Howard Berman

Mr. BERMAN

Mr. BERMAN. Mr. Chairman, without accepting the gentleman's assumptions about the worthiness of the bill, I withdraw my reservation of objection.

Mr. BERMAN. I yield to the gentleman from Arizona.

Mr. BERMAN. Madam Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time, and I would ask the chairman to consider one specific thing about one very discrete narrow part of the manager's amendment. In the fantasy world we are in, should this bill ever actually become a law, the issue on the passport violations that the gentleman from Michigan just spoke to, there are limited situations where someone that you and I and everyone around would agree truly was a refugee, with a well-founded fear of persecution, escaping from a politically repressive regime took advantage of some kind of falsified and altered passport in order to escape. The only question I have, as we look at the manager's amendment now, there should be some discretion here in the context of either criminalizing or deportation to allow a situation where that was the purpose; the person met the full test of a refugee and that that not become a basis for deporting him or her back to the regime or incarcerating that person or charging them with a criminal offense.

Mr. BERMAN. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding to me an additional minute. To follow up, I support very strongly the Velazquez amendment, and I am glad that the chairman and the majority support it as well. It is very important. But as I look at the bill, I find an issue that will take a higher precedence than the problem of the backlog in terms of our constituents and in terms of our congressional offices and I think will put that far in the background in terms of things that most bother them, because under the Alien Smuggling and Related Offenses provision of the bill that we will be asked to vote on, anyone who assists, encourages, directs, or induces a person to reside in or to attempt to reside in or remain in the United States, knowing or in reckless disregard of the fact that such person is an alien who lacks lawful authority to reside or remain in the United States, is subject to penalties of up to 5 years in jail if it is not for commercial purposes. If it is for commercial purposes, understandably, it would be tougher sentences. So when a person calls my district office and talks to my congressional staff and says, I was here on a temporary visa, the date passed, I have an immigration petition pending, is there anything I can do? if my office assists that person or suggests that person go see a lawyer and perhaps if my assistant does not call the Department of Homeland Security and tell them to pick that person up, my staffer, potentially, is subject to criminal penalties. Congressional staff do not have congressional immunity. That means I am going to have to do all the casework in my district office. I think we need a little correction of the base bill in this particular area of alien smuggling. We are sweeping very widely here. With that, I urge adoption of this amendment.

Mr. BERMAN. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time. There is an interesting juxtaposition going on between the gentleman's amendment and the base bill. The gentleman says something that I think is very important: we have got to prioritize. The priority in a country where there are 10, 11 million people who are here without status and under this bill and would, therefore, becoming guilty of a criminal offense, he says let us get the 500,000, whatever number it is, who have committed crimes of violence and economic crimes and murder and drug dealing and all these things. And he is right. No one can disagree. That should be the most urgent priority. But in a universe where you have criminalized all 11 million, you have lost our ability to do that. So what is so funny about the argument for the gentleman's amendment is that in the context of this, all 11 million, it is the flip side of where some people have to wear a band designating it and the way of protesting that is everybody wear the band. You have lost your ability to prioritize.

Mr. BERMAN. Mr. Chairman, reserving the right to object, and I do not intend to object, I wanted to simply point out to my friend from Colorado that before he praises this legislation too much, he should make sure there really is a strategy to turn it into a law, because I am very skeptical that you will ever see this bill coming back from here, very skeptical. If I had to bet, I would bet these provisions which you like and which you think make this into an attractive proposition and a serious attempt will never be seen again. I simply want to add one other point: one day I would like you to explain to me how the employee verification system, which I think, like you do, is a critical part of dealing with the problem of illegal immigration, will ever get implemented in the context of 10, 11, 12 million people in this country in unauthorized status.

Mr. BERMAN. I yield to the gentleman from Colorado.

Mr. BERMAN. Madam Chairman, I felt that answer was not totally satisfactory from my point of view. Would somewhere in the context of the language of that provision or the report language indicate that it is not our intent in that situation, with your classic refugee purpose?

