medicaid is $14 billion a year.
It is sometimes said that immigrants pay more in taxes than they get
in welfare benefits. However, taxes go for more then just welfare. They
go toward defense, highways, the national debt, and so on. Allocating
their taxes to all Government programs, legal immigrants cost taxpayers
a net $25 billion a year, according to economist George Borjas. His
study also found that unlike a generation ago, today immigrant
households are more likely to receive welfare than native households.
One-half of the decline in real wages among unskilled Americans
results from competition with unskilled immigrants, according to the
Bureau of Labor Statistics. Most adversely impacted are those in urban
areas, particularly minorities. As the Urban Institute says,
``Immigration reduces the weekly earnings of low-skilled African-
American workers.''
Significantly, wage levels in high immigration States, like
California, Texas, New York, Florida, and Arizona, have declined
compared to wages in other States, the Economic Policy Institute
reports. Over half of all immigrants have few skills and little
education. They often depress wages, take jobs away from the most
vulnerable among us, and end up living off the taxpayer. Admitting so
many low-skilled immigrants makes absolutely no sense.
Those who favor never-ending record levels of immigration simply are
living in the abstract. But most Americans live in the real world. They
know their children's classrooms are bulging. They see the crowded
hospital emergency rooms. They sense the adverse impact of millions of
unskilled immigrants on wages. They feel the strain of trying to pay
more taxes and still make ends meet.
The Immigration in the National Interest Act fixes a broken
immigration system. With millions of immigrants backlogged, priorities
must be set.
I would like to point to the chart that shows to my colleagues that
under this bill the number of extended family members is reduced in
order to double the number of spouses and minor children admitted,
which will cut their rate in half.
Greater priority is also given to admitting skilled immigrants, while
the number of unskilled immigrants is decreased. Current law, which
holds the sponsors of immigrants financially responsible for the new
arrivals, is better enforced. This should reverse the trend toward
increased welfare participation.
In short, this legislation implements the recommendations of the
Commission on Immigration Reform, chaired by the late Barbara Jordan.
Professor Jordan, if she was here tonight sitting in the gallery, I
know she would be cheering us on. She also would approve of America's
continued generosity toward immigrants. Under this bill an average of
700,000 immigrants will be admitted each year for the next 5 years.
This is a higher level than at least 65 of the last 70 years.
Our approach to reducing illegal immigration and reforming legal
immigration has attracted widespread support. Organizations as diverse
as the National Federation of Independent Business, United We Stand
America, the Washington Post, the Hispanic Business Round Table, and
the Traditional Values Coalition all have endorsed our efforts.
Most importantly, the American people are demanding immigration
reform. I would like to point out to my colleagues on this chart that
the vast majority of Americans, including a majority of African-
Americans and Hispanics, want us to better control immigration.
As we begin to consider immigration reform now, remember the hard-
working families across America who worry about overcrowded schools,
stagnant wages, drug-related crime, and heavier taxes. They are the
ones who will bear the brunt if we do not fix a broken immigration
system. Congress must act now to put the national interest first and
secure our borders, protect lives, unite families, save jobs, and
lighten the load on law-abiding taxpayers.
Mr. Chairman, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman
from California [Mr. Gallegly] who served so ably as the chairman of
the House Task Force on Immigration Reform.
(Mr. GALLEGLY asked and was given permission to revise and extend his
remarks.)
{time} 1830
Mr. GALLEGLY. Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong support of
H.R. 2202,
the Immigration in the National Interest Act.
I first joined this body nearly 10 years ago, about the time I began
talking about the need for the Federal Government to bring badly needed
reforms to our Nation's immigration laws. Unfortunately, for many of
those years I felt like I was talking to myself.
That is clearly no longer the case. Immigration reform is an issue on
the minds of nearly all Americans, and nearly all express deep
dissatisfaction with our current system and the strong desire for
change. Today, we begin the historic debate that will deliver that
change. I truly believe that the bill before us represents the most
serious and comprehensive reform of our Nation's immigration law in
modern times. It also closely follows the recommendations of both the
Speaker's Task Force on Immigration Reform, which I
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chaired, and those of the Jordan Commission.
Mr. Chairman, the primary responsibilities of any sovereign nation
are the protection of its borders and the enforcement of its laws. For
too long, in the area of immigration policy, we in the Federal
Government have shirked both duties. It may have taken a while, but
policymakers in Washington finally seem ready to acknowledge the
devastating effects of illegal immigration on our cities and towns.
Mr. Chairman, America is at its core a nation of immigrants. I firmly
believe that this bill celebrates legal immigration by attacking
illegal immigration. It restores some sense and reason to the laws that
govern both legal and illegal immigration and ensures that those laws
will be enforced.
Finally, I would like to congratulate my colleague, Lamar Smith, who
chairs the Immigration and Claims Subcommittee, for putting his heart
and soul into this legislation. I would also like to thank him for his
spirit of cooperation, and for welcoming the input of myself and the
other members of the task force in crafting this bill.
Mr. SMITH of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
(Mr. CONYERS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his
remarks.)
Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I would like the Chair to know that I
would like to share the duties of managing this measure with the
distinguished ranking minority member on the subcommittee, the
gentleman from Texas [Mr. Bryant].
Mr. Chairman, immigration policy is an important subject to African-
Americans. We know much about the lack of immigration policy and the
consequences, and I am happy to hear that somebody somewhere consulted
African-Americans about immigration policy. I am not sure what it was
they found out, but I would be happy to explain this in detail as we go
throughout the debate. I have been in touch with these Americans for
many years.
It is funny how we get these dichotomies. Some people that do not
think much of our civil rights laws, who oppose the minimum wage, who
do not have much concern about redlining, heaven forbid affirmative
action be raised in dialogue. All of these kinds of questions that
involve fair and equal opportunity seem to not apply when it comes to
African-Americans, who were brought to this country against their will,
but we have these great outpourings of sympathy along some of these
similar lines when we are talking about bringing immigrants in. It is a
curious set of beliefs that seem to dominate some of the people that
are very anxious about this bill.
Mr. Chairman, I would like to begin our discussion by raising an
issue about ID cards, which is an amendment that will be brought
forward by the gentleman from Florida [Mr. McCollum] which requires, as
I understand it, every single individual in the country to obtain a
tamper-proof Social Security card. I guess it is a form of a national
ID card, which raises a lot of questions. This card is brought on by
the need of tracking people that are in the country illegally, and so
we are talking about a one or two percentile of the American public
that would be required to carry this kind of Social Security card. It
might be called an internal passport, which is used in some countries,
in some regimes.
Although there will be denials that this is not a national ID card,
it is hard to figure out what it really is if everybody is going to be
carrying it. There is no limitation on the use to which documents can
be obtained such as a Social Security card, and there is little
evidence, as I remember the hearings, to show that there would be any
reduction of document fraud. As a matter of fact, the Social Security
Deputy Commissioner testified that an improved Social Security card is
only as good as the documents brought in to prove who they are in the
first place. In other words, if a person gets a phony birth
certificate, they can get a good Social Security card. So I am not sure
what the logic is.
Now, Mr. Chairman, I know balancing the budget is still first in the
hearts of the Members of the Congress, and I am here to suggest that
the cost for this Social Security card has been costed out at around $6
billion. The annual personnel costs to administer the new system are
estimated to be an additional $3.5 million annually. The business
sector would be forced to incur significant cost to acquire machinery
and software capable of reading the new cards, and there would be many
hours required to operate the machinery and iron out the errors. This
is to get 1 or 2 percent of the people in this country that are
illegal. I suggest that this may be prohibitive and that perhaps we can
find a more reasonable way to deal with this very serious problem.
Mr. Chairman, may I turn the Members' attention now to the part that
has caused quite a bit of attention in this bill, and that is how we
would deal with the welfare provisions of people who come in to the
country, what the requirements might be to become sponsors. In one part
of this bill, there is a requirement that a sponsor earn more than 200
percent of the Federal poverty income guideline to be able to execute
an affidavit for a family member.
The 200-percent income requirement is discriminatory class action and
would announce that immigration is only for those that can afford
immigration. It would require a sponsor with a family of four to
maintain an income in excess of $35,000 to qualify as a sponsor. That
means that 91 million people in America would not be able to be a
sponsor of a family member for immigration. We may want to consider
that a little bit more carefully.
Mr. Chairman, I would also like Members to know about the
verification system again. The employee verification system was
discussed by the Social Security and the Immigration and Naturalization
Service representatives who conceded that their computers do not have
the capacity to read each other's data, which would completely foil
their worthwhile objective. A recent study by the Immigration Service
found a 28-percent error rate in the Social Security Administration's
database. This verification requirement, therefore, creates huge
possibilities for flawed information reaching employers, which would
then deny American citizens and lawful permanent residents the
opportunity to work. I hope that we examine this in the course of the
time allotted us for this important program.
Mr. Chairman, there is another provision that I should bring to
Members' minds. It is known as immigration for the rich. I do not know
if Malcolm Forbes had anything to do with this or not, but it reserves
10,000 spots for those who are rich enough to spend, to start a
multimillion-dollar business in the United States. In other words, if
someone is rich enough, they would be able to get a place in line ahead
of other immigrants who are waiting, that may not be able to cough up
that kind of money.
There is a problem that we will need to go into about what about drug
pushers and cartel kingpins, people escaping prosecution for their home
country; in other words, overseas criminals who might have a million
bucks and would like the idea of getting out of wherever it is they are
coming from. I think we need to think through this very, very
carefully.
Mr. Chairman, now comes one of my most unfavorite parts of this bill,
and that is the notion that we could bring in foreign workers to
displace American workers for any reason. Case in point, there is a
newspaper strike in its 8th month in the city of Detroit. Knight-
Ridder-Gannett have decided to bust the unions in the newspaper
industry. They picked the wrong city, but that was their decision. The
fact of the matter is that at the Canadian-Detroit border, they have
begun picking up people coming in to work for Knight-Ridder and Gannett
who are not American citizens, nor are they legal immigrants.
We are trying to find out, there is an investigation going on where
they are hearing about they can get jobs by coming across international
borders to gain employment in a company whose own employees are out on
strike. I find that objectionable. I hope that we do not continue the
practice.
