Border Security, Economic Opportunity, and Immigration Modernization Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. RUBIO. Mr. President, over the last few days I have received numerous e-mails and calls from conservatives and tea party activists from across the country regarding immigration. Their opinions really matter to me because they were with me 3 years ago when so many people in Washington--and in Florida, for that matter--thought I had no chance to win my election.

Let me say these people are patriots. They are Americans from all walks of life who are deeply concerned about the direction our country is headed, and they are increasingly unhappy about the immigration reform proposal in the Senate. It is not because they are ``anti-immigrant'' as some like to say, and it is not because they are closed-minded. They believe, as do I, that as a sovereign country, we have a right to secure our borders and we have a right to have immigration laws to enforce them.

They are increasingly opposed to this effort because for over three decades and despite many promises to enforce the law, the Federal Government, under both Republicans and Democrats, has failed to do so.

In the end, it is not just immigration reform itself that worries them; it is the government that has failed them so many times before. They realize we have a legal immigration system that needs reform. They realize we have over 11 million people currently living in our country illegally and that we have to deal with them. They just simply believe no matter what law we
pass, we cannot trust the Federal Government to ever actually enforce it.

This sentiment was best summed up for me in an e-mail I received from Sharon Calvert, a prominent tea party leader in Tampa, FL. She wrote:

Today, June 2013, we are in a very different political climate than we were after the last election. We are in a political climate of distrust. Distrust of government and elected representatives is at its highest.

She goes on to say:

Do we want to trust this administration to faithfully enforce a bill to the best interests of all Americans with a bill that few have read?

She makes a powerful point.

After finding out that the IRS investigates people based on their political views, all the questions that remain about Benghazi, and seeing the Justice Department target reporters, trust in the Federal Government is rightfully at an all-time low.

I share this skepticism about this administration and Washington in general. In just the 2 years I have been here, I have seen the games played and the promises broken and how the American people ultimately suffer the consequences. That is exactly what led me to get involved in this issue in the first place.

We have a badly broken legal immigration system--not only one that does not work; it actually encourages illegal immigration. We have a border with Mexico that, despite billions of dollars already spent, is still not secured. Every day, people, drugs, and guns are trafficked across the border, and we have 11 million people living in this country illegally in de facto amnesty.

What I am describing is the way things are now. This is the status quo, and it is a terrible mess. It is hurting our country terribly, and unless we do something about it, this administration isn't going to fix it.

Political pundits love to focus on the politics of all this, but for me this isn't about catering to any group for political gain. Predictably, despite all the work we have done on immigration reform, some so-called ``pro-immigrant'' groups continue to protest me daily.

This isn't about winning points from the establishment or the mainstream media either, by the way. No matter how consistent I have been in focusing on the border security aspects of reform, whenever I have spoken about it the beltway media has accused me of trying to undermine or walk away from this reform.

This isn't about becoming a Washington dealmaker. Truthfully, it would have been a lot easier to just sit back, vote against any proposal, and give speeches about how I would have done it differently.

Finally, this certainly isn't about gaining support for future office. Many conservative commentators and leaders--people whom I deeply respect and with whom I agree on virtually every other issue--are disappointed about my involvement in this debate.

I got involved in this issue for one simple reason: I ran for office to try to fix things that are hurting this special country. In the end, that is what this is about for me--trying to fix a serious problem that faces America.

The proposal before the Senate is by no means perfect. As does any proposal that will come before the Senate, it has flaws; but it also has important reforms that conservatives have been trying to get for years. For example, it changes our legal immigration system from a predominantly family-based system of chain migration to a merit-based system that focuses on job skills.

This proposal mandates the most ambitious border and interior security measures in our Nation's history. For example, it requires and funds the completion of 700 miles of real border fence. It adds 20,000 new border agents. It details a specific technology plan for each sector of the border. It requires E-Verify for every employer in America. And it creates a tracking system to identify people who overstay their visas.

These are all things that at a minimum must happen before those in the country illegally can apply for permanent status. And the proposal deals with those who are here illegally in a reasonable but responsible way. Right now, those here illegally are living in de facto amnesty. This is what I mean by that: They are unregistered, many pay no taxes, and few will ever have to pay a price for having violated our laws.

Under this bill they will have to come forward. They will have to pass background checks. They will have to pay a fine. They will have to start paying taxes. They will be ineligible for welfare, for food stamps, and for ObamaCare.

