Department of Homeland Security Appropriations Act, 2012

Floor Speech

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Mr. POLIS. Mr. Chairman, I thank the Rules Committee for allowing an open rule, including the offering of my commonsense amendment which would save millions of dollars by cutting funding to 287(g), something that is called an immigration enforcement program which actually increases crime by expanding the mandate of our local crime-fighting officials.

This program effectively adds responsibilities, which should be Federal responsibilities, to local law enforcement so that they effectively engage in Federal immigration enforcement. So instead of keeping serious criminals from threatening our communities, the 287(g) program forces police to waste their time trying to figure out the immigration status of noncriminals, as well as opening them up to charges of racial profiling which can be expensive to defend.

Instead of using our precious national security dollars on these kinds of programs, this bill has estimated savings of $6.4 million for the next year alone. The inspector general found this program cost $68 million.

These programs force local law enforcement officers to follow and enforce Federal laws even though they are not trained to do so. That is why law enforcement officers from across the country have spoken out against it. The IG found 33 problems the first time they investigated 287(g) last year. The biggest problem was that they found the program did not focus on noncitizens who actually pose a threat to public safety. Instead, it focused on noncitizens who pose no threat to public safety.

Mr. Chairman, 287(g) forces police officers to enforce laws that they are not trained to do, which is why law enforcement leaders across the board tend to oppose this law. Chief Acevedo from Austin said: ``It's a matter of resources and priority. My priority is dealing with criminals and terrorism issues, not dealing with civil matters.''

I would point out that the failure to enforce our Federal immigration laws is a Federal failure. It is a national failure. It is a national disgrace. But the answer is not to add an additional burden to our hardworking men and women who are working at local law enforcement to keep our communities safe at a time when their budgets are being constrained, both the money they receive from Washington as well as their local and State revenue.

Why are we not listening to our local law enforcement officials? Instead of cutting funding for firefighters and police, we should stop wasting taxpayer funds on failed programs like 287(g).

I would like to show the detrimental effect of the 287(g) program. You can see across Arizona, Statewide, incidents of violent crime went down 12 percent in the last 10 years. But they have one particular sheriff who does a particularly bad job of protecting his community. His name is Sheriff Arpaio. He is one of the notorious abusers of the 287(g) program. In his community, Maricopa County, crime went up 58 percent. So you have a 12 percent decrease, and then you have this incompetent sheriff who has a 58 percent increase. Now he might be incompetent in other areas as well, but one of the main reasons crime has gone up in Maricopa County is because he has diverted law enforcement resources to try to enforce Federal laws that we in this body are irresponsibly ignoring day in and day out and that this bill does nothing to fix.

In recent years, local law enforcement has increased community policing efforts, working with our residents, both documented and undocumented, to finally defeat violent crime and keep our communities safe. This is the reason why law enforcement officers across my community, including sheriffs and police chiefs, are strongly opposed to 287(g), which stretches local police forces beyond the breaking point, hinders law enforcement, and causes real harm and danger to American citizens living in our communities.

I call on Congress to fix our broken immigration system. We need to enforce our Federal laws. We need better border security. Nobody from either side of the aisle disagrees with that. But it is time to stop playing politics with this issue and stop trying to foist a Federal responsibility into our already overtaxed local community law enforcement efforts, increasing crime and putting innocent Americans in harm's way at the risk of violent crime. I strongly urge a ``yes'' vote on my amendment.

I yield back the balance of my time.

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