Immigration Reform

Floor Speech

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Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, we are here today as part of the New Democratic Coalition Immigration Task Force, which I am proud to cochair along with my colleagues, Representative Garcia and Representative Castro.

I am here to discuss immigration reform and what the path forward is for an issue that over 70 percent of the American people agree, an issue that right now threatens the security of this country, that continues to cost taxpayers money; but with the passage of a simple bill that already more than two-thirds of the Senate has supported would reduce our deficit by hundreds of billions of dollars, finally secure our border, restore the rule of law within our country, and ensure that, never again, will we have millions of people in this country here illegally.

More than a year ago, the New Democratic Coalition helped pave the way for immigration reform with the release of detailed principles on comprehensive immigration reform.

Our principles express support for commonsense reforms that reduce bureaucratic backlogs, reunite families, create jobs for Americans, and spur competitiveness.

In August, we issued a letter to Speaker John Boehner, demanding that he introduce a comprehensive immigration reform bill; and if he failed to do so, we would introduce our own.

Well, no bill was forthcoming, so New Democratic Coalition members worked with a diverse group of colleagues on both sides of the aisle to introduce the House's only bipartisan comprehensive immigration reform bill, H.R. 15, last October.

Since then, we have met with countless stakeholders, from business owners to law enforcement to agriculture to the faith-based community, all who support moving the ball forward and support our bill, H.R. 15. Businesses, tech companies, faith leaders, and our voters are demanding action on fixing our broken immigration system.

Yet despite a level of consensus rarely seen in our country on an issue--and rarely seen in Washington on an issue--the loudest, most extreme voices on the other side of the aisle have thus far been successful in preventing this body from acting and solving a problem that the American people want solved.

One of my Republican colleagues even equated DREAMers--young de facto Americans who grew up in this country and know no other country and want nothing more than to pay taxes and contribute to make America better--one of my Republican colleagues compared DREAMers with drug mules, with disparaging remarks about the size of their calves; and he continues to refuse to apologize for his hateful comments.

These kinds of deplorable, intolerant remarks are dividing our country, but they should not divide this Chamber. They should not prevent a commonsense bill from coming forward.

House Republicans need to reject the offensive and unproductive rhetoric of some of their Members and finally show real leadership on immigration reform that a majority of Republican voters support.

The only floor vote that we have even had this entire legislative session on immigration was a vote to defund the Deferred Action program, to defund the docket program, a vote to deport DREAMers, to not allow DREAMers to get right with the law and get a provisional renewable working permit. Sadly, that amendment passed the House.

We were able to stop it. It didn't happen. The docket program continues. We encourage President Obama to extend the docket program.

But just to show the American people where Congress is and what the Republicans have done, the only immigration bill that they have even voted on was to deport DREAMers. The House majority can't continue to sit by and allow extremists to define their party.

Now, the release of immigration principles by the Republicans on reform was a very positive first step, and we encourage the Republicans to work with Democrats to construct a bill based on these principles, many of which we believe are consistent with those of the New Democratic Coalition and consistent with H.R. 15. We are happy to look at new ideas built on the principles that we can establish together and a commitment to fix our broken immigration system.

But, again, our patience can't last forever. If there is continued Republican failure to bring a bill forward, we will have no option but to take out a discharge petition on the only bipartisan bill that exists. If the Speaker won't lead, I hope that the membership of this body will lead, take the agenda into our own hands, and allow a vote that will pass, a bill that will then pass the Senate and be signed by the President.

We are joined by a cochair on the New Dem Immigration Task Force, a leader in the fight to reform our immigration system, the Representative from Texas (Mr. Castro.)

I yield to the gentleman from Texas.

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Mr. POLIS. I thank the gentleman from Texas.

The strength of our Nation, a nation built on immigrants, is that the best, brightest, and hardest working from across the world want to move here. The countries that have a bigger problem today are those that are losing those people--not us, the country that stands to gain some of the best, most highly motivated and talented people from across the world, just as my great-grandparents came to these shores to make our country stronger. I know that, by working together, we can accomplish that.

Have you ever seen the unprecedented degree of coalition behind immigration reform? Have you ever seen agriculture, the faith-based community, and the business community--and labor and business together--on an issue in your time in public service or before? Have you ever seen that on an issue?

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Mr. POLIS. I think most Americans, like myself, are somewhat offended that we don't have the rule of law in this country. There are millions--10 million, 12 million. We don't even know how many people that are here illegally. We don't know where they are. We don't know what they are doing. It is a security risk. It is an economic risk. Are they paying taxes? There have been studies that show they pay some; they might not be paying others. We need to fix this.

I have gone to town halls in the most conservative part of my district, and I say, is there anyone here who thinks the immigration system is working great? I haven't met a single constituent who does. They want it fixed. They want to make sure that people are required to get right with the law and get in line behind people who did it the right way and are already in line for eventual green card or citizenship.