{time} 1845
We also have a situation in the H-1B employers in which we find that
they are bringing in even skilled workers. Example: Computer graduates
from India who are displacing American-
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trained computer people. Serious problem, serious problem. I find this
when unemployment is still outrageously high in the United States,
particularly in urban centers where there are areas in which there is
40 percent unemployment easily. So I would like to discuss and look
more carefully at the instances in which American businesses have
brought in foreign skilled workers after having laid off skilled
American workers simply because the foreign workers are more
inexpensively available.
So this program that I refer to as the H-1B program has become a
major means of circumventing the costs of paying skilled American
workers or the costs of training them. That is in the bill; it is
objectionable.
While we are on this subject, I would like to point out, too, there
are a number of people on the Committee on the Judiciary who believe
bringing people into this country has no effect on the employment rates
of people in this country; like, for instance, the more people you
bring in that take up jobs, the fewer jobs there are for people inside
this country.
Mr. Chairman, it is almost like arithmetic. Bring more in, lose more
jobs. Bring fewer in, more jobs are available. That is an immutable law
of arithmetic that does not turn on policy about U.S. immigration
reform.
I would like to make it clear that this particular measure, which has
been pointed out by the Secretary of Labor, who has urged that the
displacement of American workers through the use of the H-1B program
must be faced, and to do this that program must be returned to its
original purpose, to provide temporary assistance to domestic
businesses to fill short-term, high-skill needs. There must be a flat
prohibition against laying off American workers and replacing them with
foreign workers. Is that provision in this bill?
Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. SMITH of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I might
consume.
Mr. Chairman, first of all I would like to respond to some of the
concerns that the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Conyers] shared with us.
Now, the first was that he was worried about the 200 percent poverty
rate level of income that we required of sponsors of immigrants coming
into the country. Let me just say that that provision was in the Senate
welfare reform bill that passed 87 to 12, with large majorities of both
Republicans and Democrats supporting that welfare reform bill.
In addition to that, what this is trying to address is the crisis
that we have in America today where we continue to admit people coming
in under the sponsorship of individuals who are at the poverty level.
So it should not surprise us that as a result of our current
immigration law we have 20 percent of all legal immigrants, for
instance, on welfare; it should not surprise us that the number of
immigrants applying for supplemental security income, a form of
welfare, has increased 580 percent over 12 years.
That is the crisis that we are trying to address by simply saying
someone has to be solvent before they can sponsor an immigrant coming
into the country, when they have to say they are going to be
financially responsible for them.
Another concern mentioned by the gentleman from Michigan was in
regard to the verification program. I just want to reassure him that it
is a voluntary program that is going to be offered as a convenience to
employers for 3 years. If it does not work, we will not continue it.
But the important point here is that, according to the Social Security
Administration, we have a 99.5 percent accuracy rate when all we are
doing is checking the name and the Social Security number of someone to
find out whether they are eligible to work. The whole point of the
verification system, of course, is to reduce the fraudulent use of use
of fraudulent documents, protect jobs for American citizens and legal
immigrants already in this country, and help reduce discrimination at
the workplace.
The error rate that the gentleman mentioned was not an error rate. It
is called a secondary verification rate, and sometimes it ranges from
17 to 20 percent, as was mentioned. But this is just simply showing
that the system works. Those are the times when there was not a person
with the right Social Security number, and in many instances those were
illegal aliens who should not be employed in this country.
Lastly, the gentleman expressed concern or endorsed, which I liked,
the free market approach to labor in this country, but I want to say to
him that that is exactly why I drew up some of the figures I did about
the unskilled in this country, when we continue to allow hundreds of
thousands of individuals to gain entry to our country who do not have
skills and do not have education. As the gentleman said, they are going
to compete directly with our own citizens and own legal immigrants who
are unskilled and uneducated, and that is why we see so often in the
urban areas that wages are depressed and jobs are lost as a result.
Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Wisconsin [Mr.
Sensenbrenner].
Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Chairman, immigration reform, unfortunately,
is one of those hot button issues that politicians use for their own
purposes. However, here on the floor of the House of Representatives,
we should not be politicians, but rather we should be legislators. It
seems to me, we should shoulder the responsibility the Constitution
gives us to determine what our immigration policy should be and to
enact the laws which implement such policy.
H.R. 2202 says our immigration policy should be ``In the National
Interest''--that immigration should benefit the country as a whole.
According to the Roper poll in December 1995, 83 percent of those
polled want a reduction in all immigration and 75 percent want illegal
aliens removed.
H.R. 2202 is a step in that direction.
President Clinton organized a Commission headed by the late Barbara
Jordan to study our immigration policies, to see if the current system
is working, and to make recommendations if it is not.
H.R. 2202
contains over 80 percent of those recommendations--recommendations
which include legal and illegal immigration.
The committee will be asked to vote later on to strike some of the
sections on legal immigration because they, ``don't belong in a bill
about illegal immigration.'' This bill is not about legal or illegal
immigration, it is about our national immigration policy--immigration
in the national interest. A national interest which is impacted by both
legal and illegal immigration.
Unless one supports no border or immigration control at all, then we
have to make choices. This bill makes some of those choices. It chooses
immediate family reunification--minor children and spouses--over
extended family. It chooses skilled and educated workers over unskilled
or uneducated, and reserves jobs at whatever level for those who are in
this country legally.
And, most importantly, it makes the policy decision that people who
are in this country illegally are breaking the law and should leave
without protracted litigation that can go on for years. Let us remember
almost half the illegal aliens in this country arrive legally.
To say that jobs, education, or taxpayer financed programs should be
for those who are in our country legally is not ``anti-immigrant'' or
``isolationist.'' Rather it says that the Congress is finally serious
about regaining control of our borders. Our first priority should be
immigration policies in the Nation's interest not special interests.
Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 2 minutes.
I wan to commend the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Smith] for alleviating
many of my concerns. I find we have some areas in agreement, and I am
delighted to know about them as well.
But I would say that the gentleman is the first person that I have
heard in a long time cite as a reason for supporting an amendment is
that the other body approved of it. That usually gets the amendment in
much deeper trouble than it might otherwise be in.
Now the commission, we are trying to check, and I know Barbara Jordan
perhaps more intimately as a colleague than anyone here since I served
with her on the Committee on the Judiciary, and I do not know if she
would have supported a notion that we had to means test one's family
member to bring them in and that they had to make 200 percent of the
poverty level to get in. In other words, I do not think
[[Page
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Barbara Jordan or myself would want to tell somebody that is making
1\1/2\ times the poverty level that they cannot bring their children in
because they do not make enough money. That does not sound like Barbara
Jordan to me.
Finally, the voluntary program that the gentleman referred to is
voluntary to employers. It is not voluntary if someone is seeking a job
in the place that the employer may decide to use it. So it is voluntary
to some and involuntary to others.
Mr. BRYANT of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may
consume.
Mr. Chairman, at the beginning of last year the gentleman from Texas
[Mr. Smith], the chairman of the subcommittee, and I, in my capacity as
ranking Democrat on the subcommittee, set about to write a commonsense
immigration bill designated to address very real, very objectively
provable problems with our immigration policy in the United States
today. We set about to write a bill that did not involve Proposition
187 hysteria from the right and did not involve unnecessarily generous
efforts to bring in lots of other people, perhaps coming from the left.
We set about to write a bill that dealt with real problems. We set
about to deal with problems such as this.
Legal immigration, and I am not talking about illegal immigration, I
am talking about legal immigration under current law, resulted, between
1981 and 1985, in 2.8 million people entering the country legally. Ten
years later, between 1991 and 1995, 5.3 million people entered the
country legally, twice as many, and these figures do not include the
3.8 million backlog of relatives of these people who are now waiting to
enter the country when their time comes.
Illegal immigration in 1994 also added to the totals. In that year
1,094,000 illegal immigrants were apprehended and deported.
{time} 1900
How many succeeded in entering the country and stayed is not known,
although most estimates agree it is about 300,000 people. The fact of
the matter is, though, we have an enormous number of people coming into
this county at a very rapid rate.
The basic question that we cannot ignore, and I appeal to those
Republicans who are paying attention to certain businesses that are
anxious to have more folks in here so they can get cheap laborers, and
many Democrats who are concerned about the civil libertarian impact of
this, who are concerned about being fair to people as we have always
done on our side; I say we cannot responsibly avoid the bottom line
conclusion that we have a huge number of people entering the country
legally, and a smaller number but a large number entering the country
illegally, and it is increasing our population very rapidly.
Perhaps the best speech in this debate has already been made on the
rule, when the gentleman from California [Mr. Beilenson], a member of
the Committee on Rules, observed that our current population of 263
million people is going to reach 275 million people in 4 years, more
than double the size of the country at the end of the World War II.
The long-term picture of this population situation is even more
alarming. Our Census Bureau conservatively projects, and I am reading
from his speech, ``that our population will rise to 400 million by the
year 2050, more than a 50 percent increase from today's level, and the
equivalent of adding 40 cities of the size of Los Angeles,'' and so on.
In fact, those are conservative estimates. Many demographers indicate
we will be at 500 billion people by the year 2050.
I would just suggest that not one Member of this body can responsibly
stand on this floor and talk about how to have to balance the budget to
protect future generations or how we have to maintain national security
to protect future generations, and not at the same time recognize that
we must manage the population growth of this country in a responsible
way if we are going to protect future generations. That is simply too
many people. It is a question of quantity, of low many come in here.
Neither the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Smith], nor I harbor the
slightest hard feelings toward those that have the courage and the
gumption to leave home and come into this country. They are the kind of
people with the get-up-and-go that we want. There is no question about
that. The bottom line question, though, is how many people can we have
come in here and still manage the country in a way that our economy
will continue to promise in the future that people who are willing to
work hard can get their foot on the bottom rung of the economic ladder
and climb up into the middle class. We cannot do that with an unlimited
number of people coming into the country year after year after year.
Mr. Chairman, are there things about this bill that I would like to
change? Yes, there are. We have had disagreements. There are a number
of things that I could criticize. I do not like the fact that we did
not, in my opinion, address the H 1(b) problem mentioned by the
gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Conyers], in as effective a way as we
might have. It is improved somewhat in the bill, but the fact of the
matter is we could have done it much better.
