Luis Gutiérrez

Mr. GUTIERREZ

Mr. GUTIERREZ. Mr. Speaker, I want to make an introduction. This is the beautiful island of Puerto Rico. We own it. It is ours. We are responsible for it. The Congress of the United States governs this island. It is our colony, and we rule over it. It is $73 billion in debt. The Supreme Court said: Puerto Rico is a territory . . . belonging to the United States, but not a part of the United States. And, apparently, the responsibility to govern Puerto Rico falls to the Congress and not to the executive branch, because, for the last 6 months or more, I have talked with Obama administration officials at every level about Puerto Rico, and their response has been that they cannot or will not do anything. The message I received loud and clear was anything to help Puerto Rico had better happen in Congress. But there is no sense of urgency in Congress or anywhere else in Washington for real solutions. Puerto Rico's problems are complicated. I am here to say that the Puerto Rican people must begin putting direct pressure on this Congress for action because Puerto Rico's problems are mostly the creation of--you guessed it--Congress. The Jones Act of 1917 made all Puerto Ricans citizens of the United States, just in time for World War I, when 18,000 new draftees were needed. The Jones Act also says that Puerto Rico, unlike any State, can issue triple-exempt bonds, bonds that are free of Federal, State, and local taxes. Illinois can't do that. Neither can your State. But Puerto Rico was specifically written out of U.S. bankruptcy laws by Congress. They cannot declare Chapter 9 or anything else because a special exemption was made. So Congress creates a tax-free bond haven and Wall Street jumps in to buy Puerto Rican debt decade after decade. Puerto Rico has more than 15 times the median bond debt of all 50 States, and bankruptcy is not an option without an act of Congress. And get this: the Puerto Rican Constitution says bondholders must be paid before anything else. Right now, Wall Street is circling the wounded animal like vultures waiting to get their piece; and they are fighting against a bill that would allow Puerto Rico, like any other jurisdiction, to declare bankruptcy because that could move decisions about who gets paid and in what order they get paid into a U.S. Federal court of law. You see, the current situation favors the billionaires and hedge funds because they will get paid before the cops on the beat, the doctors in the hospitals, and the teachers in the schools. Oh, we can't investigate that crime or take down that drug dealer because we have to pay the bondholders on Wall Street first. Now, the same people who cash in on debt in places like Greece and Argentina are lining up to cash in in the Caribbean by stepping up their demands for austerity measures, privatization of utilities, and restructuring on their terms that will make them very, very rich at the expense of the Puerto Rican people. Tomorrow, I will discuss how the Puerto Rican people are being distracted by the promises of statehood by every politician who travels to San Juan or needs the votes of Puerto Ricans in Orlando, Florida. But today, I want to make clear that the sooner the people here realize that the people in this Chamber are the ones who need to take action, the sooner we can make real progress and not get distracted by politics and the pipe dreams of statehood. So for my remaining minute, I want to address the people of Puerto Rico directly in the language they speak at home around the dinner table. (English translation of the statement made in Spanish is as follows:) It is time for everyone to put political divisions aside. I have talked to the Obama Administration and they will do nothing to help Puerto Rico. The bond-holders are lining up to get paid even if the rest of Puerto Rico collapses. Wall Street is buying up Puerto Rican debt so that they can demand austerity measures, tax-breaks, and privatization of industries that will fill their pockets with even more money. Whatever plan is invented in Washington or on Wall Street will not put the needs of the Puerto Rican people first--we all know that. So what is a unified Puerto Rico's plan to move forward? Boricuas must step up right now so that Puerto Rico has a plan for the economy that will create jobs and not just drive young people off of the island to the U.S. on Jet Blue. The only place we can seek help is right here in Congress; we need to make this Congress act. I will talk more about this and the Island's the distraction of the status question tomorrow. But right now I want Puerto Ricans to put their ideas together. Go to my Facebook page--``Rep. Gutierrez on Facebook''--and let's begin working on a plan to get Congress to act. Ya es hora de que todos pongan a un lado divisiones politicas. He hablado con la Administracion de Obama y ellos no van a ayudar a Puerto Rico. Los duenos de bonos estan haciendo fila para recibir sus pagos aun cuando el resto de Puerto Rico se derrumba. Wall Street esta comprando la deuda de Puerto Rico para poder exigir medidas de austeridad, rebajes de impuestos, y la privatizacion de las industrias que llenaran sus bolsillos con mas dinero. Cualquiera que sea el plan de Washington o de Wall Street no pondra las necesidades de la gente de Puerto Rico primero--todos sabemos eso. Entonces, Cual es el plan de Puerto Rico unido para seguir adelante? Los Boricuas deben involucrarse en este momento para que Puerto Rico tenga un plan de economia que pueda crear empleos y no seguir empujando a los jovenes fuera de la isla para los Estados Unidos en Jet Blue. El unico lugar donde podemos buscar ayuda es aqui en el Congreso, tenemos que hacer que este Congreso cumpla. Voy a hablar mas sobre esto y de la distraccion de la cuestion del estatus de la Isla manana. Pero por ahora quiero que los puertorriquenos pongan sus ideas en conjunto. Vayan a mi pagina de Facebook--``Rep. Gutierrez en Facebook''--y empecemos a organizar un plan para hacer que este Congreso cumpla.

Mr. GUTIERREZ

Mr. GUTIERREZ. Mr. Speaker, I was unavoidably absent in the House chamber for votes on July 27, 2015. Had I been present, I would have voted ``yea'' on rollcall votes 467, 468, and 469.

