Department of Homeland Security Appropriations Act, 2015 -- Motion to Proceed

Floor Speech

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Mrs. SHAHEEN. Mr. President, in a few minutes the Senate is going to
have yet another procedural vote on the Department of Homeland Security
funding bill.

The bill before us, the House-passed version of the funding bill,
can't become law. We have already heard the President reaffirm
yesterday that he is going to veto the House-passed bill before us.
That means we could face a shutdown of the Department of Homeland
Security.

At this point, given the threats from terrorism, given the work that
is done by the Department of Homeland Security, that is not a tenable
position to begin.

Let me say, I very much appreciate the efforts of my colleague from
my neighboring State of Maine, the senior Senator from Maine, Senator
Collins. But the amendment she has put forward still raises some
serious concerns about the impact on our security, because it includes
language that would defund all of the Department of Homeland Security
directives from November 20, 2014. So it would defund those provisions
that direct law enforcement officers to place top priority on national
security threats, convicted felons, gang members, illegal entrants
apprehended at the border. It also defunds the southern border and
approaches campaign which establishes three joint task forces to reduce
the terrorism risk to the Nation. And, as she has indicated, it defunds
the deferred action programs.

While she suggested that it would allow the 2012 Executive action
that refers to the DREAMers to stay in place, it raises serious questions about whether USCIS could effectively process renewables of those DREAMers--such as the young man whom Senator Durbin spoke so eloquently about--so who knows what the court action could be on that.

While I appreciate the effort, I don't think it adequately addresses
the concerns we have in the Democratic caucus, that we need to pass a
clean bill. We need to have a separate debate about immigration.

The Presiding Officer worked very hard 2 years ago to help us get a
comprehensive immigration reform bill that most of us didn't agree with
everything in it, but most of us supported. We are happy to have that
debate, but what we need now is a clean bill--one that allows the
funding for the Department of Homeland Security to go forward.

I noticed on the news this morning, one of the issues that is at risk
in this debate over whether we are going to support funding for the
Department and the security of this Nation versus an ideological
objection to the President--this morning one of the lead items on the
news had to do with the cyber security breach at Anthem, the second
largest health insurance company in the country. I happen to have my
health insurance through Anthem, so I paid particular attention to
this.

But one of the things that is in this clean bill that was agreed to
last December by Senator Mikulski and Congressman Rogers was funding
for the cyber security center within the Department of Homeland
Security to address the next-generation threat to our cyber networks.

That is critical funding we need if we are going to intercept the
kinds of breaches we saw with Anthem and heard about this morning. Yet
that funding is at risk because there is not agreement to get a clean
bill done to fund the Department of Homeland Security.

What we have heard from almost everybody who has spoken is: We agree
we should fund the Department of Homeland Security; we agree to the
dollar levels that are in that bill; we agree to making sure the safety
and security of this country should be paramount. We have heard a
number of our colleagues from the other side of the aisle and from the
House who have said ultimately this is about getting a clean bill. So
we should do that now. We should provide certainty, we should get this
done, and we should stop having an ideological debate about whether we
are going to support immigration and the President, or whether we are
going to support the safety and security of this Nation.

I think we should all be able to agree that the safety and security
of America comes first. We should get this clean bill done, and then we
can go on and debate immigration reform.

Mr. President, how much time do I have left?

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Mrs. SHAHEEN. I think it is worth noting some of the great work done
by the Department of Homeland Security, which interfaces with the
American people more than any other department.

Every day Customs and Border Protection processes nearly 1 million
travelers entering the United States and seizes 19,000 pounds of
illegal drugs between the ports of entry. The Transportation Security
Administration--the people who work at our airports--screen 2 million
passengers and their baggage. The Coast Guard patrols 3.4 million
square miles of U.S. waterways and conducts 54 search and rescue
missions that save lives annually.

Every day FEMA provides $3.7 million in Federal disaster grants to
individuals and households and provides $22 million to States and local
communities for disaster response and recovery. Every day the Federal
Law Enforcement Training Center trains 8,000 officers from across the
country. This work is just too important for our security to be delayed
or disrupted because of ideological reasons concerning immigration
reform.

We need to pass a clean, full-year Homeland Security funding bill. We
need to pass it without controversial riders, and I hope we will do
that.

I yield the floor.

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