National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2014--Continued

Floor Speech

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Mr. DURBIN. I thank the Senator very much.

THE DREAM ACT

Mr. President, maybe we will be in session 24 hours, 48 hours, 72 hours, and then we are finished, the year 2013 comes to a close. The unfortunate thing from where I am standing is we have missed an opportunity. About 6
months ago, we passed a comprehensive immigration reform bill. It had been 25 years in the making.

We know our immigration system is broken. We know it is unfair. We know people are suffering because of it. And we know we can do better. So we came together and 68 of us voted on the floor of the Senate, about 6 months ago, to pass comprehensive immigration reform.

I worked on that bill with seven colleagues--four Democrats, four Republicans. We came up with a good bill, not a bill I agree with in all of its specifics, but one that I think is a good, fair compromise.

We sent it to the House of Representatives. They have done nothing--nothing. They made some statements--some encouraging, some discouraging. The fact is, they never called this bill.

Mr. President, 2014 is another opportunity for the House of Representatives to rise to this challenge, and I hope they will.

There are many parts of that bill that are so essential--strengthening our border, a very important issue to all Americans, particularly on the other side of the aisle; a pathway to citizenship, just a matter of simple, elemental justice, which is a passion on our side of the aisle. We brought those two concepts together to make the bill work.

But included in those concepts is an idea which I introduced into legislation about 13 years ago. It was called the DREAM Act. It basically said if you came to the United States as a child, were brought here in undocumented status or overstayed a visa and were here undocumented, finished high school, had no serious criminal background, we would give you a chance, a chance to earn your way to citizenship--legality and citizenship.

Last week, I visited a group on the Mall who were fighting for immigration reform. Since the middle of November, these immigration, faith, and labor leaders have been fasting, urging the House of Representatives to take up this responsibility and pass the immigration bill.

Their commitment to fighting for immigration reform has inspired people all across this Nation to join the movement and to tell stories about families torn apart by the broken immigration law in America.

We cannot ignore the injustice of this system and the suffering that millions of people in our own country are living with.

I want to urge Speaker Boehner to move forward on immigration reform in 2014. I understand there is a small, very vocal, very negative minority of his caucus that refuses to support any change in immigration law. But that is nothing new. In our Nation of immigrants, there has always been that force at work. In the time of Abraham Lincoln's Presidency, they even had a political party. It was the Know-Nothing Party. They opposed immigrants. They opposed Catholics. They were virtually against everything. Lincoln campaigned against them, and eventually they disappeared from the American political scene. But their sentiments can always be found at every point in our history.

The one part of this immigration bill, as I mentioned earlier, that is near and dear to me is the DREAM Act. I fought to pass it for 12 years. There were times when we called the DREAM Act on the floor of the U.S. Senate, and I would look up in the gallery and it would be filled with young people, men and women wearing graduation gowns and mortar boards, to remind people that they were undocumented, officially unwelcome in America, and yet their heart was here and their lives have been spent here and they were just asking for a chance to be part of our future. Some heartbreaking moments when the amendment was defeated on the floor of the Senate and I met with them; some encouraging moments when the comprehensive bill passed and included the strongest DREAM Act language that we have ever written.

For most of their lives, these young people have been trapped in the shadows, fearing they could be deported at any moment and facing obstacles to developing their talents in this country. Isn't it ironic that we have invested so much already in their lives--educating them, giving them an opportunity to thrive in this Nation--and then, right at that moment when they are ready to go to college or go into a job--we tell them: Leave. We do not want you. That is not right. It is not fair. It does not make any sense.

Last year, President Obama did something that was significant. He announced his administration would grant temporary legal status to these immigrant students who grew up in the United States. This historic program is known as DACA. DACA stands for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals. It gave the DREAMers a chance to come out of the shadows and be part of America. In the last year, more than 567,000 people have applied for this DACA status; 460,000 have received it.

Later today or tomorrow, the Senate will vote on the nomination of Alejandro Mayorkas to be Deputy Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, which I will support.

As Director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, Mr. Mayorkas has been charged with implementing DACA, the President's Executive order.

It was a complicated job, but Mr. Mayorkas did it in an outstanding way.

Earlier this week my colleague and friend Senator Grassley of Iowa spoke on the floor about Mr. Mayorkas and the DACA program. I wish to take a moment to respond to some of the things he said in the Congressional Record.

Senator Grassley initially questioned the legality of this DACA program. I want to be clear. DACA is entirely appropriate and legal. Throughout our history, our government has decided which persons should be prosecuted and which ones would not be prosecuted based on law enforcement priority and available resources. Past administrations of both political parties have stopped deportations of low-priority cases. Courts have long recognized their authority to do that.