Mr. GUTIERREZ

Mr. GUTIERREZ. Madam Speaker, just a few weeks into his campaign and Donald Trump has a bill on the floor of the House. That is better than some of the Senators he is running against. Donald Trump announces his campaign, saying Mexican immigrants are mostly murderers, drug dealers, and rapists. What is the response from the Republican Party? Do they denounce him? No, they only denounce people when they go after war heroes who ran for President. I denounce him for that, too. Some tried to distance themselves from his comments. Okay. But here we are on the floor of the House passing a bill to jump on the Trump bandwagon, cynically exploiting a family's tragedy in San Francisco to score political points. I have been very clear from day one, despite efforts to spear me by hard-line advocates, that the person, this Lopez-Sanchez, who pulled the trigger in San Francisco should have been deported and never turned over. I have no sympathy for him. I have said it on this floor, and I will say it again today: murderers should rot in hell. The breakdown by the Federal Government--the Federal Government--to deport a known criminal, as they have done before, to keep them in jail, is what led to an American woman losing her life. She was just about the age of my daughters when she was killed. A tragedy, and a preventable tragedy, if the Federal Government had done what it is supposed to do, and preventable if this Congress had done what it was supposed to do and address immigration years ago, as my side of the aisle has been pleading for you to do. But this Republican proposal is not a serious attempt at fixing the problem. Instead of piecemeal measures aimed at maximizing deportation, the long overdue solution is for Congress to enact comprehensive immigration reform that combines smart enforcement at the border and in the interior with a clear plan for reducing the size of the undocumented population in America. We do this by having a modern visa system so people can come with visas and background checks, not with smugglers or overstaying visas and just blending in. We do this by telling millions of people who have never committed crimes: Come forward; admit you are here illegally; go through a background check; and work your way to the right side of the law. Get the millions of immigrants inside the system and on the books so they no longer need to worry about their local police working with or without the deportation system. If you get millions and millions of immigrants inside the law, then the ones who are criminals can't qualify to get inside the law. They will stick out like sore thumbs, not blend in to our communities across America and cause havoc, as they did in San Francisco. But this is very specifically the approach the Republican majority refused to touch with a 10-foot pole because they see demagogues like Donald Trump.

Mr. GUTIERREZ. But this approach of bringing millions and millions of immigrants inside the law so that we can get after the criminals that stick out like sore thumbs outside of the law, this approach is what has been the approach that the Republican majority refuses to touch with a 10-foot pole because they see demagogues like Donald Trump firing up frustrated voters and want to take the easy way out.

Mr. GUTIERREZ

Mr. GUTIERREZ. Mr. Speaker, I was unavoidably absent in the House chamber for votes on Wednesday, July 22, 2015. Had I been present, I would have voted ``yea'' on rollcall votes: 453, 454, 455, 456, and 457. Had I been present, I would have voted ``nay'' on rollcall votes: 450, 451, 452, and 458.

Mr. GUTIERREZ

Mr. GUTIERREZ. Mr. Speaker, I was unavoidably absent in the House chamber for votes on July 21, 2015. Had I been present, I would have voted ``yea'' on rollcall votes 448 and 449.

Mr. GUTIERREZ

Mr. GUTIERREZ. Mr. Speaker, a few weeks ago, I was on the HBO show ``Real Time'' with Bill Maher on a Friday night, and I had a chance to talk with Ann Coulter who, as you might have guessed, I don't have on my speed dial for regular conversations. It was a couple of days after Donald Trump announced he was running for the Republican nomination because he thought Mexican immigrants were criminals, drug dealers, and rapists. When it was my turn, I told Ms. Coulter--and, by extension, Mr. Trump--that what they were saying about Mexican immigrants would serve as a voter registration machine to turbocharge voter registration in the Latino and immigrant community, all because of their particularly mean and--frankly, let's be honest--racist attacks on Mexican immigrants. It was particularly important that I was in California for the show because I was watching the Republican Party make exactly the same mistake they made in the 1990s when it lost control of the politics in California. By supporting extreme anti-immigrant policies to kick kids out of school and cut off families from being part of our society, California went from a purple State that had given the Republican Party important leaders like Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan and, in just a few years, was transformed into a deep shade of Pacific blue. Why? It is because millions of immigrants became citizens; millions of immigrant citizens registered to vote; and millions of registered voters voted to punish the Republican Party for being mean, shortsighted, and for offering demagoguery, not real solutions to issues. This brings me back to Mr. Trump, who is trying to be the standard bearer of the anti-immigrant wing of the Republican Party and trying to define the party as one that will fight against immigrants it sees as murderers, drug dealers, criminals, and rapists. Jan Brewer has endorsed Trump, and there he was, this past weekend, standing with Joe Arpaio in Arizona. Democrats could not paint a clearer picture if we tried. You should understand that, when Donald Trump said Mexican immigrants are criminals, what do I and other Puerto Ricans hear? I hear him saying all Puerto Ricans are criminals; and, as far as the Republicans are concerned, we all are. Millions of others here--Hondurans, Colombians, and Dominicans--it is clear to all of us that what he is really saying is that all Latinos are suspect, whether we were born here or not. Look, Trump's stereotyping is nothing new. Every single wave of immigrants has met the same resistance. They say they are lazy, they are bringing crime and diseases, that they are not like us, and they are coming to kill our sons and rape our daughters. Whether you came to Chicago from Mexico a decade ago or from Mississippi in the 1950s to escape Jim Crow, you heard the same thing. If you came to New York from Ireland or came from Sicily a century ago, it has always been the same thing. I say that Latinos should do what the Irish and the Polish and the Italians did, become citizens and vote. To my constituents and anyone today that is offended by what Donald Trump stands for, I have a simple message: Become a citizen--``hazte ciudadano.'' There are more than 8.8 million immigrants who hold green cards and meet the residency requirements and are eligible to apply for citizenship today. That includes about 5 million Latinos who can apply to become citizens today. Mr. Speaker, let me fill you in on a little secret. With fee waivers, up to 20 percent of all of those 8.8 million will pay absolutely nothing for their citizenship application. Becoming a citizen for free so you can make it clear that you are offended by Donald Trump, it is poetic and patriotic. Rather than renew your green card for $450, become a citizen for about $230 more, or zero if you are part of the 20 percent. Look, Mr. Speaker, almost all of the immigrants in this country are going to remain in this country until the day they die. Let's be honest. For the millions who meet the requirements of citizenship, I say take the step, learn the language, learn our history and how our government works, and take the test. Every time you see Trump's face on your TV, vow to learn a little more English or a few more history facts so you can take the citizenship test. Let's turn the ignorance and the hatred of a TV personality running for President and turn it into something that strengthens democracy for all Americans. You know what, if millions of people naturalize, become citizens, and we add to that the million Latino citizens who this year will turn 18, plus all of our allies in the African American community, the LGBT voters, younger voters, environmental voters, women voters, Asian voters, and union voters that are being pushed away by the Republican Party, all the people they don't want in their coalition constitute a majority of Americans. Together, we are the new American coalition that will dominate politics for decades to come; and together, we will create a stronger, more inclusive, and more egalitarian Nation. Let's turn Trump's negative words into something positive. That is how you deal with bullies and bigots.

Mr. GUTIERREZ

Mr. GUTIERREZ. Mr. Speaker, I was unavoidably absent for the following vote on July 13, 2015. Had I been present, I would have voted ``yea'' on rollcall vote 434.

