Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2007

DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 2007 -- (Senate - August 02, 2006)

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Mr. CORNYN. Madam President, I thank and commend Senator Stevens and Senator Inouye for their hard work on the Defense appropriations bill. They have done a tremendous job of putting together a bill that funds programs critical to the global war on terror.

I come to the floor today to talk about another aspect of our national security, and that is our border security. This amendment is a border security emergency supplemental appropriations amendment that I filed to the Defense appropriations bill.

At the outset, I made clear to the chairman of the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee, Senator Stevens, and anyone else who was interested, this amendment does not reduce by one penny any funding for the Defense Department or our troops, nor would this amendment add to the budget deficit because it is emergency spending necessary to control our borders and improve our national security.

It has now been about 2 months since the Senate passed a comprehensive immigration reform bill and over 7 months since the House of Representatives passed its bill. We are at a stalemate, I think it is fair to say, with no apparent way out.

While there has been no progress over the past few months on comprehensive immigration reform and border security measures, I remain optimistic and certainly committed to sending the President a comprehensive immigration reform bill before the end of the year.

The enforcement titles in the House and Senate bills are, upon inspection, people would agree, very similar. And there are several different proposals for addressing the 12 million people who are currently living here out of status, including one Senator Kyl and I introduced about a year ago. Others have offered productive and constructive ideas and concepts, and I welcome all those who share my goal of moving this process forward and addressing this subject this year.

The main hurdle to a conference with the House and ultimately a bill approved by both Chambers is not a lack of common ground between the two bills. Instead, I submit it is a deep-rooted public skepticism that the Federal Government will enforce the immigration laws and fund enforcement programs that are necessary to maintain any level of integrity in our immigration system.

Unfortunately, Madam President, their skepticism is warranted. In 1986, Congress promised the American people that there would be a one-time amnesty and that increased enforcement would then prevent a buildup of illegal immigration in the country.

As we know, the amnesty came, but the enforcement did not. Unless and until Americans are confident that the Federal Government will control the border and enforce the law, they are unlikely to support an immigration bill that includes any temporary worker program.

One way to build that confidence is for Congress and this administration to fully fund border security and immigration enforcement programs starting with those that the Congress has already authorized and that the President has indicated are necessary to control our broken immigration system.

What are Americans to think when Congress authorizes additional Border Patrol agents and detention beds and claims then to have dealt with our broken borders, but when Congress turns around, it fails to fund the positions and the infrastructure that we just got through authorizing. Unfortunately, that has been the pattern too often over the last years.

Last week, Senators Kyl, Isakson, Chambliss, and I sent a letter to President Bush asking him to send Congress an emergency supplemental request to fully fund those programs; again, not new programs, by and large, but programs that have already been authorized by an act of Congress, signed into law by the President but never funded, in addition to a couple of additional programs the President himself has said we need in order to deal with this problem. A request by the President would send a clear message that the time for the status quo is over, it is no longer acceptable, and that the Federal Government will fund and, yes, will enforce the immigration laws of the United States.

But I am also prepared to proceed with an amendment to this Defense appropriations bill, the amendment that is before the Senate. It is my hope and desire that by funding enforcement programs that we will increase the credibility of the Federal Government when it comes to actually creating a system that will work and will facilitate a successful conference on comprehensive immigration reform between the House and the Senate.

This amendment in no way eliminates the need for comprehensive immigration reform. It is not a substitute for it, and I believe that comprehensive immigration reform should and can be done in a single piece of legislation. In fact, this amendment, rather than being a substitute for that comprehensive immigration reform, is just the opposite. This amendment will allow us to find common ground on visa reform and ways to address the 12 million individuals who are currently living in the shadows and outside our laws.

Absent action on this sort of credibility-restoring measure, I am afraid that we will find ourselves at a continued stalemate and do nothing.

My amendment would fund an additional 500 Border Patrol agents, along with the necessary support staff, training, and education to help make our borders safe. The President called for an additional 2,500 agents, and this appropriations amendment would allow him and us to meet that goal.

This amendment would also fund 1,300 additional detention beds which would allow the Department of Homeland Security to end its policy of catch and release more quickly.

The Intelligence Reform Act of 2004 authorized 8,000 additional beds, but Congress and the President have only funded 6,700 additional beds.

This amendment would provide $60 million to fund the US-VISIT entry-exit system. But the GAO report released today that revealed that undercover agents routinely were able to enter the country with false documents demonstrates, in as current fashion as today's news, the need to move forward with a biometric entry-exit system, and this amendment would provide the funds to do exactly that, something we have already passed and has been authorized but which we have not funded.

The President has also called for an expansion of the electronic verification system that would allow employers to quickly and more reliably determine whether new hires are authorized to work legally in the United States.

Unfortunately, the basic pilot program, which is a voluntary program, but it is only utilized by a handful of employers, has not been successful because it is not mandatory and it is not nationwide, and the Government today, even under this voluntary program, struggles to service the 10,000 employers who do voluntarily participate.

If we were serious about expanding the verification system to all employers around the country--which means approximately 6 million companies--on the timeframes proposed by the House and Senate, Congress needs to fully fund that program. This amendment would do that.

Anyone who has visited the border region knows that the infrastructure of our Coast Guard and our Border Patrol is woefully out of date. At one point, all of the P-3 surveillance aircraft along the border were grounded due to structural failures. This amendment therefore funds $973 million for Coast Guard improvements in vessels, aircraft, and equipment, and to replace air assets and engage in air fleet modernization--something that is long overdue. This funding was previously passed by the Senate in H.R. 4939, only to be stripped during the conference report.

Of course, this amendment alone will not fix our broken immigration system. We need comprehensive reform. But until Congress regains the credibility it so sorely needs to be able to move forward on comprehensive immigration reform, we will remain stuck as we are now with the Senate, which has passed a bill and the House which has passed a bill failing to convene a conference and work out our differences and actually provide a solution to this problem.

We do need comprehensive immigration reform. We need to create a temporary worker program for those who come to our country and want to work legally and then return to their country of origin. We need to address the 12 million individuals who are currently living in the shadows who are already present, living among us.

I remain committed to comprehensive immigration reform and I will continue to advocate for a bill that provides economic and national security. But I believe that funding for our border security is a necessary and essential step in that direction and I urge my colleagues to support this amendment.

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