In a decision last year striking down Arizona's immigration laws, the Court reaffirmed that the Federal Government has broad authority over who is going to be deported. Republican-appointed Justice Anthony Kennedy, who wrote the opinion, said: ``A principle feature of the removal system is the broad discretion exercised by immigration officials.''

The President's action is not just legal, it is smart. It is realistic. Today there are millions of undocumented immigrants in the United States. The government has to set priorities. Those with criminal records, serious criminal records, should leave. They should be deported--no excuses. Under the Obama administration's policy, that is a high priority. That is the way it should be.

Senator Grassley also claimed on the floor that the immigration service has not released adequate information about the DACA program. I disagree with my colleague and friend. USCIS has been transparent about this process, publishing data on its Web site showing the number of applicants who applied and those who have been accepted and rejected.

For the past few years I have come to the floor of the Senate regularly to tell real-life stories of those DREAMers. I have done it over 50 times. We actually had a reunion of the DREAMers I have spoken of on the floor of the Senate. I want to take some time today to update the story of one of those DREAMers.

This is a photograph of two brothers, Carlos and Rafael. They are siblings who were brought to the United States by their parents when they were kids. Carlos grew up in suburban Chicago, graduated from Palatine High School, where he was an honors student. In high school Carlos was captain of the tennis team, a member of the varsity swim team. He volunteered with Palatine's Physically Challenged Program, where every day he helped feed lunch to special needs students.

Listen to what one of Carlos's high school teachers said about him:

Carlos is the kind of person we want among us because he makes the community better. This is the kind of kid you want as a student, the kind of kid you want as a neighbor, the kind of kid you want as a friend to your child and, most germane to his present circumstance, the kind of person you want as an American.

It is good news. Last week Carlos graduated from Loyola University in Chicago, majoring in education. His lifelong dream was to be a teacher. It almost did not come true. You see, last year Carlos and his brother Rafael were placed in deportation proceedings. They were going to be expelled from the United States. I asked the Obama administration to reconsider. They decided to suspend the deportation. That was the right thing to do. After graduating from Loyola University, Carlos was offered a teaching position starting in just a few weeks. Carlos will be teaching at Schurz High School, a Chicago public school on the northwest side. In addition to his teaching duties, Carlos will also be helping with the school's DREAMers organization and the tennis team, a sport he knew well from high school.

There is no question that we need the best and brightest to teach in our schools. We need people like Carlos who are committed to the next generation of tomorrow's leaders.

Teach for America knows that great teachers can come from all walks of life, from graduating seniors in our Nation's most elite colleges, to former investment bankers and veterans. Last week Teach for America announced that it plans to actively recruit DREAMers who have received DACA deferment, so more DREAMers like Carlos will be able to give back to the country they know. They will be in classrooms not only teaching the important subjects, but with their very lives they will be teaching the next generation of Americans what immigration has always meant to this country.

I ask my colleagues who stand on the floor critical of the administration's deportation policies, would America be better off if Carlos had been deported last year? Would Chicago be better if this bright, idealistic young teacher was not headed to the classrooms in a few weeks to try to help educate the next generation of leaders in this country? Of course not.

To hear Carlos's story is to realize the benefits immigration reform will bring to America. Imagine what is going to happen when 11 million undocumented immigrants have the opportunity to step out of the shadows, like these DREAMers, and contribute fully to America. Imagine what it will mean to them to no longer live in fear of a knock on the door, to be able to declare who they are, where they live, who is in their family, to be able to work without any fear, to be able to travel, to go back to important family events in other countries and return to the United States.

Legalization will unleash the earning potential of millions of people. They will be able to pursue jobs that match their skills instead of working in the underground economy.

It is the right thing to do. It will make America stronger. I am confident that wiser voices will prevail in the House of Representatives.

Just the other day I had a conference call with Catholic bishops. They have made this a special effort on their part to support comprehensive immigration reform. They were from all over the United States. In addition to their prayers, I asked them to reach out to their congregations, tell stories like Carlos's story and Rafael's story, and tell people this is really very fundamental and basic when it comes to issues of justice.

FOR-PROFIT COLLEGES AND UNIVERSITIES

Mr. President, I have come to the floor I cannot tell you how many times to talk about an industry in America--the for-profit college and university industry. I have talked about the basics. Most people could not tell you what for-profit colleges are or which ones are for-profit. Well, the major colleges--I will start at the top with the Apollo Group, the University of Phoenix, and DeVry out of Illinois is second. Kaplan, which was owned by the Washington Post, is third. There are a lot of other ones.