Mr. GUTIERREZ

Mr. GUTIERREZ. Mr. Speaker, I was unavoidably absent in the House chamber today because I was at the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals hearing in New Orleans, LA, on President Barack Obama's immigration executive actions. Had I been present, I would have voted ``nay'' on roll call vote 431. I would have voted ``yea'' on roll call vote 432 and in favor of the Lee/Schakowsky/Clarke Amendment which would have struck from the underlying bill controversial policy riders that will undermine a woman's right to choose. This amendment would have protected women's health care choices and was especially vital to low-income and minority women's health. I would have voted ``yea'' on roll call vote 433 in support of H.R. 6, the 21st Century Cures Act.

Mr. GUTIERREZ

Mr. GUTIERREZ. Mr. Speaker, I was unavoidably absent in the House chamber for votes on Friday, July 10, 2015. Had I been present, I would have voted ``nay'' on rollcall vote 431, ``yea'' on rollcall vote 432, and ``yea'' on rollcall vote 433 in support of H.R. 6--21st Century Cures Act.

Mr. GUTIERREZ

Mr. GUTIERREZ. Mr. Speaker, for the record, I am not Mexican, and I am not an immigrant. Given the rhetoric of one of the leading Republican candidates for President, it is important to point that out at the start before I am accused of being a criminal, a drug dealer, or a rapist. To be fair, Donald Trump didn't say that all Latinos or all Mexicans are rapists, just that the vast majority of Mexican immigrants are rapists, drug dealers, and criminals. Clearly, if anyone has firsthand knowledge of Mexican immigrants working in the United States, it should be the owner of a hotel, casino, office buildings, or a clothing line. But Trump doesn't seem to be basing his opinions about Mexican immigrants on personal knowledge. To justify his claims, Trump says that most of the women coming from Central America to the U.S. through Mexico and other countries report being sexually assaulted. On this point, he and I have some agreement. Women and children at the lowest rung of our economic and social ladder are incredibly vulnerable to sexual assault and rape. But the leap from saying that most undocumented women are vulnerable to assault and saying most undocumented men are rapists is, as he might say himself, huge. The documentary on PBS Frontline, ``Rape in the Fields,'' was a powerful expose on how immigrant women toiling in our fields are regularly the victims of rape and abuse because perpetrators recognize how vulnerable immigrant women are. They are afraid to talk to the police, afraid they will be deported, and afraid they will lose their children. And this fear to report crimes makes us all less safe. Yes, the rape and abuse is sometimes perpetrated by other Latino immigrants, perhaps even Mexicans, but these crimes are also committed by men of all colors and national origins, including red, white, and blue Americans. So when Donald Trump says on CNN, ``Well, someone is doing the raping,'' as further evidence that we should be building a big wall so he can plaster his name on it and keep immigrants out, I think it is pretty clear The Donald misses the point. The question is: How do we create an immigration system that protects us from criminals and that allows people to come with visas and not smugglers so that their work is honored, safe, protected by our labor laws? How do we make sure that these workers who contribute so much to America's economy are not afraid to dial 911 and report wage theft or assault when someone, anyone, is threatening them or their families? Now, the anti-immigration wing of the Republican Party in this body and on the air is saying that Trump may have a point. After all, a beautiful, innocent woman was shot in cold blood by a Mexican immigrant in San Francisco just last week. Why wasn't he deported? Why wasn't he held in jail the last time? And you will actually hear this on FOX News: Why is President Obama letting Mexicans kill beautiful young American women? As the father of two daughters about the age of Kate Steinle, the young woman who was shot and killed, I pray every night that no one of any racial or ethnic background ever does my daughters harm, and I can only imagine the grief that her family is feeling. When we have felons in Federal custody or State or local custody with warrants for drug crimes who are deported multiple times and come back, this Congress has not done its job, unfairly leaving States and localities to cope with decades of inaction on immigration, criminal justice, and a range of other issues. I have no sympathy for the man accused in this crime. Murderers should rot in hell. So if we had a system that allowed people who have lived here a long time, contributed productively to American society, and who have children and other deep roots in the United States, what if we allowed them to come forward? What if we made them pay for their own criminal background checks, fingerprinted them, made them prove their identity, and check on them every so often to make sure that they are not gaming the system or committing crime? What if we had a system where people came here legally in the first place, if they could prove their identity and that they had no criminal background? I argue that such a system would allow us to reduce significantly the number of people who are in this country without legal status. It would shrink the size of communities where many people are undocumented, where people are afraid to call the police so that criminals find it easy to blend in and not stick out. Such a system would allow us to concentrate our enforcement and deportation resources on real criminals who should be jailed and then thrown out and kept out. I argue that such a system would make it harder for criminals to hide and easier for honest, hard-working folks to contribute to their communities without fear. Unfortunately, that is exactly the system that some Republicans have been fighting against. When a hotel and casino owner gets on his high horse about Mexican immigrants, about crime, rape, and murder, let's think about who is standing between the United States--this country, the one that we love and we have sworn to protect--and a modern immigration system based on common sense, compassion, and, yes, the rule of law.

Mr. GUTIERREZ

Mr. GUTIERREZ. Mr. Speaker, I was unavoidably absent for the following votes on July 7, 2015. Had I been present, I would have voted ``yea'' on rollcall votes 390 and 391. Personal Explanation

Mr. GUTIERREZ

Mr. GUTIERREZ. Mr. Speaker, I was unavoidably absent in the House Chamber for votes on Tuesday, June 23, 2015. I would like the record to show that, had I been present, I would have voted ``nay'' on rollcall vote 376, ``yea'' on rollcall vote 377, and ``yea'' on rollcall vote 378.