Mr. BERMAN. Madam Chairman, further reserving the right to object, in case anyone noticed, the gentleman from Arizona did not support rules which prevented us from discussing maybe the most important issue involved in the context of whether or not to pursue comprehensive immigration reform. Madam Chairman, I withdraw my reservation.

Mr. BERMAN. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time, and I do not oppose the amendment. In fact, I think it should be labeled from ``our lips to God's ears.'' If we say that by a certain date we will stop and Homeland Security will stop, using the chairman's definition, will have operational control so that no terrorists, no illegal aliens, no drug smugglers ever come into our country; if we say that and we say it strong enough, then maybe it will happen. And after we do that, I suggest a bill that says that by a certain date we eliminate poverty, and pass that, and a few other very important goals that I think we all share here.

Mr. BERMAN. Mr. Chairman, I am not in opposition, but I would like to claim the time in opposition.

Mr. BERMAN. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, I congratulate and agree with the notion that no immigration benefit should be given to any alien until all relevant background and security checks have been completed and any suspected fraud related to the granting of such status or benefit has been fully investigated and found to be unsubstantiated. The gentleman from Florida is right. He has said in the context of his comments for this amendment that he believes that is happening now, and he may be right. I do not know that it is not. But all I know is that for my congressional office and for my colleagues' congressional offices, every time our staffs call regarding the processing of an immigration application, we hear there is nothing we can do. We are waiting for the FBI to get an answer. Why the FBI is just choosing the cases our congressional offices do, to hold back on providing information and denying immigration benefits, I do not know. In other words, what you say and what you ask for is correct, but the problem is not so much with the immigrant. The problem is with the bureaucracy. The resources, the leadership to get these terrorist lists, these watch lists, the criminal database up to date so we can get this information in a quick time is very important. I would just like to tell a quick story about the NSEERS program in Los Angeles. They had a registration date for different countries. If you are here from Iran on a nonimmigrant visa, come in on such and such date and register. People did that. Huge numbers of people flocked into the Los Angeles office of INS to do that. The FBI was totally unable to give any clearance to the people who were coming in. Huge numbers of people were held, detained and kept overnight over a weekend thinking they were just going to file a registration form because the FBI could not get the clearance. That is a scandalous way to treated a number of people who came here as refugees fleeing the tyranny of the ayatollah because our bureaucracy failed to provide the answers. So to me the answer here in Homeland Security and the FBI and in the other critical agencies is to get these lists and this other critical information online and accurate and quick so that we can move ahead with legitimate requests for these benefits that should be conditioned on getting that information out. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. BERMAN. Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. BERMAN. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding. I want to understand the state of play. If this amendment goes to a vote, a recorded vote, then am I to understand that the chairman and the Republican leadership has offered a tough bill and now they are asking their colleagues on the majority side to soften the criminal penalties for illegal immigration?

Mr. BERMAN

Mr. BERMAN. Mr. Chairman, parliamentary inquiry.

Mr. BERMAN

Mr. BERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time. Listen to Mr. Kolbe, Mr. Upton and Mr. Hayworth. This rule will bring to the floor a bill which is an insult to the intelligence of the American people and an insult to the intelligence of this body. We can have all kinds of debates; guest worker, no guest worker; birthright citizenship, no birthright citizenship; fence, no fence. These are legitimate arguments to have. But a bill that the Speaker of the House, the chairman of the Rules Committee and the chairman of the Judiciary Committee know cannot solve the crisis of illegal immigration, they know from the start, that they bring up and ask this body to pass in order to tell the American people they are doing something about a problem they know cannot be solved by the bill they are presenting is insulting the intelligence and trying to con the American people. This rule should be rejected for that reason. In this bill is an employer-eligibility system which is a critical component of a comprehensive approach to dealing with illegal immigration. How are you ever going to impose effectively an employer- verification system where every person who is hired and every person who is now working has to be verified by the Social Security Administration when you have 11 million people in this country, almost all of whom are working except for the children, almost all of whom are working in undocumented fashion for an employer, the heart of the perishable fruit and vegetable industry, the heart of a number of other industries in this country, and expect that system to pass. This is a con. There are only two things going on. Mr. J.D. Hayworth is right: Either they expect the Senate to add the program for adjustment of status and guest workers and bring it back to the floor to the squeals of many of the people on the other side of the aisle, or they intend never to see this bill again but say for the next elections that they are solving a problem or trying to solve a problem that they know intellectually and personally and have said over and over and over again in conversations and in the press will not solve the problem. Vote no on the rule. Reject this con, put together a proposal that solves the crisis in illegal immigration, that does something about the national security issues that illegal immigration threatens, that does something about the humanitarian tragedy that now exists, that recognizes the crisis and that provides the solution that the American people are entitled to.