We could have said we are not going to let any American jobs be given
up in order to hire folks who are imported for the purpose of taking
their jobs. That is what my amendment would have done. I offered it in
the Committee on Rules and they refused to let us bring it to the
floor. We will deal with that probably on the motion to recommit.
I do not like the diversity program. I opposed it in 1991 when it was
put in and managed to get it cut in half in the current bill. I still
say it is, in effect, a racist program. It is a designed to try to
bring more white folks into the country because somebody does not like
the number of Asians and Hispanics entering the country. I think it is
wrong to have a program like that in the law at all, even if the bill
cuts it in half. I have to say that, like we always do when many bills
come up, we are going to have to go along with some things that we do
not like in order to get a lot of things that I think we need.
I do not agree with the investor portion of the bill either. But we
have to agree on a bill that will reduce the quantity of people coming
into the country. That is what we are all about here tonight. Mr.
Chairman, I strongly urge Republicans and Democrats alike not to vote
to sever the legal immigration changes in this bill from the illegal
immigration changes in this bill. If we do that we are voting to kill
our attempts to reform legal immigration. It is just that simple.
Not a single person who is voting to sever this bill is coming
forward saying, ``if you sever it, we will bring it back to the floor.
We will deal with it later.'' Not one of them wants to deal with the
question of legal immigration. On the contrary, they want to kill it
and eliminate it from the bill.
Think of what that would mean. After eliminating that from the bill,
many people then will be left to march around the floor beating their
breasts talking about how tough they are going to get on illegal
immigration. But illegal immigration amounts to, we think, maybe
300,000 a year; legal immigration amounts to 1 million a year. That is
where the big numbers are. We either deal with legal immigration or we
admit that we are not going to be serious and not going to have enough
courage to deal with the really central problem facing this country in
terms of the number of people that are entering. Please do not vote to
sever illegal and legal immigration.
Mr. Chairman, this bill was written to avoid the extremes. So far we
have done that. If amendments that are offered, such as this foreign
agriculture worker amendment, which neither the gentleman from Texas
[Mr. Smith] nor I support, were to succeed, I could not continue to
support this bill. The fact of the matter is that it is an anachronism.
It was a bad part of our law many years ago. We in 1986 tried to
address that problem. We ended up with amnesty and a variety of other
remedies to solve the problem. Here we are, right back with it again.
Please vote against these extreme amendments. Let us try to keep this
thing in the middle of the road.
I could speak a long time about all the things this bill does. There
is not time in the general debate to do it. I will simply say this: I
wish I could avoid having to deal with this subject.
[[Page
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It is so sensitive, it is so subject to mischaracterization, it is so
subject to misinformation of people, particularly folks that have
strong views about the needs of their own ethnic communities, and so
easy to imply that those of us who are trying to do something about the
quantity of immigration generally somehow have hard feelings toward
them.
That is not true. I think my record is strong enough over the years
to make clear it is not true. It is not true of the gentleman from
Texas [Mr. Smith] either. I wish I could avoid the subject. But I will
say this: If I did avoid it and I left this House, as I am going to do
at the end of this year, I would look back on this year and know that I
hid from a problem that was my responsibility to solve at a time when I
had a chance to solve it.
I strongly urge my Democratic colleagues and my Republican colleagues
as well to help us pass a constructive bill that deals with the
question of the vast number of people that are coming into the country,
the rapid increase in our population, and preserve a situation in which
folks that are trying to get their foot on the bottom rung of the
ladder can climb that ladder into the middle class without having to
scramble and scrape and fight for jobs with folks that are just
entering the country. That is really what we are all about here.
Mr. BERMAN. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. BRYANT of Texas. I yield to the gentleman from California.
Mr. BERMAN. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding, and for
all his work on this bill. Mr. Chairman, the gentleman indicated it is
very important to get the figures accurate. I agree. I just want to
cite for the Record that I do not think his comments on the level of
immigration during the first 5 years of the 1990's is any where near
the accurate figure.
The Department of State, in a letter dated March 15, last Friday,
responded to a series of questions that I asked, as follows. The first
question was: ``What was the average annual immigration level for the
period 1992 to 1995?'' The average annual immigration level, 1992 being
the first year that the 1990 changes went into effect.
``By immigration level,'' I said in the question, ``I mean the total
of all legal immigration categories, including refugees.''
The answer that the Department of State said was, ``The annual
average immigration level for the period 1992 to 1995, based on total
immigrant admission figures, is about 801,000,'' not 1 million or 1\1/
4\ million, to come to a 5 million----
Mr. BRYANT of Texas. Mr. Chairman, if I may reclaim my time, I think
what I said was between 1991 and 1995 we had about 5 million people
coming into the country. The gentleman's figures does not seem to
contradict that.
Mr. BERMAN. It does. It is substantially less than that. That would
be an average of 1 million people a year. In 1991 it was under the old
law, it was less. The new law, which went into effect in 1992, the
average was 800,000. That is barely over 3 million for those 4 years.
It is substantially less.
I just wanted to clarify the Record. That includes, Mr. Chairman,
refugees as well as all the other legal immigration categories. What it
does not include are about 50,000 legalization categories, which are
people already in this country. I just wanted to indicate that the
Department of State, which has the most accurate records on legal
admissions, indicates the figure is significantly less than 1 million a
year.
Mr. BRYANT of Texas. Of course, I would dispute that it is
significantly less, even if those figures are accurate. We are working
with figures that we have worked with throughout this debate that were
brought to us by the Commission on Immigration that Barbara Jordan
chaired.
The bottomline figure, however, still is the same. The number of
people who are entering the country is enormous, and the biggest number
of people entering the country are in the category of legal immigrants.
The gentleman is advocating, as a number of my friends are, and I
wish they were not, that we sever legal immigration from illegal
immigration, meaning that we leave out, if we take his figures for a
minute, and we leave out the question of 800,000 a year, and I say a
million, we leave out that question, but we get real tough here on
300,000 illegal immigrants that are entering the country.
I would just suggest that it makes no sense to omit legal
immigration. If you are concerned about the rapid growth in our
population, and I did point out that between 1981 and 1985 legal
immigration was 2.8 million, and from 1991 to 1995 it was 5.3 million,
about twice as much, and even by Mr. Berman's figures it would be a lot
more, if not twice as much, the problem is the quantity of people. How
can we not deal with legal immigration if we are going to look at the
problem of quantity of people coming into the country? I say we have
to.
Mr. SMITH of Texas. Mr. Chairman will the gentleman yield?
Mr. BRYANT of Texas. I yield to the gentleman from Texas.
Mr. SMITH of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I just want to say to the gentleman
that his figures are absolutely correct. I am reading from the chart
put out by the INS called ``Immigration to the United States, Fiscal
Years through 1993.'' Of course, in 1993 we had 904,000 admitted; in
1992, 973,000 admitted; in 1991, 1.8 million; 1990, 1.5 million; 1989,
over 1 million. The gentleman is correct, the average has been over 1
million a year.
Mr. BERMAN. Mr. Chairman, if the gentleman will continue to yield,
those figures do not reflect legal admissions through the legal
immigration system. The gentleman is lumping in the legalization
program for people who are already here.
The Department of State administers the granting of visas for people
to come into this country. Their figure is the accurate figure. It is
about 800,000. I do not want to belabor this point. There is a lot I
can say in response, but I will wait for my own time.
Mr. BRYANT of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I would just conclude by saying
even if we took the gentleman from California's figures, my speech
would be identical. I would not change a single sentence in it. We have
to deal with this huge quantity of people. We have to deal with legal
immigration. We cannot just talk about illegal immigrants and try to
scapegoat them. We have to deal with legal immigrants as well.
I would point out the politically potent groups lobby in regard to
the legal immigrant category. The less powerful groups speak for the
illegal immigrant category. So we are being asked to leave out the
biggest numbers, those of legal immigration, and just pound on the
illegal immigrants. That is, in effect, what is going on here. Let us
deal with this subject comprehensively, both legal and illegal. I urge
Members to support this bill, to vote against the more extreme
amendments that might be offered, and let us do what is in the interest
of our country.
Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. SMITH of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman
from Florida [Mr. McCollum].
(Mr. McCOLLUM asked and was given permission to revise and extend his
remarks.)
Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding time
to me.
Mr. Chairman, I rise to strongly support
H.R. 2202, the immigration
bill before us. I have served on this subcommittee and worked with
immigration for all the years I have been in Congress. I cannot think
of any more important immigration legislation to pass than this bill.
Mr. Chairman, I can testify to the fact that the legal immigration
provisions in here are exceedingly important and exceedingly generous,
contrary to what we might hear some other people say. With the
exception of the period of legalization or amnesty that occurred after
the 1986 law, the 3.5 million people that this bill would allow to come
into this country legally over the next 5 years would be the highest
level of legal immigration over the last 70 years. So make no mistake
about it, this is not a restrictionist proposal that has come out of
the committee on legal immigration.
In fact, there are some good features about it, very important
features. We have been skewing the legal immigration so much toward
family reunification and so much toward preferences, such as allowing
brothers and sisters in of those who are here legally, that we have not
been taking in the traditional numbers of seed immigrants who have
[[Page
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special talents and skills but do not have any relatives here whom we
should, and whom historically this country has and upon whose hard work
we have had the great melting pot and the great energy we have had to
make this economy and this great free market Nation of ours. So I urge
the legal immigration provisions be maintained in the bill and be
adopted.
On the illegal side, the bill has great provisions in it to remedy
defects with the asylum provisions. We have had people claiming
political aslym wrongfully and fraudulently for years now, saying that
they would be harmed by being sent back home for religious or political
persecutions of some sort. As soon as they set foot in an airport they
say the magic words and they get to stay here.
This is wrong. They should not. There should be a summary or
expedited exclusion process to deal with those people, especially those
who do not make a credible claim of asylum when they first set foot off
the plane. This bill remedies the problem, and it sets some real time
limits for applying for political asylum.
Last but not least, it deals with the big problem of illegal
immigration overall. There are about 4 million illegals here today. We
have granted legalization to about 1 million over the last 10 years. We
have 4 million permanently residing in this country today, and we are
adding 300,000 to 500,000 a year. That is too many to absorb and
assimilate in the communities where they are settling. They are
settling in very specific communities, and they are having negative
social and cultural impacts on those communities.