Mr. GUTIERREZ

Mr. GUTIERREZ. Mr. Speaker, you are in the presence of greatness. No, not me, but I am flattered if that was your first thought. Rather, I speak of my excellent grandson, who has come to Washington and to the floor of the House of Representatives to see his grandpa at work. Tonight, Luisito, who is 12, will be my escort, along with his grandma, at the annual White House picnic for Members of Congress and their families. It would take way more than the allotted 5 minutes to enumerate all of the reasons for this grandfather's pride, so let me just say I am looking forward to showing him off at tonight's gathering. But more than tonight's picnic, what I am really looking forward to is Father's Day. This Sunday, in Chicago, along with Luisito, my grandson, I will be with his dad and my daughters, who always make the old man feel loved. And this Father's Day, I will be especially thankful for being allowed to have my family around me, because on Monday, I will be visiting with hundreds of children who cannot be with their dads. On Monday, I will be joining seven of my colleagues in San Antonio to visit the two largest family detention facilities in the country. Karnes and Dilley are where moms and their children are being kept behind bars awaiting resolution of their immigration cases seeking asylum. Remember a year ago when tens of thousands of children and young people were fleeing violence in three countries in Central America? The Republicans thought that these children would bring this country to its knees, and anti-immigration groups organized mobs to protest and keep children out of detention facilities in their communities. Do you remember that? Well, many mothers with small children were also fleeing to the U.S. last year, and they are still being held in detention facilities, which are operated by private prison companies in Texas and Pennsylvania. They are detained for the completely lawful act of seeking asylum. My colleagues and I are going to see firsthand what is going on. The minority whip, Mr. Hoyer, and two of my closest allies on the family detention issue, Ms. Lofgren and Ms. Roybal-Allard, both of California, are going, and we will be hosted by our colleague from Texas, Mr. Castro, as we visit the two facilities. I am sure that Immigration and Customs Enforcement personnel, and even private companies who are contracted to run the facilities and profit from the incarceration of other people, are trying their best to make the conditions of detention for these moms and kids as humane as they can. But, you see, that misses the point. We shouldn't be holding vulnerable women and children in detention. We have mothers and small children living in jail-like facilities with uncertain futures, limited access to legal counsel, and this has been going on for some time, for almost a year for some of them. Even with schools and laundry and TVs, they are still being held behind fences. Moms still have to explain to the youngest children that, no, in fact, they do not know when they can leave or whether they will be deported back to the violent countries they fled after months in detention. Children who face trauma, gangs, murder, and sexual assault in their neighborhoods were forced to leave alone or in groups or with a parent. They faced all sorts of dangers--smugglers and predators--on the journey to northern Mexico, where we know assault, robbery, and rape are commonplace. Then they crossed the U.S. border, often with the guidance of additional smugglers and criminals, and, following the process in the U.S. law, presented themselves to authorities to request asylum. Now, because we have not put money into our immigration court system and, by the way, because we have not created ways for people to come here with visas instead of smugglers, we are all paying a higher price to house and feed moms and kids when much cheaper monitoring and supervision options are available. Why? The government feels that imprisoning these children and moms, even in relatively humane conditions, will be a deterrent to others. But 136 House Democrats, including all 8 Members traveling to Texas on Monday, have asked the Secretary of Homeland Security to end the practice of holding moms and children in detention when there are other ways to get the job done. The children are paying the highest cost. It doesn't take a developmental expert to know that weeks and months in detention in prison-like conditions, having already lived through weeks and months and years of desperation, are not conducive to good child development. But with my Republican friends, it is usually not the human cost that matters. So let me break it down another way. At $343 per person per day, we are spending $125,000 per detainee per year--$125,000. But the alternatives to detention we could be using cost about $5.50 a day, or about $2,000 a year. That is cost savings logic that even in Washington we can understand. Mr. Speaker, regardless of how you feel about the funding and regardless of how you feel about immigration or policy issues, Central America, or any other issues, you cannot lose sight of the fact that we are talking about children. As a father, I will not be able to look at those children without seeing my grandson, and they are probably a lot like your children and grandchildren, too. I am going to Texas for myself to see these women and children we are holding, and I encourage my colleagues to do the same.

Mr. GUTIERREZ

Mr. GUTIERREZ. Mr. Speaker, this past weekend and all day on cable news ever since, we watched a police officer in McKinney, Texas, wrestle with a 14-year-old teenager after what was reported to be a pool party. He throws her to the ground, pulls his gun out and points it at some other kids, screams at her, and then sits on the teenager, who is in her bikini, for a period of time. This is the latest installment of the hit cable television news story of the last year or more called ``Cops Behaving Badly Caught on Tape.'' This version was not the most deadly, although there have been versions of this story that end in death. It has caused a lot of hot air on radio and TV. Some of it is constructive, and some of it is just offensive. But has it caused a more serious discussion of police and communities of color? Has it sparked a more serious discussion about how teenagers and police interact or should interact? I hope so, but I kind of doubt it. Recently, I met with a young man from Chicago who made a real impression on me. He is from the Phoenix Military Academy, a smart teenager. He is going to go places. He said: You know what, Congressman? I have taught myself strategies to deescalate the situation whenever I come in contact with police. Did you hear that? A teenager feels he needs to teach himself ways to deescalate tensions with adult police officers. We are apparently leaving it up to our teenagers to figure out ways to deal with the police, which is precisely backwards from how things ought to be. What the videotape from Texas and the comment from my young friend at Phoenix Military Academy in Chicago have in common is that there does not seem to be any communication between adults on the police side and young people in our community, who the police are sworn to protect. Instead of a cooperative relationship between teenagers and adults who are there to protect them, there is an adversarial relationship. A couple of weeks ago, I looked around while I was at a Judiciary Committee hearing on policing strategies in the 21st century, and all I saw were people who were 50, 60, and 70 years old. There were no young people called to testify, to tell us what they face, how they feel, and what we, as adults, should do to help them. Very few of us are former or current law enforcement. And while all of us are former teenagers, still, for most of us, it has been quite awhile since we were a teenager, and our experiences may not be all that typical of what young people and the police face today. I hope adults like me in places of influence and authority can be helpful in creating the conditions where avenues of communication are created, but a 3-hour hearing with political undertones and more than a little grandstanding is not nearly enough. Almost every city in America is one bad incident, an overzealous policeman, or a videotaped moment of stupidity or hatred away from a riot. Michael Brown, Eric Garner, Walter Scott, and Freddie Gray are names we know, but knowing their names is just not enough. We need a sustained effort from Congress and from every institution in our society to address the chasm between young people, and especially young people in communities of color and the police hired to keep them safe. And let's remember, while the country was transfixed with a video of the cop, the teenagers, and the pool party in Texas, two of my constituents were shot and killed this past weekend in Chicago. They were among 5 dead in Chicago and among 27 people shot from Friday to Monday. At least 5 people were killed and 25 others were shot in and around Chicago the weekend before; 12 dead and 56 were wounded over the long Memorial Day weekend. Knowing the names of Sandy Hook, Newtown, and Columbine are not enough when Baltimore, Chicago, and other cities are also losing young people--mostly young people--at this rate. It goes beyond police practices and the easy availability of guns, but that is part of it. When legislators spend more time making guns easier to carry and stand-your-ground laws make murder wraps easier to beat, our priorities are skewed. It goes beyond racial profiling, but that is part of it. When 84 percent of sobriety checkpoints in Chicago are set up in Black and Latino neighborhoods so that cops can stop anyone who drives by, that sends a message that is destructive. It goes beyond economic opportunity, but that is also part of it. Honestly, we do not spend much time in this Congress thinking about how we help 10- and 12-year-olds know that a bright future is possible for them. We do not do much for children to help them achieve their future, but instead we cut things like Head Start and spend more and more money on jails. Listen, in America, we must change the conversation so that we as a nation are working together to help make sure the next generation lives to adulthood first. We need to stop talking so much about what protects us from those kids and start talking more about what we as adults are going to do to protect those kids from the world we have created for them.