In return, the only thing they get is a temporary work permit, and they can't renew it in 6 years unless they can prove they have been holding a job and paying their taxes. For at least 10 years, that is all they can have. After all that, they cannot even apply for permanent status until the fence is built, the Border Patrol agents are hired, and the border security technology, E-Verify, and the tracking system are fully in place.

Yet despite all of these measures, opposition from many conservatives has grown significantly in the last few weeks. Why? Well, because they have heard the Secretary of Homeland Security can just ignore the border requirement. But this is not true. The Department does have the discretion on where to build the fence but not on the amount of fencing it must build. At the end of the day, it is simple: 700 miles of pedestrian fencing must be built.

They have also heard the Secretary of Homeland Security can just waive the radar and the drones and the ground sensors and the other technology required in the bill. But that is just not true. The Secretary can always add more to the plan, but the list of border security measures we mandate in the legislation is the minimum that must be implemented.

Some oppose it because they have heard ``a future Congress can just defund all of the security measures'' as they have done in the past. But that is just not true. The money is built into the bill. Unlike previous border security laws, it doesn't leave it dependent on future funding.

They also oppose the bill because they have heard it creates a taxpayer subsidy for people to buy a car or a scooter. That is just not true. Nothing in this bill allows that.

Finally, they oppose the bill because they have heard that last Friday, a brandnew, 1,100-page bill no one has read is what is now before the Senate. That is just not true. This is the exact same bill that has been publicly available for 10 weeks. The main addition to it are about 120 pages of border security because in order to add 700 miles of fence, 20,000 border agents, and a prohibition on things such as foreign students or tourists from getting ObamaCare, we had to add pages to the bill.

Now, I understand--I do--why after reading these false claims people would be opposed to this bill. I also understand why, after we have been burned by large bills in the past, people are suspicious of big reforms of any kind. I understand why, after promises made in the past on immigration have not been kept, people doubt whether they will ever be kept again in the future.

But I also understand what is going to happen if at some point we do not come up with an agreement we can support on immigration reform. What is going to happen is we will still have a broken legal immigration system. We will not have more Border Patrol officers. We will not have enough fencing. We still will not have mandatory E-Verify. And we will still have 11 million people living here illegally.

That is why I am involved, because despite all of the problems we have with government, the only way to mandate a fence, E-Verify, and more agents is to pass a law that does so.

I knew getting these requirements into the bill would not be easy. This administration insisted the border is already secure, and they fought every effort to improve the border security parts of this bill. The administration wants the fastest and easiest path to citizenship possible, and they fought every condition and every trigger in this bill.

I got involved because I knew if conservatives didn't get involved in shaping this proposal, it would not have any of the border security reforms our Nation desperately needs.

Getting to this point has been very difficult. To hear the worry and the anxiety and the growing anger in the voices of so many people who helped me get elected to the Senate, whom I agree with on virtually every other issue, has been a real trial for me. I know they love America, and they are deeply worried about the direction this administration is trying to take our country.

When I was a candidate, I told people I wanted to come here and fight. I want to fight to protect what is good for America and fight to stop what is bad for America. I believe what we have now regarding immigration is hurting our country badly, and I simply wasn't going to just leave it to Democrats alone to figure out how to fix it.

I guess perhaps at the heart of my support of this proposal is that I know firsthand that while immigrants have always impacted America, America changes immigrants even more. Just a generation ago my parents lived in poverty in another country.

America changed them. It gave them a chance to improve their lives. It gave them the opportunity to open doors for me that were closed to them. And the longer they lived here, the older their kids got, the more conservative they became, the more convinced they became that limited government and free enterprise and our constitutional liberties made this Nation special.

I am a firsthand witness to the transformative power of our country, how it does not just change people's pocketbooks, it changes their hearts and their minds. Despite all the challenges and despite our broken government, I still believe this is that kind of country.

I realize in the end many of my fellow conservatives will not be able to support this reform. But I hope you will understand that I honestly believe it is the right thing to do for this country--to finally have an immigration system that works, to finally have a fence, to finally have more agents and E-Verify, and to finally put an end to de facto amnesty.

In my heart and in my mind, I know we must solve this problem once and for all or it will only get worse and it will only get harder to solve.

To my fellow conservatives, I will continue to fight alongside you for real tax reform, for lowering our debt, for balancing our budget, for reducing regulations, for rolling back job-killing environmental policies, and for repealing the disaster of ObamaCare. To my fellow conservatives, I will continue to fight alongside you for the sanctity of life and for traditional marriage. But I will also continue to work in the hopes of one day uniting behind a common conservative strategy on how to fix our broken immigration system once and for all.

I yield the floor.

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