Mr. BERMAN

Mr. BERMAN. Mr. Chairman, I appreciate the gentleman yielding me the time. I am told that the chairman of the committee, I was not on the floor, in his comments after our ranking member spoke said, This shows the difference between the Democrats and the Republicans. Democrats are for amnesty. Republicans are not. I remember back in the campaign in 1968 for President, or one in one of his races for Governor, George Wallace made the comment that, No one was going to out-``seg'' me. Those kinds of charges and that kind of misuse of language is done by people who know that they are trying to fool the American people into thinking they are doing something. This bill will never become law. It may pass this House, but it will never become law for the very reasons that it does not take a comprehensive approach to the problem. The chairman of the Judiciary Committee says it is already illegal to come to this country without permission, without a visa of one kind or another; and he is right. That is why we call them illegal immigrants. And he says, so all we are doing with this bill is dealing with the people who came legally and then overstayed. I guess that is because the first part of it, dealing with the people who came here illegally, has worked so well. That is why every year hundreds of thousands of people are able to cross this border and work in this country. A few do some horrible things. But they come and the law has not made a difference. Unless you take a comprehensive approach, you will never solve the problem. If what the chairman defines as amnesty is amnesty, then George Bush is for amnesty; John Cornyn, the Senator from Texas, is for amnesty; Senator Kyl of Arizona is for amnesty; and the chairman himself by saying that there needs to be a guest worker program eventually is for amnesty, because when the people who came here illegally get to come back into this country, because they have left or they have applied from within this country to work in our fields or our restaurants or other industries that have become heavily reliant on unauthorized workers, we are saying you get to do what you came here to do even though you committed an illegal act. The fact in 1986 was not amnesty. None of the proposals now for a comprehensive immigration proposal include amnesty because they are all based on meeting certain future obligations, paying fines, continuing to work, coming out of the shadows, going through a background, learning whether or not they have committed any criminal acts other than the entrance here. At the heart of why this bill will never become law are the reasons that the gentleman from California (Mr. Calvert) spoke to. In this bill is a very logical employer verification system. It was what was missing from the 1986 bill. It is why the 1986 bill did not work. But everyone knows you can never implement an employer verification system unless you deal with the 11 million people who are now in this country. Because otherwise every grower, every restaurant owner, every hotel, every tourism industry, huge numbers of construction firms are all going to get the answer back on this verification system: the person you have working for you is not here legally; you will have to fire them. They will be closed down. That will never happen. The employers of this country will never let that pass, because this bill will not even allow us to offer an amendment to make it comprehensive, to accept every one of the provisions, some of them to my way of thinking are draconian and over broad, but accept every one of the provisions of this bill and just add that aspect of the bill that can make for a coherent whole. They will not even let us bring that as an amendment. I urge that Members of this House rise above the demagoguery that is going on about who stands for what and oppose this bill until we are allowed the chance to vote for a tough, comprehensive bill that does something real about illegal immigration.