Mr. GUTIERREZ

Mr. GUTIERREZ. Mr. Speaker, I was unavoidably absent for the following votes on Thursday, June 4, 2015. I would like the record to show that, had I been present, I would have voted ``yea'' on roll call votes 301 and 308, and ``nay'' on roll call vote 307.

Mr. GUTIERREZ

Mr. GUTIERREZ. What does that bumper sticker say? ``Don't mess with Texas.'' Well, I am about to not follow that advice. You see, Texas has put itself front and center in the national debate over immigration and is leading the way among the 26 States suing the Federal Government to stop the lawful and sensible executive actions introduced by the President. The court case that has gotten so much national attention is Texas v. The United States. The 25 other States with Republican Governors and attorneys general who are suing the country play second fiddle to Texas. A week ago, in the Fifth Circuit in New Orleans, a three-judge panel issued a split decision. They did not issue a stay to the injunction of the President's executive actions imposed by a lower court, you guessed it, in Texas. Two out of three judges ruled that Texas would likely be found to have standing to bring the lawsuit because Texas would have to issue more driver's licenses to long-term Texas residents. Now, please note that we are not talking about free driver's licenses. We are talking about driver's licenses at the same cost everyone else pays. As a matter of fact, they could raise the price of the driver's licenses. Somehow, having more licensed drivers who can drive legally in Texas and across the country and who know the rules of the road is an unreasonable burden on the State of Texas, according to the politicians who run the State. So Texas is holding up the implementation of the program around the country for as many as 4 million people who live in American families. Who would these licensed drivers be? They would be immigrants who have U.S. citizen children. They would have lived and worked in American neighborhoods for years, shopped at the same grocery stores, and taken their kids to the same parks and schools as citizens do. They would have submitted their fingerprints for a criminal background check at their own expense. So while most Americans no longer believe we should be trying to deport all 11 million undocumented immigrants, and especially not those with deep roots in the U.S. with families, the politicians who run the State of Texas believe we should. Lived in the U.S. for 5 years or more? 10? 15? Driving to work anyway? Own a business that employs citizens? Too bad. The Republican leaders in Texas do not want you to be able to work on the books, pay your full share of local and Federal taxes, and pay for a driver's license so you could drive legally. No. That would be a burden. Reality and Texas should really get to know one another. Now, let's remember that this is the same set of Texas politicians-- including the Governor and some Republican Members of Congress--who are reluctant to tell some of their voters that no, in fact, President Obama does not have a secret plan to use Walmart department stores as internment camps for gunowners, which is the latest conspiracy theory promoted by Chuck Norris. We can all get a chuckle about Operation Jade Helm--the alleged U.S. military invasion of Texas--but it is not as funny when we begin to realize that for many Republicans in the Republican Party in Texas, crazy is a constituency that must be dealt with delicately. So I want to end by speaking directly to the millions of families who are waiting for Texas politicians and judges to stop the delay tactics. And I will use the language many of them speak and which God understands as well, or at least I assume he speaks Spanish because he named his only son Jesus. I will summarize my remarks first in English. The message is that we will not give up hope and cannot stop pushing for the implementation of the President's executive actions just because politicians have prevented something important from happening-- again. That is why I am inviting people in Chicago to join me on Saturday in Little Village so we can renew our commitment to prepare ourselves for DACA and DAPA. (English translation of the statement made in Spanish is as follows:) Don't give up. There are Republican politicians in Texas and elsewhere trying to block our way towards implementation of DACA and DAPA and they want us to lose heart, lose patience, and lose our resolve. But we must stay strong and prepare ourselves and our brothers and sisters and our neighbors to be ready when--eventually--the court rules in favor of America's immigrants. I will continue fighting and I need your help. If you live in Chicago come join us on Saturday morning in Little Village at Iglesia Santa Inez de Bohemia. And wherever you live, continue fighting and preparing your neighbors and yourselves to keep our families together and make sure we are not deporting those who are assets to our country. No se rinden! Hay politicos republicanos en Tejas y en otros lugares tratando de bloquear nuestro camino hacia la implementacion de DACA y DAPA y quieren hacernos perder la esperanza, perder la paciencia y perder nuestra determinacion. Pero hay que permanecer fuertes y preparandonos a nosotros mismos, a nuestros hermanos y hermanas y a nuestros vecinos para estar listos cuando la corte finalmente resuelva a favor del Presidente y de los inmigrantes en Estados Unidos. Voy a seguir luchando y necesito su ayuda. Si usted vive en Chicago venga y unase a nosotros el sabado en la manana en la Iglesia de Santa Ines de Bohemia en La Villita. Y dondequiera que ustedes vivan, sigan luchando y preparando a sus vecinos y a ustedes mismos para mantener a nuestras familias unidas y asegurarnos de que no estemos deportando aquellos que son un gran valor a nuestro pais.

Mr. GUTIERREZ

Mr. GUTIERREZ. Mr. Chair, I was inadvertently absent in the House chamber for a vote on Wednesday, June 3, 2015. Had I been present, I would have voted ``yea'' on rollcall vote 276 in support of the Nadler Amendment to remove language in the underlying bill to prohibit the use of funds to transfer or release detainees held at Guantanamo Bay. Amendment Offered by Mr. Farr

Mr. GUTIERREZ

Mr. GUTIERREZ. Mr. Speaker, I was unavoidably absent in the House chamber for votes on Monday, June 1, 2015. Had I been present, I would have voted ``yea'' on roll call vote 264, ``yea'' on roll call vote 265, and ``yea'' on roll call vote 266. Finally, I would have voted ``nay'' on roll call vote 267 in opposition to H.R. 1335, the Strengthening Fishing Communities and Increasing Flexibility in Fisheries Management Act.

