Executive Session

Floor Speech

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Mr. TILLIS. It is something I support. I think we should all consider it a compliment when people want to leave the countries of their births to come to the United States, for they know what we know--that it is a great place in which to live and thrive.

I have a concern with the unanimous consent request before us, the RELIEF Act. Senator Durbin and I have worked on a couple of immigration issues on which we have bridged the gap but have not quite gotten there.

First off, it could lay the groundwork for a significant increase in legal immigration, but I am also concerned with the mechanics we find ourselves in right now. As I understand it, the RELIEF Act has six cosponsors--all Democrats. Yet there is another bill that is moving through the Senate right now that was offered by Senator Lee. It has been offered in other Congresses, but it is actually making headway. It has 35 cosponsors, and 15 of them are Democrats. They include Senator Harris, of California, and Senator Duckworth, the junior Senator of Illinois. I believe this is a very narrowly focused effort to address a lot of the concerns that Senator Durbin has.

I do not believe Senator Durbin has the support of the Senate to take this through regular order at this point, let alone through unanimous consent. I hope Senator Durbin and others will recognize that we do have a shortage of high-skilled workers in this country and that we do need to fix a number of problems, but I don't think they can be fixed with the RELIEF Act.

I encourage Senator Durbin to work with Senator Lee and with the 34 other Senate Members on a bipartisan basis to address this so we can bring the Fairness for High-Skilled Immigrants Act to the floor and send it to the House for its consideration.

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Mr. TILLIS. Mr. President, I come to talk about another issue of immigration that concerns me in North Carolina, and I think it is something about which every American should be concerned. It is the sanctuary policies that have been implemented in counties and cities and, at least in one case, statewide.

``Sanctuary city'' sounds like a great concept as the United States is a sanctuary to which so many people seek to immigrate. Yet the policy of the sanctuary city actually breaks down the relationship between Federal authorities and local authorities. I think this is dangerous and could potentially--and not only potentially--have serious consequences in communities. I will use a few examples.

Over the past year in North Carolina, we have had over 500 people who have been released who had been arrested by local authorities. Many of them had been arrested for having committed serious crimes. They had been charged with murder, rape, indecent liberties with a child, heroin trafficking--a very, very long list--in cities just 25 minutes from where I live, down in Charlotte, in Mecklenburg County. They arrest people but not simply because they are illegally present. In fact, you can find virtually no instance in which a local authority would arrest somebody just because one is illegally present. The people who are in these jails have been charged with crimes, and in many cases they have been serious crimes.

Two weeks ago in Mecklenburg County, the Mecklenburg County sheriff had made the decision to release four people--one who had been charged with murder, two who had been charged with indecent liberties with a minor, and one who had been charged with heroin trafficking. They had been illegally present but had not been in jail because they had simply crossed the border or had had their visas expire. They had been in jail because they had committed serious crimes.

When Immigration and Customs Enforcement hears about these folks who have been detained, they issue what they call detainer orders. A detainer order is a request to hold a person in jail for at least 48 hours so ICE can go to the jail, interview him, and determine whether they want to transfer him into ICE's custody and potentially deport him.

This is a very dangerous policy that has actually, ultimately, resulted in other people being harmed. Think about those people being released who have been charged with rape or murder or heroin trafficking. They go back into the community and cause harm to someone else.

What I have decided we need to do is to at least provide a private right of civil action to a victim of that unwise decision. If that charged murderer or heroin trafficker goes out and assaults someone or murders someone--in some cases, someone who has a DWI is charged with vehicular homicide and goes back out and while under the influence harms someone else in, say, an automobile accident--I think the person who gets harmed or, sadly, his survivor should be able to bring a case against that governmental entity that has the sanctuary policy.

For those who think sanctuary policies are safe and that only safe people are being released, this shouldn't be an issue to them--right?-- because no harm is going to occur. Yet, if harm occurs, I believe the victim should have a right to seek restitution.

Our bill is fairly simple. It is called the Justice for Victims of Sanctuary Cities Act. It is a bill that reads, if you as a governmental entity refuse to cooperate with ICE and then release someone who does harm to someone else, that person has the right to sue that governmental entity.

Our governments in the United States--the local governments and State governments--have the right to say they are immune, that they can't be sued. They have that right, and I respect that right. Yet, if they refuse to allow themselves to build their cases in court and say that what they did was appropriate and safe, then it should come at the consequence of the Federal funding for which they would otherwise be qualified to receive.

Again, if sanctuary cities are safe and if all we are doing is releasing people who are not threats to the community, this should be a nonissue for any sanctuary jurisdiction. It would only be an issue if there is a victim as a result of the jurisdiction's political decisions.

That is why we have introduced the Justice for Victims of Sanctuary Cities Act. In fact, we listened to some of the sanctuary jurisdictions, and they said: Well, we could get into legal trouble if we hold them for 48 hours, and for that reason we release them after a judge has ordered their release.

We have another bill that addresses that problem so that liability will go away. We are hearing what they have to say and trying to address it in additional legislation.

But I think this is a bill that makes sense, and I think it is something that law enforcement, county commissions, and city councils should take a look at.

I think they should work with ICE. Here is the last reason why I think working with ICE is very important: ICE has a legal responsibility to pursue these people if they are released by the local government.

Here is what happens. You release somebody who is charged with murder or vehicular homicide or heroin trafficking or rape. You release them in the community, and ICE has to go pursue them in the community.

So instead of allowing ICE to go into a jail and have a safe transfer from one jail into the ICE detainee system, they have to actually create a task force. They have got to go into a community, and they have to apprehend them. They have a statutory responsibility to do that.

Ironically, in some of those instances, the very law enforcement agency that released them now has to go into the field and back them up if it is a dangerous situation when they are trying to apprehend this person whom ICE has a legal responsibility to apprehend.

I think this is a commonsense bill. Hopefully, it is one that will give sanctuary cities some pause before they release somebody charged with murder or rape or heroin trafficking--a potentially dangerous person--back into the community, whom the Federal authorities have to pursue no matter what.

2059 and the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration.

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Mr. TILLIS. Mr. President, maybe just to add another chapter to that story, first, we did have a hearing on this bill about 2 weeks ago in Judiciary. That is the first step before you move to a markup.

I will be asking for a markup on this bill because I think it is a bill that is a commonsense bill. It is a bill that actually has a safe- harbor provision for people in the community who may be illegally present who want to work with law enforcement. We are listening to the concerns that law enforcement have expressed. We have addressed them, like so many times we have addressed these sorts of matters before.

So we will have a markup on the bill, we will have a vote out of committee, and I hope that we have a vote on this floor, because at the end of the day, some of the examples that Senator Durbin noted are sad and should be avoided, but the real sad examples are the people who are dying, being raped, and being poisoned by people who were detained and could have been transferred into ICE custody and deported to make our communities safer, including the communities of illegally present people, who are less safe as a result of the current sanctuary policies.

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