What is interesting about these colleges and universities is they could not exist without generous subsidies from the Federal Government. Here is what happens. They lure students into enrolling in their schools. The students, often because they are low income, qualify for Pell grants and student loans. The Pell grants and student loans flow from the government through the student into the for-profit schools.

It turns out there is a 90-10 rule. Imagine this. These for-profit schools cannot take more than 90 percent of their revenue from the Federal Government--90 percent. They are 10 percent away from being a total Federal agency. But they make amazing amounts of money, huge amounts of money. They pay their CEOs millions of dollar because this is a very lucrative undertaking.

But there are three things you should remember about for-profit schools--three numbers. You will know what the challenge is if you remember these three numbers:

Twelve. Twelve percent of all the graduates of high school go to for-profit schools.

Twenty-five. Twenty-five percent of all the Federal aid for education goes to these schools.

Forty-seven. Forty-seven percent of all the student loan defaults are with students who have enrolled in these for-profit schools.

So 12 percent of the students, 25 percent of the Federal aid for education, and 47 percent of the student loan defaults.

Why are these students defaulting? There are several reasons. One reason is that the diplomas from these schools are not worth much. I will tell a few stories in a moment. The other reason is that once the school enrolls these students and brings in their student loans, they really do not care that much as to whether they finish. It is not that important to them. The money has already flowed to the school. A third reason, of course, is that many of these students finish school, and with their questionable or worthless diplomas, they cannot find jobs. What happens then? They cannot make their student loan payments.

I will tell some specific stories when I talk about one of these for-profit school operations. It is called Corinthian Colleges, which is a publicly traded corporation that owns for-profit schools in the United States and Canada. It is now in the spotlight for engaging in manipulative marketing and deceptive job-placement practices.

Earlier this week, a Huffington Post article called attention to these abuses. It was entitled ``How a For-Profit College Created Fake Jobs to Get Taxpayer Money.'' The headline says the whole story. The article reports that Corinthian has been encouraging the manipulation of job-placement rates to entice students to sign up for programs and to avoid the scrutiny of the government and the accreditors.

Corinthian College subsidiaries--Everest College is one of them--have been criticized in the past for having high dropout rates and some of the highest 3-year loan default rates in America even while its tuition rates are higher than community colleges or even flagship State schools for an equivalent degree. In spite of the bad press, Corinthian Colleges--such as Everest--have managed to come out on top, increasing enrollment, increasing profit margins, and increasing payments for their executives. It would appear these gains were at least in part due to the manipulative marketing practices and a corporate culture of deceit toward its students.

According to this article, Eric Parms enrolled in Everest College's heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning repair program in the summer of 2011. Eric had been laid off from his job. He was attracted to Everest because of the promise from its advertisements and recruiters that their HVAC program would lead to a good job and a decent living. So Eric picked up his family--his wife and two sons--and he moved from Ohio to Georgia to enroll in this Corinthian school, the Everest College program. He was a good student. Eric received all A's, only missing one class on the day his 7-year-old son was diagnosed with leukemia. After completing the 9-month program, Eric Parms was left with a $17,000 student loan debt and could not find a job.

What Eric did not know was Everest College was paying more than a dozen local employers what they called an on-boarding allowance of $2,000 a head to secure 30 days of employment for their graduates. These were not real jobs; these were jobs which Corinthian Colleges--Everest College--were frankly bankrolling so it looked as if their graduates were going to work. The money was purportedly a fee to help pay for things such as training and uniforms. In reality, by paying companies to take graduates for temporary jobs, the Everest College was able to boost its official job-placement rate unrealistically. This helped Everest College continue to fly under the radar of its accreditors.

However, Corinthian paid companies for jobs without considering the long-term effects on students. The fact that they would sign them up for 30 days and then turn them loose really did not mean that much to Corinthian; they just had to show that they went to work at some point.

Well, after he graduated Eric had to beg the school's career service counselor to even set up interviews. Even then, he would arrive at interviews supposedly set up for him, and the potential employers would tell him they had never heard of Everest College. Remember, Eric Parms was on the hook for $17,000 in student loans for this course he took.

Finally, Eric was set up by career services to work in a contract position with ADG Enterprises laying electrical wires. After less than 2 months on the job, he was laid off and cut off from career services from Everest. Everest had used him to get $17,000 in student loans and turned him loose without a job, without a future.