Mr. GUTIERREZ

Mr. GUTIERREZ. Mr. Speaker, the voting was going on for months spearheaded by the Women on 20s campaign. A nominee was announced last week. Women on 20s is a campaign that has been agitating to have a woman's portrait, the portrait of a great American woman, placed on the $20 bill by at least 2020, the 100th anniversary of the U.S. recognizing a woman's right to vote. The Women on 20s campaign narrowed down their nominees for this honor to four women: Wilma Mankiller, a trailblazer and first woman chief of the Cherokees; Rosa Parks, credited with starting the Montgomery bus boycott by not relinquishing her seat and sparking the modern civil rights movement in 1955; Harriet Tubman, an abolitionist born a slave who became one of the most noted conductors on the Underground Railroad; and Eleanor Roosevelt, who redefined the role of First Lady while being a noted civil rights and human rights activist in her own right. More than 600,000 votes were cast in an online poll, and the winner announced with great fanfare last week is Harriet Tubman. I am overjoyed that this great American leader was selected. As the author of Put a Woman On the Twenty Act of 2015, H.R. 1910, I think matching a specific person with a specific biography will sharpen the focus of this remarkable grassroots effort to put a woman's face on our currency. My legislation does not limit the idea of putting a woman on our money to Harriet Tubman or any particular nominee. It instructs the Secretary of the Treasury to convene the citizen panel that will make recommendations and get it done. From my perspective, as we see women breaking barriers at every level of our society and as we see people of color breaking barriers at every level of our society, our money ought to more accurately reflect who we are as a nation in the 21st century. I am not saying that Andrew Jackson or any of the men we honor on our money are not worthy. Many of our Founding Fathers made important contributions to this country which we continue to enjoy today in the United States and throughout the world by the spread of democracy. It is also true that part of our history includes the practices and decisions we certainly are not proud of as a nation. Let's be straight: President Jackson was, for many, a war hero, a great defender of the young American Republic and, really, the first President and founder of the Democratic Party. He oversaw our Nation as it expanded west. It is the expansion of this Nation, the manifest destiny that pushed settlers west, that pushed the institution of slavery west, and that pushed the extermination and forced migration of Native peoples west. That is precisely the nexus of Andrew Jackson and Harriet Tubman and illustrates why putting a new face on our money makes so much sense. The forced removal of Native peoples from their lands so that we could expand the practice of slavery is at the heart of Andrew Jackson's legacy. The landgrab and the Trail of Tears of the Cherokee people is key to contextualizing President Jackson. It was when Harriet Tubman was about 6 years old that Jackson became President. She was born a slave in Maryland and eventually walked to freedom in Pennsylvania. She went back again and again, at least 19 times, telling more than 300 former slaves how to follow the Big Dipper constellation that pointed to the North Star and the way to freedom to the north. She was an agitator. She was a subversive. She used the tools of social change to improve America. She fought for the little guy against the strong guy. She was willing to put herself at great risk to ensure justice for others. She was a woman, and she was Black. In other words, she is an ideal American. The other women honored as nominees by the Women on 20s campaign were also great Americans. They were also subversive troublemakers, agitators, and, therefore, exactly the kind of people I think we need on our currency. But Harriet Tubman, because she is a woman, because she is a woman of color, because she fought for freedom and for a better America in the face of this Nation's greatest and, for many like me, still unresolved sin of slavery and racism, because she turned the tide of history for the better, she is very, very worthy of this great honor. In a few years, maybe in a few months, we will all wonder why it took so long to put an American woman on our $20 bill. Well, it shouldn't take so long. Members of this body, Mr. Speaker, have the ability to do something about it and speed this process along. Cosponsor the Put a Woman on the Twenty Act of 2015. It is H.R. 1910. Join me in calling on the Secretary of the Treasury to do this, whether it is Harriet Tubman or anyone else that a fair and open process arrives at. Let us stand as a Congress to put a great American woman on our money.

Mr. GUTIERREZ

Mr. GUTIERREZ. Mr. Speaker, later today, the House will consider amendments to the National Defense Authorization Act. That is the bill that tells the military what to do with all the money we give them. In the committee of jurisdiction over the military, the Democrats and Republicans whose job it is to examine these issues voted to include two studies of how immigrants are or are not included in military recruitment. Republicans are in the majority, so on the Republican-led Republican majority committee these two amendments won their votes and were added to the bill. The Gallego and Veasey amendments were included. But no matter how many times Republican leaders have appeased the hard-liners on the fringes of their right flank--to disastrous consequences, I might add--they have chosen to capitulate one more time and ruled last night that amendments can be stripped from the bill today, these two reasonable amendments. It is another glaring example of why the Republicans, from their Presidential nominee all the way down to their local government candidates, are in very, very deep trouble when it comes to the immigration issue. One amendment simply asked the Secretary of Defense to study the impact of letting immigrants who grew up for years in the United States, who have passed a criminal background check, and who have a legal work permit to be in the United States; it asked the Secretary to study whether including them in military recruitment would help diversify our military. A study. The second did not call for any action or any study at all. It simply said it is a sense of Congress that the Secretary review whether recipients of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals be allowed to serve in the military. It is kind of telling the top brass: This is what we think you might want to do. That is the program where 700,000 young immigrants came forward, got right with the law, and got a work permit after they passed a criminal background check. But do you know what the Secretary of Defense ``reviewing'' something is, when it comes to the hard-liners? Do you know what ``studying'' something related to immigrants who have deferred action is to the nativists? Do you know what the contingent of hardcore anti-immigration guys in the Republican Conference started shouting? You guessed it? The A word. Amnesty. I have the language right here: ``It is the sense of the House of Representatives that the Secretary of Defense should review section 504 of title 10.'' And they yelled: Amnesty, amnesty, amnesty. Members of Congress from Alabama to Iowa to Texas began throwing around the amnesty attack. It is a backdoor amnesty, they said. We shouldn't ``reward'' illegal aliens who want to risk their lives to defend their adopted country when we have red-blooded Americans who want to fight and die. Breitbart, in one article a couple of days ago, used the word ``amnesty'' 20 times in less than 1,400 words while ticking off the Members of the House of Representatives who might lose elections to more anti-immigrant candidates if the two studies are allowed to be included in the defense bill. This all reminds me of the story of the Little Mouse. I used to read it to my grandson, Luisito--the same story you probably read to your kids and grandkids. It goes like this. If you give a mouse a cookie, he is going to ask you for a glass of milk. And if you give him a glass of milk, he is going to ask for a straw. Anything you give the little mouse is going to lead to a newer and bigger request. That is what it must feel like to Speaker of the House Boehner with his nativist wing of his party. If you give them 30,000 more border patrol guards, Mr. Speaker, they are going to ask you for more deportation. If you give them a record number of deportations, they are going to ask the Speaker for a vote to more quickly deport vulnerable children. If you give them the vote for quicker deportation of children, they will demand a vote to deport all DREAMers who have permission to work in the United States legally-- 700,000. And if you give them a vote on deporting DREAMers, they will ask for a hearing on amending the Constitution to eliminate birthright citizenship. That is what the mouse will do. He will change the Constitution of the United States. And then at some point they will demand that every single reference to anything related to immigrants without papers, even a research project, be declared an amnesty and stripped from legislation. If you give a mouse a cookie, he is going to want some milk, Mr. Speaker. And if you give the restrictionists a vote or hearing on every crazy idea they come up with, you will be relegated as a party to being a provincial party with power in the House of Representatives, and maybe from time to time being able to run the Senate, but you will never win the White House and you will never run the Supreme Court. At some point, I respectfully suggest you cut off the mouse's supply of cookies.

