F. Sensenbrenner

Mr. SENSENBRENNER

Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, I reluctantly oppose this amendment for a couple of reasons. I do not think it is workable, and it will cause huge problems on the northern border that will result in a lot of jobs being lost both in the United States and Canada. First of all, we have got about 20,000 detention beds that ICE has got under its control; and about 80 percent of those detention beds are currently filled by criminal aliens, and they are subject to mandatory detention. If there are more people that are put into the detention system without more beds being created by ICE, the courts will not allow for overcrowding of detention facilities. And all of a sudden, there are going to be criminal aliens that are going to be either released on the street or not being put in detention simply because there are not the slots that are available. And that is going to result in the misallocation of resources. Now, I certainly am all for internal enforcement, but given the fact that there are a half million aliens that illegally enter the United States every year, the requirements here do not match up with the facilities and the infrastructure available. And the deadlines that the gentleman has in his amendment are going to be simply unworkable, and it is going to end up resulting in the agency shifting its resources from what it is doing now, which is concentrating on the criminal aliens and the drug smugglers and the human trafficking smugglers, to other people. Now, I would also like to talk a little bit about the northern border. What this amendment does is that it has a requirement that there be a mandatory biometric universal processing through the automatic entry-exit control system, which is the US-VISIT program with the fingerprint scans for aliens. We do not have the facilities on the northern border to do that at the present time. The amendment says, not later than January 1 of 2008 that this infrastructure will be in place. But what this will require is that everybody who does not prove they are a United States citizen or a permanent resident of the United States get out of their car and have a fingerprint scan and wait for the data to come up on the screen of the immigration inspector on the northern border. Now, when 9/11 occurred and there were hours and hours of waiting to get across the border between the United States and Canada, there were a lot of businesses, and the auto business simply did not get the goods that they needed to be able to conduct their business on the dock in time for the first shift to be able to use that raw material or to use their parts. And that kind of an obstruction along the northern border is going to mean huge unemployment in those border-sensitive communities where manufacturing, particularly, is intensely reliant on the products arriving on the dock in time. It is not going to be just in our country, but it is going to be in Canada as well. The amendment is a good intention, but it is going to cause all kinds of enforcement problems, as I have described; but it is going to cause a lot of innocent people to lose their jobs along the northern border and should be opposed. Mr. Chairman, I yield 30 seconds to the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson-Lee).

Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance of the time. Mr. Chairman, I described that this amendment is unworkable. We will have a reallocation of resources. I would not want this bill to cost thousands of people in the northern border communities, legitimate, honest, hardworking American citizens as well as their counterparts on the Canadian side of the border to lose their jobs simply because goods cannot get across the border. I appreciate the thought behind the gentleman's amendment, but it really is not a workable one, and it should be rejected as a result of that. Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of the amendment. The amendment acknowledges that immigration fraud has become endemic and, even more seriously, that internal corruption at U. S. Citizenship and Immigration Services threatens the national security and erodes the integrity of our immigration system. The extent and seriousness of the problem was brought to light in a closed bipartisan session of the Subcommittee on Immigration, Border Security and Claims of the Judiciary Committee earlier this year. Although the serious allegations and investigations discussed there cannot be discussed in the open, I urge my colleagues in the strongest terms to pass this important amendment. The ease with which unscrupulous immigration officials can be tempted to issue visas or benefits in return for money, goods, or favors was brought to light a month ago with the issuance of a Government Accountability Office report on consular malfeasance. In that report, it was revealed that the Diplomatic Security Service had investigated 28 cases of visa selling by State Department employees in the last few years. Those were only the cases that were discovered in the some 200 consular sections located abroad. U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services conducts its application processing in the United States, and yet thousands of allegations of misconduct, some involving criminal acts and foreign influence, have yet to be investigated because of lack of focus, resources, and confusion of sub-agency jurisdiction. This amendment would ensure that an internal law enforcement division within U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services would receive, process, and investigate allegations of misconduct and internal corruption in a timely manner. To fund this office, a $10 fee will be charged to all visa applicants. The amendment would also provide that the Director of the division would have the authority to subpoena documents, reports, and data, and to appoint such officers as necessary to carry out the internal affairs functions. I urge my colleagues to support this very important amendment.

Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of the amendment. Let me say the significant point the gentleman from Kansas has made is that last year the Congress prohibited the Department of Homeland Security from using appropriated funds to change the oath. Because it is an appropriation bill, the Congress would have to renew that prohibition year after year after year. This will save us some work in the future by making the change permanent law. I support the amendment. In 2003, the Department of Homeland Security proposed changes to the oath which every naturalized citizen must take which would have significantly weakened the oath and demeaned its historical significance. Due to strong public opposition, those changes were never implemented. However, since the oath is not set forth in federal statute, but only in regulation, the agency can modify its language at any time in the future in a similarly inappropriate way. The Oath is the fundamental statement of allegiance to the United States and our Constitution, and this allegiance is what unites Americans of all backgrounds and provides for our commonality. We are not a nation based upon race, creed, or religion--we are a nation based upon our loyalty and allegiance to our country and her principles. As the gateway into U.S. citizenship, the Oath should be protected by Congress. The Oath of Allegiance has historic roots in the language of the founders. We should protect this historical statement of national unity and support the Ryun amendment. We have already set the precedent in an appropriations bill of requiring that no appropriated funds could be used to amend the Oath of Renunciation and Allegiance as it currently is memorialized in federal regulations. I urge my colleagues to support this amendment.

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

Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, this amendment increases civil penalties against employers who do not comply with the Employment Eligibility Verification System to such fantastically high levels that they could easily bankrupt companies for first offenses. When companies are bankrupted, everybody who works at that company loses their job. The amendment would raise penalties to not less than $50,000 for each violation for each alien. Penalties of this magnitude are not merely a deterrent; they would make almost every violation into a capital offense. And I thought the Democrats were against the death penalty. Let me say first that the underlying legislation already dramatically increases the civil penalties for employers who knowingly hire illegal aliens or who fail to comply with the Employment Eligibility Verification System. I did this because current penalties are so low they are not a deterrent. This bill raises penalties for first-time offenses from $250 to $2,000 per alien for a first-time offense to not less than $5,000 per alien; penalties for second-time offenses are raised to no less than $10,000 per alien; and for employers with two or more previous offenses the penalty is not less than $250,000 per alien. The penalty levels in this bill are quite sufficient to act as a deterrent for employers who might otherwise hire illegal aliens or ignore the verification requirements. In fact, they have been attacked by practically every employer association in Washington. The amendment goes just too far in order to make a political point; thus it is not a serious amendment. The amendment designates the proceeds of the penalties to States and localities, which would be required to use the funds to provide services to illegal aliens. When penalties are funneled back in this matter, it sets up an incentive to use immigration as a fund-raiser for States and localities. That should not be the goal. We should not be using Federal funds to pay for services to illegal aliens. Money collected from civil penalties should be deposited into the Treasury. Mr. Chairman, I urge my colleagues to oppose this amendment. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, this really is an overkill amendment. I think that the increases that are contained in the underlying bill will be sufficient to act as a deterrent. I think we all know as far as the border security situation is concerned, we have to put more efforts on the border to prevent illegal aliens from coming across. We also have to turn off the magnet of employment of illegal aliens in the United States. The employer verification system turns off the magnet. The increase in the fines for not using the employer verification system or hiring illegal aliens are sufficient to act as a deterrent. I can tell you that our courts are going to be tied up horrendously because everybody who gets a citation for violating the law under Mr. Gonzalez's amendment is going to ask for a trial by jury, and I doubt we will ever be able to get very much of the money that he thinks we are going to collect. I think what is in the underlying bill is able to do the trick. I would like to challenge those who are making the argument that we have got to get tough on the border and we have got to get tough with employers to turn off the magnet. When the time comes to vote for passage of the bill, vote ``aye.'' Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding me time. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of this amendment, which requires the Department of Homeland Security to report to Congress on the implementation of the employment eligibility verification system which this bill expands economy-wide. One of the key components of this bill is a mandatory, national employment eligibility verification system. By checking the work authorization status of each person working in the U.S., we will finally be able to flush out the those working illegal. We are expanding the Basic Pilot Program, which has worked extremely successfully as a voluntary program for 10 years. Employers who use the Basic Pilot to conduct employment eligibility checks clearly like the system and that it is easy to use. A 2001 report found that ``an overwhelming majority of employers participating found the basic pilot program to be an effective and reliable tool for employment verification''--96 percent of employers found it to be an effective tool for employment verification; and 94 percent of employers believed it to be more reliable than the IRCA-required document check. The system is available to employers both over the internet, and through a toll-free telephone number. Employers may use whichever option is more convenient. As this system is expanded to a much larger scale, I am committed to working with the Department of Homeland Security and the business community to ensure that it works well and meets the needs of America's employers. I believe it is important that the verification process is user-friendly for all businesses--large and small. This amendment would require DHS to report to Congress after the first and second years of implementation, and specifically address the concerns of businesses. These reports will assist Congress in monitoring the progress of the program. I urge my colleagues to support this amendment.

Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding me time. My, how times have changed. I was here in 1993 and I was the principal Republican author of a bill called the Brady Bill, which in part required the establishment of an automated system to check out whether somebody who was trying to purchase a firearm was eligible under the law to purchase and possess that firearm. That had an automated system to verify the eligibility of the prospective firearm purchaser against the database that was maintained by the Department of justice. Lo and behold, the people that were pushing the Brady bill, and there were many more on that side of the aisle than the side I serve on, said this system is going to be a foolproof system in order to make sure that convicted felons or adjudicated mental incompetents will never get a firearm in their hands by purchasing it from a licensed firearm dealer. So if it was good enough then to check out people who might not be eligible to possess a firearm because of a felony conviction or a mental incompetency adjudication, then the same type of system ought to be good enough to check out whether somebody who is asking for a job is legally entitled to work in this country. There is a 2-year delay in implementing the verification system in this bill. That is a little bit more than we heard on the Brady bill. But I think that telling the Department of Homeland Security that they got have to get this thing up and running in 2 years to be able to verify the new hires and then, 4 years later, the existing hires is plenty of time to be able to check out, in a manner that does not create a national identification card, whether somebody is eligible to get a job. This is a good amendment. It requires progress reports on how the Department of Homeland Security is doing. What is wrong with that? We ought to pass the amendment.

Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Chairman, I claim the time in opposition to the motion to recommit.

Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Speaker, securing our Nation's borders is an imperative, and this bill does it. Turning off the magnet that brings people into the United States to work illegally is an imperative. This bill does it. This 149-page motion to recommit, which we received a couple of minutes before the author made his motion, we have been able to look at enough of this 150 pages to see that it does not provide one bit of enhancement to the employment verification system. That is the big hole in this bill. So there is no way that employers will be able. There are no enhancements to employer verification. Mr. Speaker, throughout this debate, both yesterday and today, my friends on the minority side have been doing their best to try to make this bill unworkable, one of which was their almost unanimous support for keeping the penalties for illegal presence in the United States as a felony. Let me tell you that even though my amendment to reduce those penalties was voted down largely by people on the other side of the aisle, when this bill gets to conference, those penalties will be made workable. You can count on that. Keep immigration reform on track. To secure our borders and to have a secure employer verification system, pass this bill. Vote against the motion to recommit. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from New York.

