National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2022

Floor Speech

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Mr. TIFFANY. Madam Speaker, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

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Mr. TIFFANY. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Madam Speaker, extending visa waiver privileges in the U.S. Virgin Islands for Caribbean countries will present yet another challenge for immigration enforcement and drug interdiction efforts.

The Department of Homeland Security has historically noted that a special visa waiver program for the U.S. Virgin Islands would result in a significant increase in overstays and make it easier for previously removed aliens to re-enter U.S. territory. This amendment would also hamper our efforts to stop the import of illegal drugs.

According to the Drug Enforcement Administration, cocaine is the principal drug threat in the Caribbean with the U.S. Virgin Islands already serving as a major transshipment point between cocaine- producing countries in South America and the continental United States.

A special visa waiver program for the U.S. Virgin Islands would also open the door to birth tourism, something we have already seen in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, a U.S. territory in the Pacific.

In 2017, The Wall Street Journal noted that ``Saipan has become known as the latest hot spot for birth tourism, a place where women can give birth to babies who will automatically acquire U.S. citizenship.'' The problem has become so widespread that, in recent years, more children have been born to Chinese tourists on the islands than Americans.

Chinese syndicates have also taken advantage of the CNMI program to engage in human trafficking and forced labor. By any measure, the CNMI Visa Waiver Program has been an unmitigated disaster. We should be getting rid of these programs, not expanding them.

Madam Speaker, America's immigration laws and visa restrictions should apply uniformly across the country. We should not be creating special loopholes or allowing States and territories to operate their own independent immigration systems. At a time when the United States is seeing record illegal immigration and record asylum claims, creating this visa program is a bad idea at the worst possible time.

I have to say, I am stunned that the majority would bring this forth at this time when we have a deluge that is happening at the southern border. Now to create another loophole just like in the Pacific, only this time in the Atlantic, it is not appropriate to be doing this at this time.

Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues to oppose this, and I reserve the balance of my time.

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Mr. TIFFANY. Madam Speaker, I would just respond this way: America offers great support to all of our friends in the Caribbean. It is not accurate that we don't offer support. We do.

The second point is that the Secretary of--I am assuming she was referring to Homeland Security--could exclude or change the program. How likely is that when we see what is happening currently? When we were told by this government a month ago that people coming from Afghanistan would have an SIV, we have found very few of them have that. They have just been waived in on parole.

That is part of the reason why Congress needs to maintain its authority, because we cannot count on the executive branch enforcing the laws of this country. All we have to do is look at the news of the day to understand that we have open borders, and it is because the executive branch refuses to control our borders.

Madam Speaker, I urge a ``no'' vote on this amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

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Mr. TIFFANY. Madam Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

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Mr. TIFFANY. Madam Speaker, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

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Mr. TIFFANY. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Madam Speaker, arbitration clauses in contracts let private parties agree in advance on a way to resolve further disputes and have significant benefits. But for years, Democrats have worked relentlessly to undermine arbitration and the efficiencies arbitration agreements often have for private parties.

These agreements generally work well and the process itself is a fair and effective way to solve disagreements. Arbitration is also usually faster and cheaper than hiring an attorney and suiting up for drawn-out litigation.

Making arbitration harder for certain claims will mean Americans spend more time in court with no guarantee of getting better outcomes. The Democrat-driven campaign to up-end the use of arbitration will certainly benefit the plaintiff's bar. But it will make life worse for the American people.

With that context in mind, we can consider this amendment in light of the larger policy debate it is connected to. This amendment rests on the idea that pre-dispute arbitration agreements are fundamentally problematic and unfair or work poorly. But that is not true.

And this amendment cannot be considered in isolation. Instead, it is a policy gateway to the Democrats' longstanding priority to eliminate arbitration agreements entirely. This amendment should be rejected. Separately, it is true that we can have a debate over the merits of arbitration agreements now in the context of the NDAA, but we should not be having that debate here and now.

If the policy in this amendment is sound, Congress should consider that policy as an independent bill, in the light of day, and after appropriate congressional oversight.

Madam Speaker, I oppose this amendment because it is bad policy and because of this flawed process, and I urge my colleagues to do the same.

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Mr. TIFFANY. Madam Speaker, as I stated earlier, this is a policy gateway that the Democrats seek to eliminate arbitration. It has been a longstanding goal of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle to achieve that goal, and this opens up the door to it.

And I think about the debates that we have in the Judiciary Committee, where courts are being clogged up, talking about needing more judges, changing the circuits, things like that. This will add to the clogging of our courts, and that is why we should oppose this bill.

Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

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