Mr. GUTIERREZ

Mr. GUTIERREZ. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to the latest efforts by leadership to appease hard-liners on immigration. Today, this body is allowing their loudest anti-immigrant voices to overrule the adoption of the Gallego amendment by none other than the Republican-controlled Armed Services Committee, controlled by the Republican majority. Not only are they throwing their highly touted regular order out of the window, they are taking one more dive down the anti-immigrant rabbit hole. The amendment by my friend from Arizona simply expresses a sense of the House that the Secretary of Defense should review whether recipients of deferred action should be allowed to serve in the military. It doesn't say the military must allow them to serve. It says, let's do a review, a study, a sense of Congress. We woke up today and this is how we feel. Remember that these same 700,000 recipients who grew up here in America, passed a criminal background check, and now have a legal work permit to reside in the United States, they are ready to risk their lives to defend the only country they know. It just says, Hey, do you guys want to take a look? Meanwhile, you totally missed the Veasey amendment calling for a similar study of how executive actions of President Obama and prosecutorial discretion could expand the pool of potential military recruits and how enlistment of DACA applicants would impact military readiness. They missed that one. I guess NumbersUSA didn't give you a call over on the other side or Heritage Action forgot to tell you about that provision. So, Republican hard-liners fixated on the Gallego amendment. Seeing the word ``review,'' all they heard was the word ``amnesty.'' If the majority party is unable to allow a nonbinding study approved by the committee of jurisdiction where they are the majority because it includes the word ``immigrants'' without slapping the amnesty label on it, how on Earth will you be able to fix our broken immigration system or win over the fastest-growing group of voters in this country? It is clear to me that the candidate who is ready to embrace immigrants and protect DREAMers and their families may as well start measuring the drapes at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, and I think I know what her name is.

Mr. GUTIERREZ

Mr. GUTIERREZ. Mr. Speaker, what would it be like if the Chamber and this government reflected the diversity of the American people? There would be a lot more portraits of women alongside all the portraits of committee chairmen of the past decades. In 2015, it wouldn't be newsworthy when a competent, intelligent person who happens to be African American is hired for a job for which she is supremely qualified, which happened this week when Loretta Lynch was sworn in as our 83rd Attorney General. We wouldn't still be talking about unequal pay for equal work. I believe that, if there is a country that truly believes in equality, that it is time to put our money where our mouths are, literally, and express that sense of justice on the most widely used currency in international transaction. Last week, I introduced the Put a Woman on the Twenty Act to build on the grassroots campaign known as Women on 20s, working to bring gender equality to our currency. Their public campaign has garnered more than half a million votes in support of putting a woman on a $20 bill. I loved the idea, and it was brought to me by a smart, young woman on my staff, Kate Johnson. To me, this isn't just a women's issue; it is an American issue. My bill simply directs the Secretary of the Treasury to convene a panel of citizens to solicit recommendations from the public for a woman to be placed on the $20 bill. Women have inspired generations of Americans for their courage by challenging this Nation to protect the civil rights of all Americans. Women have advocated for voting rights and equal protection under the law and for programs that serve the most vulnerable members of our communities. Women led us out of slavery on the Underground Railroad, taught us what the phrase ``all men are created equal'' really means by fighting for women's suffrage and civil rights and have led in all sectors in society. When I go to the bank, when I use an ATM, when I travel overseas, the $20 bill is already widely used and in the purses and wallets of hundreds of millions of Americans. We all know that the almighty dollar speaks; but what if it had a woman's voice? Consider for a moment the powerful message that would be sent to a young girl in Chicago if she saw a portrait celebrating Rosa Parks or Harriet Tubman when she reached into her wallet to make a purchase. What about the young man in a country far away who maybe is still hearing damaging messages about the role of women in his country? The portrait of Wilma Mankiller or Eleanor Roosevelt on the United States bill that represents power and success to him provides a new opportunity to show our common values about equality and inclusion in faraway places. The organization Women on 20s has put forward four exceptional female leaders for this honor: Rosa Parks, Wilma Mankiller, Harriet Tubman, and Eleanor Roosevelt. That is a great list, but there is no reason to stop there. The initiative has sparked conversations about the many great women who have contributed in significant ways to strengthening our Nation. I have certainly benefited from the passionate advocacy of women who have fought for civil rights and equality, as have my daughters and constituents in Chicago, many of whom are debating and weighing in on the candidates for this incredible honor. Roosevelt University in Chicago has launched a campuswide campaign to champion Eleanor Roosevelt for the honor and not just because they were named after her. As a result of the campaign, students are participating in a national dialogue about her work advocating for child labor laws to protect kids and all workers from unsafe conditions and long hours, for gender equality, and safe housing. Now, I don't know who will be chosen. She could be one of the women suggested already or any one of many other talented, impressive women in our country's history. My mother, who is an amazing woman, would probably get my personal vote, but she is out of the running because, thankfully, she is still alive. I believe the time has come to have our currency represent the contributions of women throughout our history. A woman's place is in the boardroom, chairing the committee, in the laboratory, in the Oval Office, and, yes, even on our currency.