The only way to solve the illegal immigration problem is to cut the
magnet of jobs, which is the reason they are coming. About half are
coming as visa overstays, so no matter how many Border Patrol you put
on the border, you cannot stop the flow of illegals here. The only way
to do that is to make employer sanctions work. That has been a
provision in law since 1986, that says it is illegal for an employer to
knowingly hire an illegal alien.
The reason that has not been working is because of fraudulent
documents, because the employer has not been able and the Immigration
Service has not been able to enforce that law. I am going to offer a
very simple amendment here shortly that is going to go to that problem
on the Social Security card, which will be one of the six cards, one of
the six documents that we will have to choose from when you go to seek
a job, to show that you are eligible for employment after this bill
passes.
I think what we need to do is simply require the Social Security
Administration to make the Social Security card, which is the most
counterfeited document in the country, be as secure against
counterfeiting as the $100 bill and as proofed against fraudulent use
as the passport. It would go a long way to cutting down on fraud and it
would make employer sanctions work.
Mr. BRYANT of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman
from California [Mr. Berman].
(Mr. BERMAN asked and was given permission to revise and extend his
remarks.)
{time} 1915
Mr. BERMAN. First, Mr. Chairman, I want to say both to the gentleman
from Texas [Mr. Smith], chairman of the Subcommittee on Immigration,
and to the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Bryant], the ranking Democrat,
that we do have some strong differences on several aspects of this
bill. But I think the debate undoubtedly during the next couple of days
can get very heated on a subject which is very passionate. I just want
to start out indicating that I have the greatest respect for both
gentlemen from Texas. These are not Pat Buchanan clones sitting on the
House floor that would seek to build walls around this country. Their
proposal, while I think is much too drastic a cut in legal immigration,
still recognizes legal immigration. I do not believe that it is
motivated by racism or xenophobia, and I compliment both of them
because they have become experts in the subject and believe sincerely
in where they are coming from. We just have a fundamental difference.
The rates of immigration as a percentage of the American population
now are far lower than they were at any time in the 19th or early 20th
century, far lower than they were at that particular time. The bill
before us, we will see charts undoubtedly during the debate which will
talk about backlog visas and other visas to try and show that the cuts
are not severe. The fact is the cuts in legal immigration are close to
30 to 40 percent. The backlog visas that are given for the first 5
years or so are essentially to legalize people who are already here,
who are protected under family unity, who came in under the
legalization program. These are people who within the next year or two,
in any event, will be legalized through the normal legalization process
because they will have naturalized and be able to bring in spouses and
minor children.
The harshest part of this bill is it essentially ends, and I say that
advisedly, it essentially ends the right of U.S. citizens to bring in
adult children and parents. It also wipes out any right to bring in
siblings notwithstanding the fact that there are so many people who
have waited so patiently, who have followed the rules, who have
accepted the appropriateness of following the law and waited in line.
This just cuts them off at the knees and says, ``We don't care.''
Why do I say the gentleman from Texas undoubtedly will agree that his
bill wipes out the right to bring in siblings and protects no one in
the backlog so that a person who has been waiting 15 years to come into
this country, if his number does not come up before the effective date
of this law, will be wiped out? But he will argue with me about parents
and adult children. But I think if one reads the bill, he will accept
my view of why I say this bill effectively eliminates that right.
With respect to parents, initially the bill created no guarantee for
parents, and the State Department came in to our subcommittee and said,
and there has never been a bit of refutation of that, that the
spilldown effect from spouses and minor children and the using of those
slots would eliminate every parent from admission for the next 5 years.
So in full committee, the chairman of the subcommittee offered an
amendment to create a floor of 25,000. But along with that floor, the
bill contains provisions to say that that parent has to have come in
where he has already secured a health insurance policy and a long-term
care insurance policy.
I venture to say there are not 10 people in this House of
Representatives that will have long-term health care insurance. Where
you can possibly find it, except for being in Congress, which is not
necessarily long-term insurance, but the fact is I do not know where
you can find it, but if you can find it, the average cost of that kind
of policy is $9,000 a year. With children, the exce
Major Actions:
All articles in House section
IMMIGRATION IN THE NATIONAL INTEREST ACT
(House of Representatives - March 19, 1996)
Text of this article available as:
TXT
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[Pages
H2378-H2461]
IMMIGRATION IN THE NATIONAL INTEREST ACT
Mr. SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to House Resolution 384 and rule
XXIII, the Chair declares the House in the Committee of the Whole House
on the State of the Union for the consideration of the bill,
H.R. 2202.
{time} 1813
in the committee of the whole
Accordingly the House resolved itself into the Committee of the Whole
House on the State of the Union for the consideration of the bill (
H.R.
2202) to amend the Immigration and Nationality Act to improve
deterrence of illegal immigration to the United States by increasing
border patrol and investigative personnel, by increasing penalties for
alien smuggling and for document fraud, by reforming exclusion and
deportation law and procedures, by improving the verification system
for eligibility for employment, and through other measures, to reform
the legal immigration system and facilitate legal entries into the
United States, and for other purposes with Mr. Bonilla in the chair.
The Clerk read the title of the bill.
The CHAIRMAN. Pursuant to the rule, the bill is considered as having
been read the first time.
Under the rule, the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Smith] will be
recognized for 60 minutes, and the gentleman from Michigan [Mr.
Conyers] will be recognized for 60 minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Smith].
Mr. SMITH of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I might
consume.
Mr. Chairman, I would like first to thank the chairman of the
Committee on the Judiciary, the gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Hyde], for
his generous support along the way. It is he who has been captain of
the ship, and it is his steady hand at the helm who has brought us to
these shores tonight.
{time} 1815
Mr. Chairman, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman
from Illinois [Mr. Hyde], the chairman of the Committee on the
Judiciary.
(Mr. HYDE asked and was given permission to revise and extend his
remarks.)
Mr. HYDE. Mr. Chairman, I thank the distinguished chairman of the
Subcommittee on Immigration for yielding me time, and I am pleased to
speak here on this very important issue.
Mr. Chairman, immigration reform is one of the most important
legislative priorities facing the 104th Congress. Today, undocumented
aliens surreptitiously cross our border with impunity. Still others
enter as nonimmigrants with temporary legal status, but often stay on
indefinitely and illegally. The INS administrative and adjudicatory
processes are a confusing, inefficient bureaucratic maze, resulting in
crippling delays in decisionmaking. The easy availability of fraudulent
documents frustrates honest employers, who seek to prevent the
employment of persons not authorized to work in the United States.
Unfortunately, the result of illicit job prospects only serves as a
magnet to further illegal immigration. Clearly, we face a multifaceted
breakdown of immigration law enforcement that requires our urgent
attention.
The 104th Congress can make an unprecedented contribution to the
prevention of illegal immigration as long as we have the will to act.
H.R. 2202 provides for substantially enhanced border and interior
enforcement, greater deterrence to immigration-related crimes, more
effective mechanisms for denying employment to undocumented aliens,
broader prohibitions on the receipt of public benefits by individuals
lacking legal status, and expeditious removal of persons not legally
present in the United States.
The Committee on the Judiciary, recognizing that issues involving
illegal and legal migration are closely intertwined, approved a bill
that takes a comprehensive approach to reforming immigration law.
Today, we create unfulfillable expectations by accepting far more
immigration applications than we can accommodate--resulting in backlogs
numbering in the millions and waiting periods of many years. We simply
need to give greater priority to unifying nuclear families, which is a
priority of
H.R. 2202.
In addressing family immigration, the Judiciary Committee recognized
[[Page
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the need for changes in the bill as originally introduced. For example,
the Committee adopted my amendment deleting an overly restrictive
provision that would have denied family-based immigration opportunities
to parents unless at least 50 percent of their sons and daughters
resided in the United States.
During our markup, we also modified provisions of the bill on
employment related immigration--removing potential impediments to
international trade and protecting the access of American businesses to
individuals with special qualifications who can help our economy. We
recognized the critical importance of outstanding professors and
researchers and multinational executives and managers by placing these
two immigrant categories in a new high priority--second preference--
exempt from time consuming labor certification requirements. We
restored a national interest waiver of labor certification requirements
and delineated specific criteria for its exercise. In addition to
adopting these two amendments which I sponsored, the committee also
substantially modified new experience requirements for immigrants in
the skilled worker and professional categories and deleted a provision
potentially reducing available visas up to 50 percent. The net result
of these various changes is that American competitiveness in
international markets will be fostered--encouraging job creation here
at home.
Another noteworthy amendment to this bill restored a modified
diversity immigrant program. Up to 27,000 numbers--roughly half the
figure under current law--will be made available to nationals of
countries that are not major sources of immigration to the United
States but have high demand for diversity visas. The program will help
to compensate for the fact that nationals of many countries--such as
Ireland--generally have not been eligible to immigrate on the basis of
family reunification.
This week we have the opportunity to pass legislation that will give
us needed tools to address illegal immigration and facilitate a more
realistic approach to legal immigration. Our final work product should
include an employment verification mechanism, because America's
businesses cannot effectively implement the bar against employing
illegal aliens without some confirmation mechanism.
H.R. 2202
appropriately gives expression to the utility of reviewing immigration
levels periodically, but we need to adopt an amendment by the gentleman
from Kansas [Mr. Brownback] and the gentleman from Illinois [Mr.
Gutierrez] that deletes language in the bill imposing a sunset on
immigrant admissions in the absence of reauthorization because such a
provision can create serious potential hardships for families and major
disruptions for American businesses.
There are two other amendments I wish to comment on briefly at this
time. An amendment by the gentleman from Florida [Mr. Canady] will
require that employment-based immigrants and diversity immigrants
demonstrate English language speaking and reading ability. I plan to
support it because I believe that our common language is an essential
unifying force in this pluralistic society and a key to success in the
American work force. An amendment by the gentleman from Wisconsin [Mr.
Kleczka] reimburses fees to Polish nationals who applied for the 1995
diversity immigrant program without being selected. Such recompense is
entirely appropriate because the State Department erred in its handling
of applications from nationals of Poland.