That is exactly what the bipartisan bill proposes. It provides a way that people can register with the law, mandatory workplace authentication to ensure that anybody who gets a job going forward has at least the provisional status that allows them to have that job. Only about under 10 percent--I think it is 8 or 9 percent--of companies in this country use E-Verify. We need to improve E-Verify. There is money to do that in the bill to make sure it is correct more often. And then, of course, we need to make it mandatory along with the route, of course, for the people that need to go to work the next day to have the provisional permit that they need to go to work the next day and get in line behind other Americans, other people that are in line for citizenship or a green card.

There are a lot of misperceptions out there about the bill. One thing that is important to talk about is that this bill that is being proposed, the bipartisan immigration reform, H.R. 15, as well as the Senate bill, don't confer citizenship on anybody. Zero people are made citizens under this bill. That is as it should be. You don't want to reward illegal behavior. What you want to do is say get right with the law, pay a fine, a penalty, you violated the law.

What should the penalty be? Pay that fine, register, and get right with the law. And do you know what? If you demonstrate that you have become a productive American, you learn English, you have a job, and you support your family, in 13 years, 12 years, 15 years, you can stand for American citizenship, take a test and eventually become an American citizen.

But no one should be rewarded for violating the law under this bill, and no one is. What it does is it creates the line. What is so frustrating today is people say, ``Oh, why don't they get in line?'' when, in reality, there is no line. If you are a parent of an American child who is growing up here, there is no line for you to be gone for 20 years while your child is being raised without you. That doesn't make any sense. You have to create a way that we can do this within the system of law that is to the benefit of the American people, prevents people who don't have documentation from undermining wages for other Americans, makes sure that they can buy their own health care so that taxpayers aren't left on the hook for health care for people that can't even buy insurance if they wanted.

There are practical reasons that this saves money for the average American family. This helps push up wages for the average American family. It reduces our deficit by hundreds of billions of dollars. We could use that as a pay-for. We always look for ways--we could use that as a pay-for for a tax cut for the middle class. We could use it as a pay-for to fund universal preschool. We could use it as a pay-for to ensure that we have the military preparedness we need to meet the challenges of the 21st century or to honor our veterans who have served us in our recent conflicts.

I yield to the gentleman from Texas.

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Mr. POLIS. Another sector it would be great for is the real estate industry and homes. Many immigrants who don't have their status currently are forced to rent, sometimes under the table. They would be able to finance and buy their own homes, helping to revitalize areas that have high vacancy rates and lots of foreclosures. We have areas in Colorado that continue to be hit by foreclosures. We would love to introduce new buyers to those markets and help ensure that families have good, stable homes to raise their American children in.

Another thing that I think a lot of Americans don't realize is that in many cases the children of these families are American nationals. So you might have in one family two Americans, one person with a green card, and two that don't have paperwork. So what should the solution be? Should it be to send all of them to another country? Are you going to send an American citizen who has never even been to another country back to another country because they are an 8-year-old? Are you going to force them into the foster care system because you are just taking the parent?

This country is about family values. Immigration reform should unite families, and we should celebrate what is the backbone of our strength as a Nation, the American family.

We are joined by another leader in the battle to replace our broken immigration system with one that works for our country, the gentleman from California (Mr. Cárdenas), and I yield to the gentleman.

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Mr. POLIS. I thank the gentleman from California, who has been a tremendous leader in the fight to fix our broken immigration system, for his heartfelt comments.

I wanted to quote from last week a Wall Street Journal op-ed that criticized the Republicans' failure to act. It is not every day that The Wall Street Journal criticizes Republicans with harsh words. It is kind of one of those ``man bites dog'' stories, but they didn't mince words. The Wall Street Journal wrote:

Republicans have killed immigration reform for now, but a recent study shows in the real economy it is needed. The irony is that many Republicans who support handouts to farmers oppose reforms that wouldn't cost taxpayers a dime and would help the economy.

So rather than help farmers succeed in the private sector by hiring employees they want, the Republicans are seeking to keep them on the public dole, giving them taxpayer money rather than allowing them to operate in the marketplace and sell their products at the market.

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office found that the Senate comprehensive bill, which H.R. 15 is based on, would raise wages for Americans by $470 billion, create an average of 120,000 jobs for American citizens, and increase the growth of our GDP by 3.3 percent.

Polls continue to show that vast majorities of the American people support immigration reform--Republicans, Independents, Democrats, every demographic, every State supports immigration reform. Congress' failure to act is becoming inexcusable. Look, if the Republican majority puts together a bill based on the principles they laid out, let's have a floor discussion, and let's get something done. If they fail to fill the promising words of those principles with an actual bill, then we will take the only bipartisan bill we have, H.R. 15, and file to discharge it. What does that mean? That is the only way that the membership of the House of Representatives can bring a bill to the floor without the Speaker's blessing. We would love to work through the Speaker.

We challenge the Speaker to lead. We applaud, and our new Dem coalition put out a statement applauding the immigration principle, saying we can find common ground and pass a bill. But there needs to be a bill. If there is not, let's move forward with the one we have, which would pass tomorrow on the floor of the House.

I am honored to yield to a leader in the fight to reform immigration, a cochair of the New Democratic Coalition Immigration Task Force, my colleague, the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Garcia).

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