John Conyers

Mr. CONYERS

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment. This Norwood No. 65 amendment includes a number of provisions of the CLEAR Act; and in addition to giving State and local police the same authority to enforce immigration laws as a Federal agent, the provisions do not require, as a matter of fact limit, the amount of training that they could receive in order to enforce these rather technical provisions. Moreover, the provisions require the entry of millions of civil immigration law violators into the National Crime Information Center, an FBI database of those who are wanted; and these entries go on thousands of times each day. I am just wondering if my colleague, the author of this amendment, is aware of the incredible complexity that he is suggesting now be included in this measure. If these categories were limited to wanted criminals, that would be one consideration. However, the list includes millions of people with technical status violations that are fluid and easily remedied, and we would be creating, I think, in my judgment, an administrative nightmare. We have a lot of examples. But let me just close by saying that local police have more than enough work to do hunting down the people that are law violators. But entering the names of people with minor status problems into a criminal database would overwhelm it and mix those who may be legal and those who are not criminals with the rest who are. It exposes to liability for unlawful arrests. It discourages immigrants from working with local law enforcement. And those are the reasons I have serious reservations about this amendment. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the distinguished gentleman from California (Mr. Berman).

Mr. CONYERS. Madam Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Madam Chairman, the problem about fraud in this program is that people apply multiple times when the rules only allow one application a year per person. In some cases, multiple applications are the result of people trying to cheat the system; but in other cases, people may apply not understanding that, unlike many other lotteries, multiple applications are not allowed and do not really improve your chances. The State Department has already addressed this in several ways. This program, I want to emphasize to the membership, is extremely valuable for those countries that have so very few people coming in under the regular system, and I would not want us to take this out of the present law. It is working well. We have had many success stories, and we think that there is not a serious history of fraud in the program.

Mr. CONYERS. I yield to the gentlewoman from California.

Mr. CONYERS

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I yield 4 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Zoe Lofgren), a distinguished member of the Judiciary Committee, the head of the California Democratic delegation.

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman I yield 2 minutes to the courageous gentlewoman from California (Ms. Lee).

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, will the gentlewoman yield?

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, could we begin this discussion amongst ourselves by distinguishing between earned legalization and amnesty? Earned legalization is not a free lunch. Those working under this program will have to work for years in the United States to gain citizenship. They are here. They work. They pay taxes. They raise their families. And that is one legitimate plan. What does someone have here for an alternative? The bill before us does nothing about the 11 million people who are already here. And, by the way, is the President of the United States supporting an amnesty program? I do not think so. I thank the gentlewoman for yielding to me.

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Ladies and gentlemen, let me say from the outset that we on this side, the Democrats, believe that a strong border security policy is an absolute necessity for this Nation. We must ensure that terrorists cannot lurk in the shadows of our society and do us harm. Let us begin with that. Now, if you will look at the dissenting views in our report on this measure, there may be 20 to 40 different reasons that we do not like the bill. So rather than take all that time up, what I want to talk about is the one that offends me the most, and that is the criminalizing of unlawful presence. Now, this, alone, should turn away a majority of the House. There are roughly 11 million undocumented individuals in the United States who, under sections 203 and 201 of this bill, would be subject to mandatory detention if convicted of a crime of being unlawfully in the United States. First time in history. Are you ready for this? These individuals would be mandatorily retained without regard to whether the person is a flight risk or poses any danger. Re-entry after removal would also be another aggravated felony, and these provisions would result in a permanent bar to re-entry and no chance of a waiver whatsoever. Now, criminalizing unlawful presence by an incarceration of more than 1 year is, to me, over the top. Millions of immigrants could be impacted and would suddenly be unable to apply for relief if they had been convicted of unlawful presence. Any immigrant who overstayed a visa and was convicted would be permanently barred from any form of immigration relief. Families who have been living and working in the U.S. for years would suddenly be ineligible for immigration relief that they would otherwise be able to receive. Virtually anyone who overstayed a visa could be guilty of an aggravated felony and thus ineligible for release. Now, the last thing I want to mention before I reserve the balance of my time is to state what we do need. And I have taken a little time to come around to this. We do need a program for the 11 million people in this country who are out of status to a system of earned legalization. This is the only rational solution that I can bring to you today, my colleagues. The President of the United States, who I seldom quote, has said that without a comprehensive approach that includes earned legalization, we will not solve the problem. Otherwise, these millions will remain in this country, in the shadows; and we will not know what they are doing and who they are and where they are going. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Linda T. Sanchez), one of our dedicated members on the Judiciary Committee and a leader in the Hispanic Caucus.

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Farr). (Mr. FARR asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Berman), a senior member of the Judiciary Committee. (Mr. BERMAN asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance of the time. This debate has a peculiar forgetfulness about where we are. The Republicans have been in control for 5 years, and we keep hearing about what is wrong: There is not enough personnel; there is not enough equipment; we are giving people tickets and letting them go; the whole program is horrible. Would you explain to me why it has not been corrected before now, and you offer now criminalizing up to 11 million people as a solution? This doesn't make sense. But, folks, hang on to your hats because tomorrow it could get worse. The distinguished Rules Committee has proposals before them. We do not know what we will get on the floor. Citizenship for people born in the United States, just because their parents were born somewhere else, forfeiture of church property if they provide shelter for illegal immigrants, jail sentences for priests or nuns who help illegal immigrants get food or shelter; these are serious Republican proposals for improving immigration policy of which they have complained without letup since this discussion has begun. The Rules Committee takes these proposals up tomorrow, and we may see them on the floor with recommendations that they become part of this bill. We don't need it to get worse to know that we don't need this measure. It's going nowhere, and I hope that somebody feels that they are getting some sound-bites out of this because I feel very badly about this important measure.