Mr. SENSENBRENNER

Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Madam Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Madam Chairman, for purposes of clarification, before I summarize the provisions within the manager's amendment, I will highlight what the amendment does not contain. The amendment does not contain a sense of Congress on foreign workers; nor does it decrease the criminal penalties for illegal entry and illegal presence. The latter issue will be addressed in a separate amendment I will soon offer. I will now summarize the provisions of the manager's amendment within the jurisdiction of the Judiciary Committee. First, the amendment contains a provision drafted by the gentleman from Utah (Mr. Cannon) that will prohibit localities from requiring businesses to set up day labor sites as a condition for conducting or expanding a business. No business should be compelled to facilitate the hiring of illegal aliens by establishing labor sites on or near their premises, and this amendment will prohibit this practice. The amendment also contains a provision drafted by the gentleman from California (Mr. Issa) that requires the Attorney General to report on the status of criminal alien prosecutions, including prosecutions of smugglers. Mr. Issa is rightly concerned about the lack of sufficient prosecutions of alien smugglers who prey upon the most vulnerable. The amendment also includes a number of important provisions that will facilitate the ability of the Departments of Justice and Homeland Security to combat illegal immigration. Specifically, the amendment sets mandatory minimum sentences for repeated marriage fraud; improved sentencing enhancements for aliens who enter illegally after criminal convictions; clarifies that the Board of Immigration Appeals' decisions on motions to reopen removal proceedings are not subject to judicial review; increases penalties for passport and immigration fraud and penalizes fraud against aliens applying for immigration benefits; makes criminal defendants' immigration status an express consideration in determining whether they should be released on bond; extends the statute of limitations for all immigration-related fraud; makes passport fraud a ground of inadmissibility and deportability; and abolishes attorneys' fee awards to removable aliens under the Equal Access to Justice Act. Madam Chairman, I urge my colleagues to support this amendment, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to this amendment which would strike the provision added by the bill the gentleman from California (Mr. Daniel E. Lungren), mandating expedited removal for other than Mexican aliens apprehended after entering illegally within 14 days and 100 hundred miles of entry. Unlike what the gentleman from New York (Mr. Nadler) said, the Lungren provision in this bill applies to land borders only, and it would not apply to asylum seekers who ask for asylum at the time they enter through a port of entry. The provision that this amendment would strike is crucial to ending the current practice of catch and release of aliens along the southern border. While nationals of Mexico who are apprehended along the southern border can be returned to Mexico, the nationals of other countries cannot. Rather these aliens, known as OTMs, must be placed in removal proceedings which is a process that can take months. Because of a lack of detention space, most are released on the promise that they will show up for their adjudication. Experience has shown that if OTMs are released to attend their removal proceedings, they will likely disappear. Of the 8,908 notices to appear at the immigration court at Harlingen, Texas, issued last year to OTMs, 8,767 failed to show up for their hearings, according to the statistics compiled by the Justice Departments's Executive Office of Immigration Review. The fact that these aliens were able to enter illegally, be released and then disappear into society has encouraged even more OTMs to illegally enter. Arrests of non-Mexicans along the U.S.-Mexico border, which total 14,935 in 1995 and 28,598 in 2000, rose to 65,814 in fiscal year 2004. As nationals of these countries have entered with impunity, they have encouraged others to do so also. The Lungren provision addresses the problem of catch and release by requiring DHS to remove these OTMs who are apprehended within 14 days of entry and 100 miles of the border through expedited procedures. This codifies DHS's current practices. By limiting the amount of time that aliens are in proceedings, these procedures allow DHS to use its limited detention space more effectively. This in turn ensures that more aliens can be detained, which discourages other aliens from attempting to enter illegally. I urge my colleagues to oppose this amendment. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time. This amendment clarifies the inherent authority of State and local law enforcement officers to enforce the immigration law and provides reimbursement to those States and localities for their assistance. Most importantly, it provides a means for Federal, State, and local law enforcement officers to work together to apprehend, detain, and remove illegal aliens. The fact is that at the present time there are only 2,000 special agents to locate and arrest the entire illegal alien population nationwide. The Norwood amendment would allow State and local officers who are willing to do so to be a force multiplier for those 2,000 agents. It is a good amendment and should be adopted.

Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance of the time. Mr. Chairman, two of the 9/11 hijackers overstayed their visas. Under the current law, that is just a civil ground of inadmissibility. I think that that should be some type of a crime so that at least they can be detained. The businessperson who inadvertently overstays their visa because the flight is canceled, no problem; no prosecutor is going to prosecute that person because of it. I see some games being played here. The people who are saying that this bill is too harsh want to keep these penalties as felonies. I do not know why that is. I think it will be much better to make them misdemeanors, because at least, that way, we do not have to have the taxpayers pay for a lawyer to defend them if they do not have any money. And we do not have to have the space to incarcerate them in Federal penitentiaries. This amendment makes the bill workable. I believe it is a good amendment. I urge its adoption. Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, I regret to say, the gentlewoman from California, whom I greatly respect, is wrong. Under the Federal juvenile statute, children cannot be prosecuted for any Federal crime, felony or misdemeanor, if it is not a crime of violence or a drug trafficking crime. So her entire argument about making children subjected to Federal criminal prosecution simply by being here is not valid. They can be subjected if it is a crime of violence or a drug trafficking crime. What this amendment does is reduce the penalties for this type of immigration violation from a felony in the base bill to a misdemeanor. That is all the amendment does. And what it does do is criminalize the presence of the people here who have overstayed their visas. Now those who have entered the United States illegally, not through a port of entry and not submitting themselves to inspection by U.S. Immigration and Customs authorities commit a crime. That is a crime now. It is a Federal misdemeanor. But if you do go through inspection and do not go home when you are supposed to, then it becomes a civil ground of inadmissibility. So we are treating illegal aliens differently. You are a potential misdemeanant if convicted if you entered the United States illegally. But if you overstayed your visa and did not go home, then you do not subject yourself to criminal prosecution. The bill takes care of this anomaly. But it makes both offenses felonies. What this amendment does, it makes it misdemeanors. So if you are against the amendment, you want to keep it as felonies because that is in the base bill. You should be for the amendment to make it a misdemeanor for the reasons that I have stated. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Chairman, I rise to claim the time in opposition, even though I support the amendment.