This omnibus immigration reform legislation, introduced by the
gentleman from Texas, Lamar Smith, chairman of the Subcommittee on
Immigration and Claims, makes major needed changes in the Immigration
and Nationality Act. A number of the bill's provisions are consistent
with recommendations made by the Congressional Task Force on
Immigration Reform, chaired by the gentleman from California, Elton
Gallegly, as well as by the U.S. Commission on Immigration Reform,
chaired by our former colleague, the late Barbara Jordan. I also note
that the administration finds itself in agreement with significant
portions of the bill before us. The extent of bipartisan interest in
achieving immigration reform must not be overlooked as Members debate
this legislation.
The Committee on the Judiciary, during a long markup on nine
different days, improved provisions on both illegal and legal
immigration. We favorably reported
H.R. 2202 as amended by a recorded
vote of 23 to 10.
Immigration reform is very high on the list of national concerns--
underscoring the importance of our task this week. I fully recognize
the complexity of this issue--socially, economically, and emotionally.
These are problems that generate strongly held views. Nevertheless, I
am confident that this House will debate these matters with civility,
patience and good will. The 104th Congress can make a major
contribution toward solving our nation's immigration problems and
active consideration of
H.R. 2202 represents a forward step in that
direction.
Mr. SMITH of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I might
consume.
Mr. Chairman, on the other side of the aisle from me is the ranking
minority member of the Subcommittee on Immigration, my friend and
colleague, the gentleman from Texas, [Mr. John Bryant]. He has been an
equal partner in this effort to reform our immigration laws, and I want
to thank him as well.
Mr. Chairman, we now begin consideration of immigration legislation
that reduces crime, unites families, protects jobs, and eases the
burden on taxpayers. A sovereign country has a profound responsibility
to secure its borders, to know who enters for how long and why.
Citizens rightfully expect Congress to put the national interest first.
In approving the Immigration in the National Interest Act, Congress
will provide a better future for millions of Americans and for millions
of others who live in foreign lands and have yet to come to America.
This pro-family, pro-worker, pro-taxpayer bill reaffirms the dreams of
a nation of immigrants that has chosen to govern itself by law.
Immigration reform of this scope has been enacted by only three
Congresses this century. The consideration of this bill is a momentous
time for us all.
As the debate goes forward, my hope is that the discussion on the
House floor will mirror the high level of debate evident when the
Committee on the Judiciary considered this legislation earlier this
year. Even though there were disagreements over many issues, the
complex and sensitive subject of immigration reform was dealt with
rationally and with mutual respect for each others positions. This is
not to say that feelings about immigration do not run high. But it
would be just as unfair, for example, to call someone who wanted to
reform immigration laws anti-immigrant as it would be to call someone
who opposed immigration reform anti-American.
The Immigration in the National Interest Act addresses both illegal
and legal immigration. As a bipartisan Commission on Immigration Reform
and the administration also have concluded, both are broken and both
must be fixed. To wait any longer would put us on the wrong side of the
strong feelings of the American people, on the wrong side of common
sense, and on the wrong side of our responsibility as legislators.
Illegal immigration forces us to confront the understandable desire
of people to improve their economic situation. Illegal aliens are not
the enemy. I have talked with them in detention facilities along our
southern border. Most have good intentions. But we cannot allow the
human faces to mask the very real crisis in illegal immigration.
For example, illegal aliens account for 40 percent of the births in
the public hospitals of our largest State, California. These families
then are eligible to plug into our very generous government benefit
system. Hospitals around the country report more and more births to
illegal aliens at greater and greater cost to the taxpayer.
I would like to refer now to a chart and draw my colleagues'
attention to the one that is being put on the easel right now. Over
one-quarter of all Federal prisoners are foreign born, up from just 4
percent in 1980. Most are illegal aliens that have been convicted of
drug trafficking. Others, like those who bombed the World Trade Center
in New York City or murdered the CIA employees in Virginia, have
committed particularly heinous acts of violence.
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Illegal aliens are 10 times more likely than Americans as a whole to
have been convicted of a Federal crime. Think about the cost to the
criminal justice system, including incarceration. But most of all,
think about the cost in pain and suffering to the innocent victims and
their families.
Every 3 years enough illegal aliens currently enter the United States
to populate a city the size of Dallas or Boston or San Francisco. Yet
less than 1 percent of all illegal aliens are deported each year.
Fraudulent documents that enable illegal aliens to become citizens can
be bought for as little as $30. Half of the four million illegal aliens
in the country today use fraudulent documents to wrongly obtain jobs
and government benefits.
To remedy these problems, this legislation doubles the number of
border patrol agents, increases interior enforcement, expedites the
deportation of illegal aliens, and strengthens penalties. The goal is
to reduce illegal immigration by at least half in 5 years.
As for legal immigration, the crisis is no less real. In its report
to Congress, the Commission on Immigration Reform said, ``Our current
immigration system must undergo major reform to ensure that admission
continue to serve our national interest.''
Before citing why major reform is needed, let me acknowledge the
obvious. Immigrants have helped make our country great. Most immigrants
come to work, to produce, to contribute to our communities. My home
State of Texas has thousands of legal immigrants from Mexico. The
service station where I pump gas is operated by a couple originally
from Iran. The cleaners where I take my shirts is owned by immigrants
from Korea. My daughter's college roommate is from Israel. These are
wonderful people and the kind of immigrants we want. To know them is to
appreciate them.
As for those individuals in other countries who desire to come to our
land of hope and opportunity, how could our hearts not go out to them?
Still, America cannot absorb everyone who wants to journey here as much
as our humanitarian instincts might argue otherwise. Immigration is not
an entitlement. It is a distinct privilege to be conferred, keeping the
interests of American families, workers, and taxpayers in mind.
Unfortunately, that is not the case with our immigration policy
today. The huge backlogs and long waits for legal immigrants drive
illegal immigration. When a brother or sister from the Philippines, for
example, is told they have to wait 40 years to be admitted, it does not
take long for them to find another way. Almost half of the illegal
aliens in the country came in on a tourist visa, overstayed their visa,
and then failed to return home. This flagrant abuse of the immigration
system destroys its credibility.
Husbands and wives who are legal immigrants must wait up to 10 years
to be united with their spouses and little children. This is inhumane
and contrary to what we know is good for families. A record high 20
percent of all legal immigrants now are receiving cash and noncash
welfare benefits.
The chart I refer to now shows that the number of immigrants applying
for supplemental security income, which is a form of welfare, has
increased 580 percent over 12 years. The cost of immigrants using just
this one program plus Medicaid is $14 billion a year.
It is sometimes said that immigrants pay more in taxes than they get
in welfare benefits. However, taxes go for more then just welfare. They
go toward defense, highways, the national debt, and so on. Allocating
their taxes to all Government programs, legal immigrants cost taxpayers
a net $25 billion a year, according to economist George Borjas. His
study also found that unlike a generation ago, today immigrant
households are more likely to receive welfare than native households.
One-half of the decline in real wages among unskilled Americans
results from competition with unskilled immigrants, according to the
Bureau of Labor Statistics. Most adversely impacted are those in urban
areas, particularly minorities. As the Urban Institute says,
``Immigration reduces the weekly earnings of low-skilled African-
American workers.''
Significantly, wage levels in high immigration States, like
California, Texas, New York, Florida, and Arizona, have declined
compared to wages in other States, the Economic Policy Institute
reports. Over half of all immigrants have few skills and little
education. They often depress wages, take jobs away from the most
vulnerable among us, and end up living off the taxpayer. Admitting so
many low-skilled immigrants makes absolutely no sense.
Those who favor never-ending record levels of immigration simply are
living in the abstract. But most Americans live in the real world. They
know their children's classrooms are bulging. They see the crowded
hospital emergency rooms. They sense the adverse impact of millions of
unskilled immigrants on wages. They feel the strain of trying to pay
more taxes and still make ends meet.
The Immigration in the National Interest Act fixes a broken
immigration system. With millions of immigrants backlogged, priorities
must be set.
I would like to point to the chart that shows to my colleagues that
under this bill the number of extended family members is reduced in
order to double the number of spouses and minor children admitted,
which will cut their rate in half.
Greater priority is also given to admitting skilled immigrants, while
the number of unskilled immigrants is decreased. Current law, which
holds the sponsors of immigrants financially responsible for the new
arrivals, is better enforced. This should reverse the trend toward
increased welfare participation.
In short, this legislation implements the recommendations of the
Commission on Immigration Reform, chaired by the late Barbara Jordan.
Professor Jordan, if she was here tonight sitting in the gallery, I
know she would be cheering us on. She also would approve of America's
continued generosity toward immigrants. Under this bill an average of
700,000 immigrants will be admitted each year for the next 5 years.
This is a higher level than at least 65 of the last 70 years.
Our approach to reducing illegal immigration and reforming legal
immigration has attracted widespread support. Organizations as diverse
as the National Federation of Independent Business, United We Stand
America, the Washington Post, the Hispanic Business Round Table, and
the Traditional Values Coalition all have endorsed our efforts.
Most importantly, the American people are demanding immigration
reform. I would like to point out to my colleagues on this chart that
the vast majority of Americans, including a majority of African-
Americans and Hispanics, want us to better control immigration.
As we begin to consider immigration reform now, remember the hard-
working families across America who worry about overcrowded schools,
stagnant wages, drug-related crime, and heavier taxes. They are the
ones who will bear the brunt if we do not fix a broken immigration
system. Congress must act now to put the national interest first and
secure our borders, protect lives, unite families, save jobs, and
lighten the load on law-abiding taxpayers.
Mr. Chairman, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman
from California [Mr. Gallegly] who served so ably as the chairman of
the House Task Force on Immigration Reform.
(Mr. GALLEGLY asked and was given permission to revise and extend his
remarks.)
{time} 1830
Mr. GALLEGLY. Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong support of
H.R. 2202,
the Immigration in the National Interest Act.
I first joined this body nearly 10 years ago, about the time I began
talking about the need for the Federal Government to bring badly needed
reforms to our Nation's immigration laws. Unfortunately, for many of
those years I felt like I was talking to myself.
That is clearly no longer the case. Immigration reform is an issue on
the minds of nearly all Americans, and nearly all express deep
dissatisfaction with our current system and the strong desire for
change. Today, we begin the historic debate that will deliver that
change. I truly believe that the bill before us represents the most
serious and comprehensive reform of our Nation's immigration law in
modern times. It also closely follows the recommendations of both the
Speaker's Task Force on Immigration Reform, which I
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chaired, and those of the Jordan Commission.