Mr. GUTIERREZ

Mr. GUTIERREZ. Mr. Speaker, this past weekend, we witnessed the most gruesome example of a story that is becoming ever more common. Hundreds of migrants are missing and feared dead--700 or more--because the smuggling boat they were packed onto capsized in the Mediterranean Ocean off the coast of Libya. It was on the front page of every paper around the world. An estimated 3,500 people died in 2014 while making the journey from North Africa to the southern coast of Europe. Right now, along our southern border, illegal immigration is at historically low levels, but we, too, have a border that is known for smuggling, tragic losses of life, and smugglers no less brazen and no less indifferent to the lives of their human cargo than those off the Libyan coast. With few legal options and with great opportunity for work and freedom on the other side, migrants throughout the world are risking their lives in the hopes of surviving the journey to live a better life. During the peak of illegal immigration to this country a decade or so ago, one person died every single day, on average, when trying to come to the U.S. They died of dehydration in the desert or died in trucks or in boxcars in botched smuggling operations or perished as stowaways, and those are the ones we know about. Now we hear about ``La Bestia,'' or ``The Beast,'' which is the train carrying migrants from southern Mexico to the border of our country. Think about hundreds of people, most of them children and teenagers, clinging to the outside of a moving train while they are preyed upon by smugglers, sexual predators, and every kind of deviant. The migrants who are fleeing violence and poverty and gang- and drug lord-infested communities in Central America, like those fleeing African and Asian countries, are willing to literally risk life and limb for the slim chance of a better life on this side. Europe is responding to the migrant crisis by committing to more rescue operations. The rightwing, anti-immigration parties across Europe see the crisis as validation for their call to build a big wall around ``fortress Europe.'' There are a few people here in this Congress, in this building, who want to build a wall just like theirs. Most people in Europe understand that building civil society and stable economies in the Southern Hemisphere is the best way to entice people to stay home. Foreign aid and international economic development are not dirty words in Europe the way they are here. In the U.S., the policies set in Washington directly relate to the instability of neighboring countries in Central America, the Caribbean, and Latin America. Trade policies initiated here in this country have had devastating consequences in rural areas across our hemisphere, driving people from the land and driving people into drug cultivation. It is our insatiable appetite here in the United States for illegal drugs, funded with our dollar bills and enforced with U.S. guns, that creates and maintains a lot of the instability and chaos that drives people from their homes to America. Yet almost every budget that is considered in this Congress cuts mental health and drug counseling, addiction treatment and prevention, and does little to address our role in fueling instability. With specific regard to immigration and asylum, in this Congress, we are debating laws to make it harder for children to apply for asylum and laws to make it easier to deport children or to put families into lengthy and expensive detention. To add insult to injury, the Judiciary Committee just approved a measure to allow those who want to homeschool their children but who are prevented from doing so by their own government to be considered as a special class of oppressed victims to be considered eligible to apply for political asylum in the U.S. For the people from Germany and Sweden who want to homeschool their children, that is the kind of oppression that Congress responds to--people from Central America whose governments are unwilling or unable to protect children from murder and sexual assault, not so much. The reality is that we need to do more to engage and strengthen our neighbors; we need to do much more to make sure that the actions, trade, and consumption of our people are helping, not hurting; and we need to do much more to make sure that we have secure borders by also remembering to put doors on those borders so that people can come with visas in a controlled way and not risking their lives with smugglers. First and foremost, we must remember the message that Pope Francis reminded us of when he said of those who drowned in the ocean: ``They are men and women like us, our brothers seeking a better life, starving, persecuted, wounded, exploited, victims of war. They were looking for a better life.'' Let us not forget that migrants are human beings.

Mr. GUTIEERREZ

Mr. GUTIEERREZ. Mr. Speaker, the man pictured alongside me will go a long way towards determining who lives in the White House for the next few years. No, he is not a pollster or a campaign spin doctor. No, this is a Federal judge for the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas, the Honorable Judge Andrew Hanen. The lawsuit by 26 Republican Governors and attorneys general seeking to block the executive actions taken by the Obama administration on immigration was filed in his court. He has not ruled yet on the constitutionality of the case. He ordered a preliminary injunction, however, saying he thought the States have standing to bring the suit--or at least that the State of Texas did. That was enough for him to stop the implementation of the program nationwide. Not surprisingly, just last week, the judge refused the government's request to lift his injunction and allow the plan to move forward. Here is the reality: Congress mandates that about 400,000 people will be deported this year out of a total of 11 million. The Secretary of Homeland Security developed a plan to choose between hardened criminals and those immigrants who have lived here for at least 5 years, have U.S. citizen children, and can pass a criminal background check at their own expense. The plan also requires immigrants to renew their temporary status periodically to prove again that they have not committed crimes or fraudulently sought out services or benefits. It is that plan for the parents of U.S. citizens in American families, people who have been working and staying out of trouble for years, that the Texas judge here believes will cause irreparable damage to the State of Texas and, therefore, must be stopped nationally. Just as they had hoped, the judge ruled that Texas might some day in the future suffer irreparable harm because of driver's licenses. In other words, people who qualify for driver's licenses and who take the test and pay their fees for driver's licenses--if they live in Texas and apply for those driver's licenses in Texas--will be doing the State irreparable harm. I have a driver's license. It is right here. I had no idea I was causing irreparable damage to the State of Illinois just by applying for it and paying for the driver's license and learning the rules of the road and buying car insurance; but who am I to disagree with a Federal judge? On Friday, the Department of Justice will argue before the fifth circuit court in New Orleans that the President's executive actions should move forward. It is well known that the fifth circuit is among the most conservative. Look what happened a couple of weeks ago in that very same circuit court. They ruled on a lawsuit related to the State of Mississippi which, like Texas, felt it might some day in the future be dealt damage by the deferred action program announced by the President for DREAMers back in 2012. The panel of judges from the fifth circuit looked at the program, the evidence, and the cost of the State of Mississippi, and the fifth circuit judges said Mississippi is not harmed and, thus, does not have legal standing for the lawsuit. That bodes well for the country and the President's executive actions. In the meantime, Judge Hanen still hasn't ruled on the case. Maybe he is running out the clock, trying to make the immigrants in cities like Chicago and Houston lose hope or stop preparing to sign up or maybe magically self-deport and give up on watching their children, their U.S. citizen children, grow up in America. It might turn into a drawn-out series of rules and appeals that wind up in the Supreme Court, which could take us well into 2016. 2016 is an election year, where Latino U.S. citizens--not immigrants we are discussing, but their neighbors, cousins, spouses, and coworkers who are citizens of the United States--are not likely to vote for a party that is making sure that their neighbors, cousins, spouses, and coworkers are still a top priority for deportation. I have a feeling the citizens will support the candidates and the parties that support their communities. I also have a feeling that the decision to drag this fight out in the courts will be one the Republican Party regrets from a political point of view; just like the decision not to allow a vote on immigration reform over the past 2 years will be seen as one of the biggest and most consequential political mistakes of all time. How long does a vote take? Fifteen minutes--it might sound too much like a Geico commercial, but just 15 minutes could have saved the Republicans a great deal of heartache. The failure to take those 15 minutes for a vote might mean that there are no Republican Presidents for a long time who would nominate judges like this one.