Mr. BERMAN

Mr. BERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to ask my colleagues to join in saluting my good friend Chief United States District Judge Consuelo B. Marshall. Judge Marshall has stepped down from her role as Chief Judge and was honored by the Los Angeles Chapter of the Federal Bar Association on December 6, 2005, for her lifetime commitment to public service. Judge Marshall has devoted her distinguished career to the struggle for civil rights, justice and tolerance for all people. After service as Deputy City Attorney for the City of Los Angeles, and a period with the firm of Cochran & Atkins, she was appointed as a commissioner on the Los Angeles Superior Court where she was assigned to Juvenile Court, Family Court, and Civil law and Motions. In 1976, she became an Inglewood Municipal Court Judge. In 1977, she was elevated to Los Angeles Superior Court Judge and assigned to the criminal division. In 1980, President Jimmy Carter appointed her to the United States District Court for the Central District of California and in 2001, she became the first woman to serve as Chief Judge of that District--an outstanding achievement. Judge Marshall is an exceptional woman whose accomplishments are legion. The Los Angeles County Bar Association recently named Judge Marshall the Outstanding Jurist of the Year. She is also the recipient of numerous other awards, including the Los Angeles County Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Award, the Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity Thomas Bradley Distinguished Citizen Award, the Women Lawyers Association Los Angeles Ernestine Stahlhut Award, the Langston Bar Association Bernard S. Jefferson Jurist of the Year Award, and many more, too numerous to mention. In addition to her professional duties, Judge Marshall generously contributes her time and energy to many worthwhile organizations. She currently serves on the Los Angeles Board of Governors of the Association of Business Trial Lawyers. She served as a member of the Board of Directors for the Weingart Center, a non-profit facility providing health and social services for the homeless, and the Legal Aid Foundation of Los Angeles. She also served on the United States Sentencing Commission's Drug Violence Task Force which was created in an effort to understand the relationship between drugs and violence. Judge Marshall was a well respected and admired faculty member of The Rutter Group and the Trial Advocacy Workshop at Harvard Law School and has lectured extensively in many parts of the world. It is my distinct honor to salute Consuelo Marshall for the exemplary leadership she has shown as a Judge and for her outstanding contribution to the field of law.

Mr. BERMAN

Mr. BERMAN. Mr. Speaker, due to a death in the family, I was unable to vote on H. Res. 571. Had I been present, I would have voted ``no.''

Mr. BERMAN

Mr. BERMAN. Mr. Speaker, due to a death in the family, I was unable to vote on H. Res. 563. Had I been present, I would have voted ``no.''

Mr. BERMAN

Mr. BERMAN. Mr. Speaker, due to a death in the family, I was unable to vote on the conference report for the fiscal year 2006 Transportation-Treasury-Housing appropriations act. Had I been present, I would have voted ``yea.''

Mr. BERMAN

Mr. BERMAN. Mr. Speaker, due to a death in the family, I was unable to vote on the conference report for the fiscal year 2006 Military Quality of Life-Veterans Affairs appropriations act. Had I been present, I would have voted ``yea.''

Mr. BERMAN

Mr. BERMAN. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Let me, first of all, acknowledge that this is an important issue. Danish nationals are eligible for E-1 treaty trader visas pursuant to the Treaty of Friendship, Commerce and Navigation between the United States and Denmark of October 1, 1951. The U.S. and Denmark signed a protocol to the treaty on May 2, 2001, which would grant Danes eligibility for E-2 visas. That protocol is currently before the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee. However, since the Judiciary Committee began insisting in 2003 that trade agreements and treaties no longer contain immigration provisions, the Danish embassy has requested a grant of E-2 privileges through the normal legislative process. H.R. 3647 would grant those privileges to Denmark. I support that grant of such privileges and therefore support H.R. 3647. Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. BERMAN

Mr. BERMAN. Madam Speaker, if the gentleman will yield, that right is very specifically protected in the Constitution.

Mr. BERMAN. Madam Speaker, if the gentleman will yield, the other irony is, here we bash the court for not creating a new constitutional right, never before proclaimed in the context of this resolution, in order to overturn a local school decision and, at the same time, we whip bills through here left and right stripping the courts of jurisdiction to decide the cases.