Mr. Chairman, the primary responsibilities of any sovereign nation
are the protection of its borders and the enforcement of its laws. For
too long, in the area of immigration policy, we in the Federal
Government have shirked both duties. It may have taken a while, but
policymakers in Washington finally seem ready to acknowledge the
devastating effects of illegal immigration on our cities and towns.
Mr. Chairman, America is at its core a nation of immigrants. I firmly
believe that this bill celebrates legal immigration by attacking
illegal immigration. It restores some sense and reason to the laws that
govern both legal and illegal immigration and ensures that those laws
will be enforced.
Finally, I would like to congratulate my colleague, Lamar Smith, who
chairs the Immigration and Claims Subcommittee, for putting his heart
and soul into this legislation. I would also like to thank him for his
spirit of cooperation, and for welcoming the input of myself and the
other members of the task force in crafting this bill.
Mr. SMITH of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
(Mr. CONYERS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his
remarks.)
Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I would like the Chair to know that I
would like to share the duties of managing this measure with the
distinguished ranking minority member on the subcommittee, the
gentleman from Texas [Mr. Bryant].
Mr. Chairman, immigration policy is an important subject to African-
Americans. We know much about the lack of immigration policy and the
consequences, and I am happy to hear that somebody somewhere consulted
African-Americans about immigration policy. I am not sure what it was
they found out, but I would be happy to explain this in detail as we go
throughout the debate. I have been in touch with these Americans for
many years.
It is funny how we get these dichotomies. Some people that do not
think much of our civil rights laws, who oppose the minimum wage, who
do not have much concern about redlining, heaven forbid affirmative
action be raised in dialogue. All of these kinds of questions that
involve fair and equal opportunity seem to not apply when it comes to
African-Americans, who were brought to this country against their will,
but we have these great outpourings of sympathy along some of these
similar lines when we are talking about bringing immigrants in. It is a
curious set of beliefs that seem to dominate some of the people that
are very anxious about this bill.
Mr. Chairman, I would like to begin our discussion by raising an
issue about ID cards, which is an amendment that will be brought
forward by the gentleman from Florida [Mr. McCollum] which requires, as
I understand it, every single individual in the country to obtain a
tamper-proof Social Security card. I guess it is a form of a national
ID card, which raises a lot of questions. This card is brought on by
the need of tracking people that are in the country illegally, and so
we are talking about a one or two percentile of the American public
that would be required to carry this kind of Social Security card. It
might be called an internal passport, which is used in some countries,
in some regimes.
Although there will be denials that this is not a national ID card,
it is hard to figure out what it really is if everybody is going to be
carrying it. There is no limitation on the use to which documents can
be obtained such as a Social Security card, and there is little
evidence, as I remember the hearings, to show that there would be any
reduction of document fraud. As a matter of fact, the Social Security
Deputy Commissioner testified that an improved Social Security card is
only as good as the documents brought in to prove who they are in the
first place. In other words, if a person gets a phony birth
certificate, they can get a good Social Security card. So I am not sure
what the logic is.
Now, Mr. Chairman, I know balancing the budget is still first in the
hearts of the Members of the Congress, and I am here to suggest that
the cost for this Social Security card has been costed out at around $6
billion. The annual personnel costs to administer the new system are
estimated to be an additional $3.5 million annually. The business
sector would be forced to incur significant cost to acquire machinery
and software capable of reading the new cards, and there would be many
hours required to operate the machinery and iron out the errors. This
is to get 1 or 2 percent of the people in this country that are
illegal. I suggest that this may be prohibitive and that perhaps we can
find a more reasonable way to deal with this very serious problem.
Mr. Chairman, may I turn the Members' attention now to the part that
has caused quite a bit of attention in this bill, and that is how we
would deal with the welfare provisions of people who come in to the
country, what the requirements might be to become sponsors. In one part
of this bill, there is a requirement that a sponsor earn more than 200
percent of the Federal poverty income guideline to be able to execute
an affidavit for a family member.
The 200-percent income requirement is discriminatory class action and
would announce that immigration is only for those that can afford
immigration. It would require a sponsor with a family of four to
maintain an income in excess of $35,000 to qualify as a sponsor. That
means that 91 million people in America would not be able to be a
sponsor of a family member for immigration. We may want to consider
that a little bit more carefully.
Mr. Chairman, I would also like Members to know about the
verification system again. The employee verification system was
discussed by the Social Security and the Immigration and Naturalization
Service representatives who conceded that their computers do not have
the capacity to read each other's data, which would completely foil
their worthwhile objective. A recent study by the Immigration Service
found a 28-percent error rate in the Social Security Administration's
database. This verification requirement, therefore, creates huge
possibilities for flawed information reaching employers, which would
then deny American citizens and lawful permanent residents the
opportunity to work. I hope that we examine this in the course of the
time allotted us for this important program.
Mr. Chairman, there is another provision that I should bring to
Members' minds. It is known as immigration for the rich. I do not know
if Malcolm Forbes had anything to do with this or not, but it reserves
10,000 spots for those who are rich enough to spend, to start a
multimillion-dollar business in the United States. In other words, if
someone is rich enough, they would be able to get a place in line ahead
of other immigrants who are waiting, that may not be able to cough up
that kind of money.
There is a problem that we will need to go into about what about drug
pushers and cartel kingpins, people escaping prosecution for their home
country; in other words, overseas criminals who might have a million
bucks and would like the idea of getting out of wherever it is they are
coming from. I think we need to think through this very, very
carefully.
Mr. Chairman, now comes one of my most unfavorite parts of this bill,
and that is the notion that we could bring in foreign workers to
displace American workers for any reason. Case in point, there is a
newspaper strike in its 8th month in the city of Detroit. Knight-
Ridder-Gannett have decided to bust the unions in the newspaper
industry. They picked the wrong city, but that was their decision. The
fact of the matter is that at the Canadian-Detroit border, they have
begun picking up people coming in to work for Knight-Ridder and Gannett
who are not American citizens, nor are they legal immigrants.
We are trying to find out, there is an investigation going on where
they are hearing about they can get jobs by coming across international
borders to gain employment in a company whose own employees are out on
strike. I find that objectionable. I hope that we do not continue the
practice.
{time} 1845
We also have a situation in the H-1B employers in which we find that
they are bringing in even skilled workers. Example: Computer graduates
from India who are displacing American-
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trained computer people. Serious problem, serious problem. I find this
when unemployment is still outrageously high in the United States,
particularly in urban centers where there are areas in which there is
40 percent unemployment easily. So I would like to discuss and look
more carefully at the instances in which American businesses have
brought in foreign skilled workers after having laid off skilled
American workers simply because the foreign workers are more
inexpensively available.
So this program that I refer to as the H-1B program has become a
major means of circumventing the costs of paying skilled American
workers or the costs of training them. That is in the bill; it is
objectionable.
While we are on this subject, I would like to point out, too, there
are a number of people on the Committee on the Judiciary who believe
bringing people into this country has no effect on the employment rates
of people in this country; like, for instance, the more people you
bring in that take up jobs, the fewer jobs there are for people inside
this country.
Mr. Chairman, it is almost like arithmetic. Bring more in, lose more
jobs. Bring fewer in, more jobs are available. That is an immutable law
of arithmetic that does not turn on policy about U.S. immigration
reform.
I would like to make it clear that this particular measure, which has
been pointed out by the Secretary of Labor, who has urged that the
displacement of American workers through the use of the H-1B program
must be faced, and to do this that program must be returned to its
original purpose, to provide temporary assistance to domestic
businesses to fill short-term, high-skill needs. There must be a flat
prohibition against laying off American workers and replacing them with
foreign workers. Is that provision in this bill?
Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. SMITH of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I might
consume.
Mr. Chairman, first of all I would like to respond to some of the
concerns that the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Conyers] shared with us.
Now, the first was that he was worried about the 200 percent poverty
rate level of income that we required of sponsors of immigrants coming
into the country. Let me just say that that provision was in the Senate
welfare reform bill that passed 87 to 12, with large majorities of both
Republicans and Democrats supporting that welfare reform bill.
In addition to that, what this is trying to address is the crisis
that we have in America today where we continue to admit people coming
in under the sponsorship of individuals who are at the poverty level.
So it should not surprise us that as a result of our current
immigration law we have 20 percent of all legal immigrants, for
instance, on welfare; it should not surprise us that the number of
immigrants applying for supplemental security income, a form of
welfare, has increased 580 percent over 12 years.
That is the crisis that we are trying to address by simply saying
someone has to be solvent before they can sponsor an immigrant coming
into the country, when they have to say they are going to be
financially responsible for them.
Another concern mentioned by the gentleman from Michigan was in
regard to the verification program. I just want to reassure him that it
is a voluntary program that is going to be offered as a convenience to
employers for 3 years. If it does not work, we will not continue it.
But the important point here is that, according to the Social Security
Administration, we have a 99.5 percent accuracy rate when all we are
doing is checking the name and the Social Security number of someone to
find out whether they are eligible to work. The whole point of the
verification system, of course, is to reduce the fraudulent use of use
of fraudulent documents, protect jobs for American citizens and legal
immigrants already in this country, and help reduce discrimination at
the workplace.
The error rate that the gentleman mentioned was not an error rate. It
is called a secondary verification rate, and sometimes it ranges from
17 to 20 percent, as was mentioned. But this is just simply showing
that the system works. Those are the times when there was not a person
with the right Social Security number, and in many instances those were
illegal aliens who should not be employed in this country.
Lastly, the gentleman expressed concern or endorsed, which I liked,
the free market approach to labor in this country, but I want to say to
him that that is exactly why I drew up some of the figures I did about
the unskilled in this country, when we continue to allow hundreds of
thousands of individuals to gain entry to our country who do not have
skills and do not have education. As the gentleman said, they are going
to compete directly with our own citizens and own legal immigrants who
are unskilled and uneducated, and that is why we see so often in the
urban areas that wages are depressed and jobs are lost as a result.
Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Wisconsin [Mr.
Sensenbrenner].
Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Chairman, immigration reform, unfortunately,
is one of those hot button issues that politicians use for their own
purposes. However, here on the floor of the House of Representatives,
we should not be politicians, but rather we should be legislators. It
seems to me, we should shoulder the responsibility the Constitution
gives us to determine what our immigration policy should be and to
enact the laws which implement such policy.
