Community Protection Act of 2006
COMMUNITY PROTECTION ACT OF 2006 -- (House of Representatives - September 21, 2006)
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Ms. ZOE LOFGREN of California. Madam Speaker, as the ranking member has mentioned, I am a member of the Immigration Subcommittee and also the Homeland Security Committee. As a consequence, I had an opportunity to participate in some of these so-called immigration hearings in the last several months.
I must say that the impression that one receives, the inevitable impression, is that there has been a lot of talk, but as they say in the South, not much walk. Unfortunately, I think today is more of the same.
Since 1995, when the Senate and House gained their Republican majorities, 5.3 million undocumented immigrants have come into the United States. Since 2001, when President Bush assumed the Presidency, over 2 million undocumented immigrants came into the United States. We have seen 12 years, basically, 12 years of Republican rule in the House and Senate, their power, and basically nothing has happened. Nothing has happened.
And now with 5 legislative days left before we adjourn and go out to meet our voters, there are these bills that are being brought to the floor that haven't had hearings, that don't scratch the issues of the real security issues that face us. Interesting enough, these bills don't even come close to what several of the witnesses at what Congressman Flake termed the ``faux'' hearings in August, what those witnesses told us.
For example, Sheriff Lee Baca of Los Angeles County, I think the largest sheriff's jurisdiction in the country, said he supported comprehensive reform, not piecemeal reform and sets of bills that failed to address the full border security issue.
I think if we take a look at the substance of these bills, and I don't think that is even what is intended here, but if we do, we will see how little these proposals would actually accomplish.
No one is going to stick up for criminal alien gangs, not me, not anybody. But the provisions in the act are not going to be effective.
The State and local cooperation, the enforcement of the Immigration Law Act, does not require police to report immigration status of crime victims, and it really is not going to do what I think the authors suggest.
Title II, is a provision, it is a sense of the Congress that the Attorney General should adopt guidelines for the prosecution of smuggling offenses. That should have been done quite some time ago. It reminds me of the bill that we passed earlier this week, and I was unable to be on the floor, where we urge that the Attorney General and the Department of Homeland Security gain control of our borders in 18 months' time. What about now? What about the last 12 years?
So again, we are going through pretty much a charade here. Meanwhile, the President zeroed out funding for the State criminal alien assistance program. Really every year since 2001 he has zeroed it out, and the Republican-controlled Congress barely funded it at half of what was authorized. In fiscal year 2006, Congress only appropriated $405 million even though $750 million was authorized.
The list of failures goes on and on, but the truth or the proof is in the pudding. And I think as voters take a look at a situation that is not a good one, the border is not orderly, at millions of illegal aliens who have come in under the watch of the Republican Congress and see here today the scrambling around to look like we are doing something, I think they will understand that they are being played for fools.
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Ms. ZOE LOFGREN of California. Madam Speaker, really, we are talking a lot, but if we had acted in the last 12 years, we would be in a lot better situation.
It has been mentioned that violent gang members should not be admitted to the United States and that somehow we need to change the law in order to accomplish that. I would note, however, that under section 212 of the Immigration and Nationality Act, gang members are already inadmissible to the United States; and if we had adequate personnel, they would have been turned away at the border. And thinking about what we could have done, we could have voted the resources over the years to do that. I will just mention a few votes that every Republican on the floor voted against.
In 2001, rollcall vote No. 454 in November of 2001, Democrats suggested that we add $223 million for border security to help meet the promises of the PATRIOT Act on border staffing and what the 9/11 Commission recommended. What happened? On a party-line vote, that additional resources to keep gang members out was defeated.
In 2003, rollcall vote No. 301 in June of 2003, Republicans voted against consideration of an amendment that would have added $300 million for border security, including making a further down payment on the promise of the Congress in the 2001 PATRIOT Act to triple the number of border agents and inspectors along the northern border, and all the Republicans on the floor here today voted against that.
Vote No. 305 in 2003 was additional appropriations that Democrats were recommending, $300 million, again to enhance border security and keep gang members and others out of the United States. And again Republicans all voted against it; the Democrats voted for it.
Rollcall vote No. 243 in 2004, again Republicans voted against consideration of an amendment that would have added $750 million for border security.
In 2005, rollcall vote No. 160, Democrats tried again, and Republicans voted against a motion to report back to conference with instructions to add $284 million for additional border security measures. That $284 million would have included funding for an additional 550 Border Patrol agents, 200 additional immigration agents, and additional border aerial vehicles.
In 2005, rollcall vote 174, once again Republicans voted against consideration of amendments that would have added $400 million to border security. And later in 2005, rollcall vote No. 187, Republicans voted against a Democratic substitute that would have added 800 additional immigration agents and 8,000 additional detention beds, helping to meet the promise of the 9/11 Commission.
In 2005, rollcall vote 188, again Republicans voted against a motion to recommit the Homeland Security Authorization bill with instructions so that we could add 800 additional immigration agents and 8,000 additional detention beds.
And, of course, rollcall vote 56 in 2006, Republicans defeated an amendment to H.R. 4939, the supplemental approps that would have added $600 million for border security measures in the bill, including $400 million for installation, 1,500 radiation portal monitors and air patrols and the like.
Again, rollcall vote 210 this year, Republicans voted against consideration of an amendment that would have added $2.1 billion for border security, helping us to meet our commitments by adding additional Border Patrol agents, immigration agents, and detention beds.
Now, in the face of all of this negativism, we have here in the last 6 days of this Congress fluff. Fluff. I don't think the American people are going to buy it.
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