Motion to Instruct Conferees on H.R. 240, Department of Homeland Security Appropriations Act, 2015

Floor Speech

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Mr. CARTER of Texas. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may
consume.

Madam Speaker, I rise in opposition to the motion to instruct
conferees. As the House and Senate come together to find a path forward
on funding the Department of Homeland Security, we must reconcile our
profound differences over how to handle the President's executive
actions. But the minority should keep this in mind as we go to
conference: the majority of American citizens oppose the President's
actions on immigration, and they have asked us to fight those actions.

The House has acted decisively to fulfill that mandate. Six weeks
ago, when the House approved a bill funding the Department of Homeland
Security until the end of the fiscal year, the House also by large
margins approved six amendments to stop the President's far-reaching
actions.

The President himself has said--no fewer than 22 times--that he does
not have the authority to change our immigration laws unilaterally. Now
the courts have weighed in, saying that no law has given the President
the power to make these sweeping changes to our immigration policies.
The evidence is overwhelming on this side of the debate. Now, we can
vote again, but the outcome will be the same. The American people have
spoken. We must stand up against the administration's overreach on
immigration.

While it is clear the President will not fulfill or act within the
bounds of the law, we in Congress are here to defend our Constitution,
to provide those checks and balances that our Founding Fathers put into
place to ensure the President does not act like a king.

Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues to join me in opposing this
motion to instruct, and I reserve the balance of my time.

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Mr. CARTER of Texas. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may
consume.

Madam Speaker, I have had a lot of schoolteachers shake their fingers
at me and tell me things. And most of the times, I have deserved it. I
have been looked right at and told I was wrong before. Many of those
times, I deserved it.

But I want to make something really clear. This is not a debate on
immigration. This is not a debate on whether or not we are going to
fund the Department. We are funding the Department for the next 3
weeks, using the same manner that we funded this Department for years
at a time when our colleagues on the other side of the aisle were in
charge of this House.

The CR was one of the most popular vehicles that they used in funding
our country during the period of time they ran this place. So we are
not using anything that we don't all use. It funds the Department. It
keeps the Border Patrol okay and keeps them paid.

But it also allows us to do something that--by the way, the gentleman
is absolutely right. In what we would call recent history, going to
conference was so rare--my mother used to say ``rare as hen's teeth''--
when they ran this place.

So we are at least doing something that was designed to be done, and
we are going to conference. When you go to conference and you have two
sides of the story, you are supposed to go in there and discuss the two
sides of the story. What they are asking to instruct here is to just
take what the Senate sent us.

Well, to some extent, I guess we should reward the Senate. This is
about the first thing they have sent us in recent history where we have
actually had a bipartisan vote. In fact, last year we just didn't have
any votes at all. In fact, you wondered if they even knew how.

And so here we are. We are going to conference and doing it the way
it is supposed to be done. All parties will be able to participate, and
maybe we will resolve our differences and maybe we won't, but the
American people also ask us to try to work in a bipartisan manner. And
here is our opportunity.

The Homeland Security Department will be funded. They will have a
paycheck. We will address this issue in conference, and hopefully we
will come to a resolution the way we are designed to with bipartisan
participation.

This is not about immigration. And after having spent 4 years with
some of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle and some of the
colleagues over here working on immigration, I am not anti-immigration
policy. This is anti-stepping on the feet of the Framers of the
Constitution and walking all over that piece of paper.

And that is why we are here to fight today. We are fighting for the
rights of this legislative body as we address the Executive. And we are
fighting to fund the Department.

With that, I yield back the balance of my time.

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