H.R. 2202 says our immigration policy should be ``In the National
Interest''--that immigration should benefit the country as a whole.
According to the Roper poll in December 1995, 83 percent of those
polled want a reduction in all immigration and 75 percent want illegal
aliens removed.
H.R. 2202 is a step in that direction.
President Clinton organized a Commission headed by the late Barbara
Jordan to study our immigration policies, to see if the current system
is working, and to make recommendations if it is not.
H.R. 2202
contains over 80 percent of those recommendations--recommendations
which include legal and illegal immigration.
The committee will be asked to vote later on to strike some of the
sections on legal immigration because they, ``don't belong in a bill
about illegal immigration.'' This bill is not about legal or illegal
immigration, it is about our national immigration policy--immigration
in the national interest. A national interest which is impacted by both
legal and illegal immigration.
Unless one supports no border or immigration control at all, then we
have to make choices. This bill makes some of those choices. It chooses
immediate family reunification--minor children and spouses--over
extended family. It chooses skilled and educated workers over unskilled
or uneducated, and reserves jobs at whatever level for those who are in
this country legally.
And, most importantly, it makes the policy decision that people who
are in this country illegally are breaking the law and should leave
without protracted litigation that can go on for years. Let us remember
almost half the illegal aliens in this country arrive legally.
To say that jobs, education, or taxpayer financed programs should be
for those who are in our country legally is not ``anti-immigrant'' or
``isolationist.'' Rather it says that the Congress is finally serious
about regaining control of our borders. Our first priority should be
immigration policies in the Nation's interest not special interests.
Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 2 minutes.
I wan to commend the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Smith] for alleviating
many of my concerns. I find we have some areas in agreement, and I am
delighted to know about them as well.
But I would say that the gentleman is the first person that I have
heard in a long time cite as a reason for supporting an amendment is
that the other body approved of it. That usually gets the amendment in
much deeper trouble than it might otherwise be in.
Now the commission, we are trying to check, and I know Barbara Jordan
perhaps more intimately as a colleague than anyone here since I served
with her on the Committee on the Judiciary, and I do not know if she
would have supported a notion that we had to means test one's family
member to bring them in and that they had to make 200 percent of the
poverty level to get in. In other words, I do not think
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Barbara Jordan or myself would want to tell somebody that is making
1\1/2\ times the poverty level that they cannot bring their children in
because they do not make enough money. That does not sound like Barbara
Jordan to me.
Finally, the voluntary program that the gentleman referred to is
voluntary to employers. It is not voluntary if someone is seeking a job
in the place that the employer may decide to use it. So it is voluntary
to some and involuntary to others.
Mr. BRYANT of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may
consume.
Mr. Chairman, at the beginning of last year the gentleman from Texas
[Mr. Smith], the chairman of the subcommittee, and I, in my capacity as
ranking Democrat on the subcommittee, set about to write a commonsense
immigration bill designated to address very real, very objectively
provable problems with our immigration policy in the United States
today. We set about to write a bill that did not involve Proposition
187 hysteria from the right and did not involve unnecessarily generous
efforts to bring in lots of other people, perhaps coming from the left.
We set about to write a bill that dealt with real problems. We set
about to deal with problems such as this.
Legal immigration, and I am not talking about illegal immigration, I
am talking about legal immigration under current law, resulted, between
1981 and 1985, in 2.8 million people entering the country legally. Ten
years later, between 1991 and 1995, 5.3 million people entered the
country legally, twice as many, and these figures do not include the
3.8 million backlog of relatives of these people who are now waiting to
enter the country when their time comes.
Illegal immigration in 1994 also added to the totals. In that year
1,094,000 illegal immigrants were apprehended and deported.
{time} 1900
How many succeeded in entering the country and stayed is not known,
although most estimates agree it is about 300,000 people. The fact of
the matter is, though, we have an enormous number of people coming into
this county at a very rapid rate.
The basic question that we cannot ignore, and I appeal to those
Republicans who are paying attention to certain businesses that are
anxious to have more folks in here so they can get cheap laborers, and
many Democrats who are concerned about the civil libertarian impact of
this, who are concerned about being fair to people as we have always
done on our side; I say we cannot responsibly avoid the bottom line
conclusion that we have a huge number of people entering the country
legally, and a smaller number but a large number entering the country
illegally, and it is increasing our population very rapidly.
Perhaps the best speech in this debate has already been made on the
rule, when the gentleman from California [Mr. Beilenson], a member of
the Committee on Rules, observed that our current population of 263
million people is going to reach 275 million people in 4 years, more
than double the size of the country at the end of the World War II.
The long-term picture of this population situation is even more
alarming. Our Census Bureau conservatively projects, and I am reading
from his speech, ``that our population will rise to 400 million by the
year 2050, more than a 50 percent increase from today's level, and the
equivalent of adding 40 cities of the size of Los Angeles,'' and so on.
In fact, those are conservative estimates. Many demographers indicate
we will be at 500 billion people by the year 2050.
I would just suggest that not one Member of this body can responsibly
stand on this floor and talk about how to have to balance the budget to
protect future generations or how we have to maintain national security
to protect future generations, and not at the same time recognize that
we must manage the population growth of this country in a responsible
way if we are going to protect future generations. That is simply too
many people. It is a question of quantity, of low many come in here.
Neither the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Smith], nor I harbor the
slightest hard feelings toward those that have the courage and the
gumption to leave home and come into this country. They are the kind of
people with the get-up-and-go that we want. There is no question about
that. The bottom line question, though, is how many people can we have
come in here and still manage the country in a way that our economy
will continue to promise in the future that people who are willing to
work hard can get their foot on the bottom rung of the economic ladder
and climb up into the middle class. We cannot do that with an unlimited
number of people coming into the country year after year after year.
Mr. Chairman, are there things about this bill that I would like to
change? Yes, there are. We have had disagreements. There are a number
of things that I could criticize. I do not like the fact that we did
not, in my opinion, address the H 1(b) problem mentioned by the
gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Conyers], in as effective a way as we
might have. It is improved somewhat in the bill, but the fact of the
matter is we could have done it much better.
We could have said we are not going to let any American jobs be given
up in order to hire folks who are imported for the purpose of taking
their jobs. That is what my amendment would have done. I offered it in
the Committee on Rules and they refused to let us bring it to the
floor. We will deal with that probably on the motion to recommit.
I do not like the diversity program. I opposed it in 1991 when it was
put in and managed to get it cut in half in the current bill. I still
say it is, in effect, a racist program. It is a designed to try to
bring more white folks into the country because somebody does not like
the number of Asians and Hispanics entering the country. I think it is
wrong to have a program like that in the law at all, even if the bill
cuts it in half. I have to say that, like we always do when many bills
come up, we are going to have to go along with some things that we do
not like in order to get a lot of things that I think we need.
I do not agree with the investor portion of the bill either. But we
have to agree on a bill that will reduce the quantity of people coming
into the country. That is what we are all about here tonight. Mr.
Chairman, I strongly urge Republicans and Democrats alike not to vote
to sever the legal immigration changes in this bill from the illegal
immigration changes in this bill. If we do that we are voting to kill
our attempts to reform legal immigration. It is just that simple.
Not a single person who is voting to sever this bill is coming
forward saying, ``if you sever it, we will bring it back to the floor.
We will deal with it later.'' Not one of them wants to deal with the
question of legal immigration. On the contrary, they want to kill it
and eliminate it from the bill.
Think of what that would mean. After eliminating that from the bill,
many people then will be left to march around the floor beating their
breasts talking about how tough they are going to get on illegal
immigration. But illegal immigration amounts to, we think, maybe
300,000 a year; legal immigration amounts to 1 million a year. That is
where the big numbers are. We either deal with legal immigration or we
admit that we are not going to be serious and not going to have enough
courage to deal with the really central problem facing this country in
terms of the number of people that are entering. Please do not vote to
sever illegal and legal immigration.
Mr. Chairman, this bill was written to avoid the extremes. So far we
have done that. If amendments that are offered, such as this foreign
agriculture worker amendment, which neither the gentleman from Texas
[Mr. Smith] nor I support, were to succeed, I could not continue to
support this bill. The fact of the matter is that it is an anachronism.
It was a bad part of our law many years ago. We in 1986 tried to
address that problem. We ended up with amnesty and a variety of other
remedies to solve the problem. Here we are, right back with it again.
Please vote against these extreme amendments. Let us try to keep this
thing in the middle of the road.
I could speak a long time about all the things this bill does. There
is not time in the general debate to do it. I will simply say this: I
wish I could avoid having to deal with this subject.
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It is so sensitive, it is so subject to mischaracterization, it is so
subject to misinformation of people, particularly folks that have
strong views about the needs of their own ethnic communities, and so
easy to imply that those of us who are trying to do something about the
quantity of immigration generally somehow have hard feelings toward
them.
That is not true. I think my record is strong enough over the years
to make clear it is not true. It is not true of the gentleman from
Texas [Mr. Smith] either. I wish I could avoid the subject. But I will
say this: If I did avoid it and I left this House, as I am going to do
at the end of this year, I would look back on this year and know that I
hid from a problem that was my responsibility to solve at a time when I
had a chance to solve it.
I strongly urge my Democratic colleagues and my Republican colleagues
as well to help us pass a constructive bill that deals with the
question of the vast number of people that are coming into the country,
the rapid increase in our population, and preserve a situation in which
folks that are trying to get their foot on the bottom rung of the
ladder can climb that ladder into the middle class without having to
scramble and scrape and fight for jobs with folks that are just
entering the country. That is really what we are all about here.
Mr. BERMAN. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. BRYANT of Texas. I yield to the gentleman from California.
Mr. BERMAN. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding, and for
all his work on this bill. Mr. Chairman, the gentleman indicated it is
very important to get the figures accurate. I agree. I just want to
cite for the Record that I do not think his comments on the level of
immigration during the first 5 years of the 1990's is any where near
the accurate figure.
The Department of State, in a letter dated March 15, last Friday,
responded to a series of questions that I asked, as follows. The first
question was: ``What was the average annual immigration level for the
period 1992 to 1995?'' The average annual immigration level, 1992 being
the first year that the 1990 changes went into effect.