In fact, managers discouraged career counselors at Everest from re-placing people who had already been placed in a job. They were instead encouraged to send graduates to companies with high turnover rates, to provide temporary positions just so they could show that their graduates went to work even if it was just for a few days. The school had effectively placed Eric in a short-term internship program. Once it was over, there was no incentive for them to keep him. They turned him loose to vacate a space for another graduate and another $2,000 check. Then Everest would shuffle another graduate into the same position to artificially maintain that they were placing students in jobs. This was fraud--not just a fraud on the public, not just a fraud on the students, but a fraud on American taxpayers by Corinthian Colleges.

Eric lost out on the deal--a $17,000 debt for a training degree he could not use. To get a Georgia HVAC contractor license, he needed to have significant work experience and references, and no one would hire him because they did not take his degree from Everest--part of the Corinthian College system--seriously.

The practice of paying employers to hire graduates from this Everest campus ended in 2011, but it was not the only Corinthian school engaging in these practices. The California attorney general recently filed suit against Corinthian for using fraudulent marketing, paying companies to temporarily hire graduates, and using other tactics to meet accreditation standards and job-placement rates. These other tactics included paying temporary agencies to hire graduates for temporary positions while basically counting a 1-day volunteer event for dental assistant graduates as a job placement and, worse yet, ``placing'' graduates at nonexistent businesses they created as part of a class project to design business cards.

It was a big game for Corinthian, and they got paid off handsomely by Federal taxpayers and these unsuspecting students.

Corinthian has also outright misrepresented job placement rates to students by advertising numbers substantially higher than their actual rates. These deceptive practices give the illusion that this is a successful undertaking. Go to Everest and get a job. It turns out that it is a charade.

In addition to manipulation of job placement rates, recruiters for Corinthian colleges and schools withhold pertinent information from students to get them to enroll.

Lindsay Ryan, another student at Everest College who contacted my office, studied criminal justice online and was 12 weeks away from graduation when she learned that Everest was not regionally accredited and that she wouldn't be able to find a job in her field in the State of Illinois.

One would think that a college offering courses to people in Illinois would have some obligation to tell them whether or not a degree or certificate from that school could lead to a job in that State?

In Lindsay's case it didn't.

Do you know what Everest College suggested to Lindsay after she had been duped into this so-called education? They suggested she move to Florida where she might be able to use an Everest College degree. That wasn't an option for Lindsay and her family.

Now she sits, unemployed, supporting three children, her husband, and a $24,000 student loan debt to this Corinthian college, Everest College, for a worthless degree.

Over the past decade Corinthian colleges have received from the Federal Government nearly $10 billion in student aid--$10 billion. That makes up more than 80 percent of the total revenue of this college. These schools, these for-profit schools, are sucking on the Federal Treasury to come up with billions of dollars to get rich at the expense of taxpayers and these poor exploited students.

Corinthian grew during our recession, reaching a peak enrollment of 93,000 students, doubling revenue up to $1.7 billion in 2011. This is in part due to a persuasive but deceptive marketing plan promising a better career to people such as Eric and Lindsay who were looking for a way out during difficult times.

Toya Smith, a former Everest career counselor who was interviewed by Huffington Post, recognized that for-profit schools burden students with large debts, a questionable degree, and poor job prospects--while the company was profiting on Federal dollars.

She said: ``You're selling a dream to a student that you know, in reality, they are not ever going to realize.''

Did I mention Toya was a former counselor at Everest? She told the truth.

How many more times will Corinthian end up in the news for deplorable stories such as these? I have asked the CEO of Corinthian to explain these practices. His name is Massimino. He was paid more than $3 million in total compensation the last year that was reported by this corporation. I have asked him not to engage in this conduct again.

I have also written to Everest College's national accreditors, the Accrediting Council for Independent Colleges and Schools and the Accrediting Commission of Career Schools and Colleges, asking what steps they are going to take to sanction Everest for these egregious abuses of the public trust.

Finally, I have asked the Secretary of Education, Arne Duncan, to look into these allegations and to use whatever authorities the Department may have to hold Everest and its parent company, Corinthian, accountable.

If no authorities exist, I have asked him to work with me in Congress to give the Department the ability to respond more aggressively to abuses such as the ones I have outlined for Corinthian.

It is time to put an end to the corporate culture of deception and data manipulation that pervades the for-profit school industry. They are wasting taxpayers' dollars. They are abusing students and their families. We in Congress are not doing what we should.

We have to protect these students and their families. We have to protect America's taxpayers from for-profit schools that are taking advantage of the law.

I yield the floor and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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