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I yield 5\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Gutierrez), the one gentleman not on the Judiciary Committee that has worked with us all year long on this subject matter, who has done noble work for his caucus and for the committee.

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman I yield 4 minutes to the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson-Lee), ranking member of the Subcommittee on Immigration and member of the House Judiciary Committee. (Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)

Mr. CONYERS

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, today I rise to introduce a resolution calling for the observance of Global Family Day, One Day of Peace and Sharing. Everyone in this body is concerned with finding a way to achieve peace. Peace in Iraq, peace in every corner of the world. Many of us have widely divergent views about how to achieve that peace--but I am confident--we all want peace. We all have families back home who are longing for peace in the world and an end to the suffering caused by poverty, disease and hunger. Our friends, our neighbors, our parents and our children, all are hoping that this holiday season can bring more understanding, more generosity, more genuine friendship and caring among people of all faiths and cultures. Perhaps we can't agree on military strategies, or budgets. Perhaps we will remain at odds on many matters when we come back after the holiday recess. But there's one matter on which the Congress agreed in 2000 and which I believe a unanimous Congress can agree upon now. Mr. Speaker, I am today introducing a concurrent resolution which calls upon all Americans to observe Global Family Day, One Day of Peace and Sharing every January 1st. It asks that we use the first day of every year as a time to reach out to others in the spirit of peace, to share a meal, to help the needy at home and around the world. This is a matter that once agreed on by Congress, can lead to greater understanding and cooperation among political parties, faith groups, people of different races and economic class. In other words, it's something that can help us all--and that positive effect can begin during this holiday season. In the year 2000, the Congress adopted a similar resolution asking the president to issue an annual proclamation recognizing this special day, and in 2001, following the tragedy of 9/11, the United Nations General Assembly followed suit. Heads of state in more than 20 countries have personally endorsed the initiative. However, there is little public knowledge that this important tool for peace already exists. Members of Congress can remedy that. We all know how powerful an influence holidays have in our lives. Our earliest memories are often of family gatherings at Thanksgiving, or parades on the Fourth of July. Holidays teach us about the beliefs that our families hold, they inspire us, they reunite us and remind us annually about the ways in which we ought to behave. As we approach the 20th anniversary next year of our national celebration of the life and teachings of Dr. Martin Luther King, I ask that the Congress take the time to ratify once again its recommendation that our increasingly interdependent world celebrate each year with a holiday of peace and sharing that belongs equally to all our human family. Mr. Speaker, many Americans are troubled by our deteriorating image in the world, by the growing disputes among our elected leaders, by the dangers of terrorism and by the suffering of others, both at home and abroad. Yet they feel helpless to do anything about it. Global Family Day provides a way in which every man, woman and child in the United States can help to reduce suffering at home, repair our damaged image abroad, and help us remember that in the end, all peoples belong to the same family. I urge immediate action on this resolution.

Mr. CONYERS

Mr. CONYERS. Madam Speaker, if only what my good friend, the chairman, said was accurate, we would not be here to ask that this measure be turned down and that we pass a 3-month extension, as I have proposed and is in legislative form, so that the PATRIOT Act and intelligence reform would not be stymied. It is like coming to a meeting and we have forgotten all the things that most of the Members on my side of the aisle on the Judiciary Committee agreed with is wrong with the PATRIOT Act, but that we have ignored the fact that many other organizations are not for the PATRIOT Act. Now, what safeguards are being preserved is very interesting for me because the opponents of the PATRIOT Act, including seven States that have passed resolutions opposing parts of the PATRIOT Act and a number of communities that have done so, represent over 62 million Americans. Additionally, numerous groups ranging across all parts of the political spectrum have come forward to oppose sections of the PATRIOT Act and demand that the Congress conduct more oversight, including the American Civil Liberties Union, the American Conservative Union, the American Immigration Lawyers Association, the American Library Association, the Center For Constitutional Rights, the Center For Democracy and Technology, Common Cause, Free Congress Foundation, Gun Owners of America, the Lawyers Committee For Civil Rights, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, the Criminal Defense Lawyers, People for the American Way, and numerous other groups concerned about immigrants' rights. And what about the more than six death penalty additions that have been put into this build with very, very few hearings. Is that something that somebody can hold forward as protecting the rights and improving the PATRIOT Act? I do not think so. And even worse has been the abuse of unilateral powers by the administration where since September 11 our government has detained and abused physically thousands of immigrants without time limits for unknown and unspecified reasons and targeted tens of thousands of Arab Americans for intensive interrogations. All this serves to accomplish, of course, is to alienate many of those Muslim and Arab Americans that would be working with us. So, Madam Speaker, there are two pictures of what happened in the Committee on the Judiciary. One is that the bill was made clearly worse, and we have some 92 pages of dissent about the bill itself, and much of it is still of course valid in terms of the conference report that we are examining today. I urge Members, we have been tricked once, the first time when the bill was substituted, and now we are about to be fooled again if Members do not read our dissents and the reservations that we have about the PATRIOT Act. It can be made better, and we would propose that that is exactly what happen today. Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. CONYERS. Madam Speaker, I yield myself 10 seconds. May I bring to the attention of the chairman of the Judiciary Committee that section 505 of the PATRIOT Act expanded the use of national security letters, so to say they are not in the bill would not be accurate. Madam Speaker, I yield 1\3/4\ minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Eshoo).

Mr. CONYERS. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. (Mr. CONYERS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. CONYERS. Yes, I am, in its present form.

Mr. CONYERS. Madam Speaker, I offer a motion to recommit.

Mr. CONYERS. Madam Speaker, I am delighted to yield 1 minute to our leader, the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Pelosi).

Mr. CONYERS. Madam Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from California (Mr. Rohrabacher).

Mr. CONYERS. Madam Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.