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

Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Chairman, I move that the Committee do now rise.

Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, under current law, illegal entry into the United States makes an alien subject to a Federal criminal misdemeanor with a maximum penalty of 6 months in prison. However, unlawful presence itself, such as by overstaying a visa, is not a criminal offense, but only a civil ground of inadmissibility. Forty percent of the current illegal alien population entered legally, but overstayed their visas. The other 60 percent of the illegal alien population came here by illegal means and are therefore already subject to criminal penalties for committing a Federal criminal offense. At the administration's request, the base bill makes unlawful presence a crime, such as unlawful entry already is. This change makes sense. Aliens who have disregarded our laws by overstaying their visas to remain in the United States illegally should be just as culpable as aliens who have broken our laws to enter and remain here illegally. In the base bill, the maximum penalty for illegal entry was increased to a year and a day, and the same penalty was set for unlawful presence, to make the enhancements for these offenses consistent with the other penalty enhancements of the bill. The administration subsequently requested the penalty for these crimes be lowered to 6 months. Making the first offense a felony, as the base bill would do, would require a grand jury indictment, a trial before a district court judge and a jury trial. Also because it is a felony, the defendant would be able to get a lawyer at public expense if the defendant could not afford the lawyer. These requirements would mean that the government would seldom if ever actually use the new penalties. By leaving these offenses as misdemeanors, more prosecutions are likely to be brought against those aliens whose cases merit criminal prosecution. For this reason, the amendment returns the sentence for illegal entry to its current 6 months and sets the penalty for unlawful presence at the same level. Some have argued that this provision would require 11 million prosecutions. That is not true. Prosecutorial resources are limited, and authorities would rather quickly deport an alien whose only offense is to be here unlawfully rather than to prosecute and have to detain that alien pending trial. Even if an alien were prosecuted under this provision, a conviction of unlawful presence would not prevent an alien from some day attaining legal status or even citizenship if the alien would otherwise qualify. Making unlawful presence a crime, however, would serve as a greater deterrence to aliens overstaying their visas. For these reasons, I ask that the Members support this amendment. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. SENSENBRENNER

Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Chairman, I yield 90 seconds to the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Aderholt).

Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Radanovich).

Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance of the time. Mr. Chairman, I was here in 1986 when the Simpson-Mazzoli bill was passed. I voted against it because I didn't think it was a balanced bill, and I didn't think it was a workable bill, and I think that what has happened in the last 19 years showed that a no vote was the right vote. That bill was based on the fact that we would solve the illegal alien problem by giving those who are already here amnesty and then we would impose sanctions on employers who hired new illegal aliens. The reason it didn't work, as my friend from California (Mr. Daniel E. Lungren) has stated, is that the employer sanctions were never enforced. As a result, illegal aliens came across the border in increasing floods. The current system gives an incentive to an employer to hire an illegal alien in an entry-level job that is labor intensive because illegal aliens work for less money than either documented aliens with green cards or United States citizens. As a result, the bad actors in areas like the hotel and restaurant business, agriculture, landscaping and the construction business, are able to have such a competitive economic advantage because of the low wages over those who are trying to do it the right way. I can understand why the Chamber of Commerce is against this bill because of the employer verification system. I guess if I were lobbying for them, I would be, too, because they have benefited from the low wages, and the low wages that these corporations have benefited from have depressed the wages of honest, hardworking, middle-income American people and those who are trying to get these entry-level jobs who are authorized to work in this country. The key in this bill is Mr. Calvert's employer verification system because that will flush out those who hire large numbers of illegal aliens, and they can go into the marketplace and pay a decent wage to people who are legally entitled to work here. I think that this is the main reason why this bill should pass. We have heard a litany of complaints about all of the enforcement provisions, fences on the border, making a criminal offense overstaying one's visa, giving the sheriffs in border counties the authority to enforce the immigration law which they don't have now. The fact is that those people who are against this bill don't want any changes in the existing system except perhaps amnesty or, excuse me, earned legalization and ultimately citizenship for those who have broken the law. This bill has our priorities straight. We have to secure the border. We have to provide law enforcement the tools to apprehend those who have broken the law, and we have to force our employers to flush out all the fake documents that are out there that are held by people who are illegally in this country, which is what the verification program proposes to do. This is a good bill. It is a necessary first step, and if this bill is defeated, as all of those who have been saying no to everything goes down, the consequence is going to be the continuation of the intolerable existing system. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.