``By immigration level,'' I said in the question, ``I mean the total
of all legal immigration categories, including refugees.''
The answer that the Department of State said was, ``The annual
average immigration level for the period 1992 to 1995, based on total
immigrant admission figures, is about 801,000,'' not 1 million or 1\1/
4\ million, to come to a 5 million----
Mr. BRYANT of Texas. Mr. Chairman, if I may reclaim my time, I think
what I said was between 1991 and 1995 we had about 5 million people
coming into the country. The gentleman's figures does not seem to
contradict that.
Mr. BERMAN. It does. It is substantially less than that. That would
be an average of 1 million people a year. In 1991 it was under the old
law, it was less. The new law, which went into effect in 1992, the
average was 800,000. That is barely over 3 million for those 4 years.
It is substantially less.
I just wanted to clarify the Record. That includes, Mr. Chairman,
refugees as well as all the other legal immigration categories. What it
does not include are about 50,000 legalization categories, which are
people already in this country. I just wanted to indicate that the
Department of State, which has the most accurate records on legal
admissions, indicates the figure is significantly less than 1 million a
year.
Mr. BRYANT of Texas. Of course, I would dispute that it is
significantly less, even if those figures are accurate. We are working
with figures that we have worked with throughout this debate that were
brought to us by the Commission on Immigration that Barbara Jordan
chaired.
The bottomline figure, however, still is the same. The number of
people who are entering the country is enormous, and the biggest number
of people entering the country are in the category of legal immigrants.
The gentleman is advocating, as a number of my friends are, and I
wish they were not, that we sever legal immigration from illegal
immigration, meaning that we leave out, if we take his figures for a
minute, and we leave out the question of 800,000 a year, and I say a
million, we leave out that question, but we get real tough here on
300,000 illegal immigrants that are entering the country.
I would just suggest that it makes no sense to omit legal
immigration. If you are concerned about the rapid growth in our
population, and I did point out that between 1981 and 1985 legal
immigration was 2.8 million, and from 1991 to 1995 it was 5.3 million,
about twice as much, and even by Mr. Berman's figures it would be a lot
more, if not twice as much, the problem is the quantity of people. How
can we not deal with legal immigration if we are going to look at the
problem of quantity of people coming into the country? I say we have
to.
Mr. SMITH of Texas. Mr. Chairman will the gentleman yield?
Mr. BRYANT of Texas. I yield to the gentleman from Texas.
Mr. SMITH of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I just want to say to the gentleman
that his figures are absolutely correct. I am reading from the chart
put out by the INS called ``Immigration to the United States, Fiscal
Years through 1993.'' Of course, in 1993 we had 904,000 admitted; in
1992, 973,000 admitted; in 1991, 1.8 million; 1990, 1.5 million; 1989,
over 1 million. The gentleman is correct, the average has been over 1
million a year.
Mr. BERMAN. Mr. Chairman, if the gentleman will continue to yield,
those figures do not reflect legal admissions through the legal
immigration system. The gentleman is lumping in the legalization
program for people who are already here.
The Department of State administers the granting of visas for people
to come into this country. Their figure is the accurate figure. It is
about 800,000. I do not want to belabor this point. There is a lot I
can say in response, but I will wait for my own time.
Mr. BRYANT of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I would just conclude by saying
even if we took the gentleman from California's figures, my speech
would be identical. I would not change a single sentence in it. We have
to deal with this huge quantity of people. We have to deal with legal
immigration. We cannot just talk about illegal immigrants and try to
scapegoat them. We have to deal with legal immigrants as well.
I would point out the politically potent groups lobby in regard to
the legal immigrant category. The less powerful groups speak for the
illegal immigrant category. So we are being asked to leave out the
biggest numbers, those of legal immigration, and just pound on the
illegal immigrants. That is, in effect, what is going on here. Let us
deal with this subject comprehensively, both legal and illegal. I urge
Members to support this bill, to vote against the more extreme
amendments that might be offered, and let us do what is in the interest
of our country.
Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. SMITH of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman
from Florida [Mr. McCollum].
(Mr. McCOLLUM asked and was given permission to revise and extend his
remarks.)
Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding time
to me.
Mr. Chairman, I rise to strongly support
H.R. 2202, the immigration
bill before us. I have served on this subcommittee and worked with
immigration for all the years I have been in Congress. I cannot think
of any more important immigration legislation to pass than this bill.
Mr. Chairman, I can testify to the fact that the legal immigration
provisions in here are exceedingly important and exceedingly generous,
contrary to what we might hear some other people say. With the
exception of the period of legalization or amnesty that occurred after
the 1986 law, the 3.5 million people that this bill would allow to come
into this country legally over the next 5 years would be the highest
level of legal immigration over the last 70 years. So make no mistake
about it, this is not a restrictionist proposal that has come out of
the committee on legal immigration.
In fact, there are some good features about it, very important
features. We have been skewing the legal immigration so much toward
family reunification and so much toward preferences, such as allowing
brothers and sisters in of those who are here legally, that we have not
been taking in the traditional numbers of seed immigrants who have
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special talents and skills but do not have any relatives here whom we
should, and whom historically this country has and upon whose hard work
we have had the great melting pot and the great energy we have had to
make this economy and this great free market Nation of ours. So I urge
the legal immigration provisions be maintained in the bill and be
adopted.
On the illegal side, the bill has great provisions in it to remedy
defects with the asylum provisions. We have had people claiming
political aslym wrongfully and fraudulently for years now, saying that
they would be harmed by being sent back home for religious or political
persecutions of some sort. As soon as they set foot in an airport they
say the magic words and they get to stay here.
This is wrong. They should not. There should be a summary or
expedited exclusion process to deal with those people, especially those
who do not make a credible claim of asylum when they first set foot off
the plane. This bill remedies the problem, and it sets some real time
limits for applying for political asylum.
Last but not least, it deals with the big problem of illegal
immigration overall. There are about 4 million illegals here today. We
have granted legalization to about 1 million over the last 10 years. We
have 4 million permanently residing in this country today, and we are
adding 300,000 to 500,000 a year. That is too many to absorb and
assimilate in the communities where they are settling. They are
settling in very specific communities, and they are having negative
social and cultural impacts on those communities.
The only way to solve the illegal immigration problem is to cut the
magnet of jobs, which is the reason they are coming. About half are
coming as visa overstays, so no matter how many Border Patrol you put
on the border, you cannot stop the flow of illegals here. The only way
to do that is to make employer sanctions work. That has been a
provision in law since 1986, that says it is illegal for an employer to
knowingly hire an illegal alien.
The reason that has not been working is because of fraudulent
documents, because the employer has not been able and the Immigration
Service has not been able to enforce that law. I am going to offer a
very simple amendment here shortly that is going to go to that problem
on the Social Security card, which will be one of the six cards, one of
the six documents that we will have to choose from when you go to seek
a job, to show that you are eligible for employment after this bill
passes.
I think what we need to do is simply require the Social Security
Administration to make the Social Security card, which is the most
counterfeited document in the country, be as secure against
counterfeiting as the $100 bill and as proofed against fraudulent use
as the passport. It would go a long way to cutting down on fraud and it
would make employer sanctions work.
Mr. BRYANT of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman
from California [Mr. Berman].
(Mr. BERMAN asked and was given permission to revise and extend his
remarks.)
{time} 1915
Mr. BERMAN. First, Mr. Chairman, I want to say both to the gentleman
from Texas [Mr. Smith], chairman of the Subcommittee on Immigration,
and to the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Bryant], the ranking Democrat,
that we do have some strong differences on several aspects of this
bill. But I think the debate undoubtedly during the next couple of days
can get very heated on a subject which is very passionate. I just want
to start out indicating that I have the greatest respect for both
gentlemen from Texas. These are not Pat Buchanan clones sitting on the
House floor that would seek to build walls around this country. Their
proposal, while I think is much too drastic a cut in legal immigration,
still recognizes legal immigration. I do not believe that it is
motivated by racism or xenophobia, and I compliment both of them
because they have become experts in the subject and believe sincerely
in where they are coming from. We just have a fundamental difference.
The rates of immigration as a percentage of the American population
now are far lower than they were at any time in the 19th or early 20th
century, far lower than they were at that particular time. The bill
before us, we will see charts undoubtedly during the debate which will
talk about backlog visas and other visas to try and show that the cuts
are not severe. The fact is the cuts in legal immigration are close to
30 to 40 percent. The backlog visas that are given for the first 5
years or so are essentially to legalize people who are already here,
who are protected under family unity, who came in under the
legalization program. These are people who within the next year or two,
in any event, will be legalized through the normal legalization process
because they will have naturalized and be able to bring in spouses and
minor children.
The harshest part of this bill is it essentially ends, and I say that
advisedly, it essentially ends the right of U.S. citizens to bring in
adult children and parents. It also wipes out any right to bring in
siblings notwithstanding the fact that there are so many people who
have waited so patiently, who have followed the rules, who have
accepted the appropriateness of following the law and waited in line.
This just cuts them off at the knees and says, ``We don't care.''
Why do I say the gentleman from Texas undoubtedly will agree that his
bill wipes out the right to bring in siblings and protects no one in
the backlog so that a person who has been waiting 15 years to come into
this country, if his number does not come up before the effective date
of this law, will be wiped out? But he will argue with me about parents
and adult children. But I think if one reads the bill, he will accept
my view of why I say this bill effectively eliminates that right.
With respect to parents, initially the bill created no guarantee for
parents, and the State Department came in to our subcommittee and said,
and there has never been a bit of refutation of that, that the
spilldown effect from spouses and minor children and the using of those
slots would eliminate every parent from admission for the next 5 years.
So in full committee, the chairman of the subcommittee offered an
amendment to create a floor of 25,000. But along with that floor, the
bill contains provisions to say that that parent has to have come in
where he has already secured a health insurance policy and a long-term
care insurance policy.
I venture to say there are not 10 people in this House of
Representatives that will have long-term health care insurance. Where
you can possibly find it, except for being in Congress, which is not
necessarily long-term insurance, but the fact is I do not know where
you can find it, but if you can find it, the average cost of that kind
of policy is $9,000 a year. With children, the exception to the flat
ban on adult children is unmarried, never married, between the ages of
21 and 25, if they have b
