DACA
Floor Speech
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Mr. President, I am here to speak about President Trump's decision to shut down the DACA Program, the so-called Dream program that allows children who were brought here by their parents, often at a very young age, and who grew up here and are now, as far as they know, full Americans--this is their home--to not be thrown out of their adopted country and sent home to a place that they do not know, all because of what their parents did when they were still children. We don't even hold children accountable for contracts they enter into. You have to be an adult to be held accountable for a contract you enter into. Yet, apparently, this President is willing to take these children, break up their families, and send them to a country they do not know, all because of a decision that was made by their parents, in some cases when these kids were infants.
I have spoken to these kids, who are generally called Dreamers, who have no memory of living anyplace other than this country. I don't know about the Presiding Officer, but it is hard for me to scroll back and come up with any concrete memories of when I was 1 or 2 or 3 years old.
These are kids who grew up in American schools. They grew up in American families. They grew up playing American sports. They grew up as a part of our culture. But now, for reasons that really defy humane explanation, the President wants to cast a cloud over about 800,000 children--now turned into young adults in many cases and many more who are right behind them in the program--who were looking forward to this as something they could do when they came of age to get their full-on DACA permit.
We have over 1,000 people who are approved under the DACA Program in Rhode Island. We are pretty proud of them. They have served in the military. They have had jobs around the country.
Ninety-one percent of DACA recipients are employed, pay taxes, and contribute to Social Security. When we had the immigration debate, that is what we said we wanted people to do: Pay your taxes, get a job, pay into Social Security, support yourself, and support the system around you. Well, they have done that. But because of a decision they did not even make--a decision that under American law they would be incapable of making because they were not adults--this shadow of punishment and family disruption has been put over them by perhaps the least humane person ever to hold the office of President of the United States. And if this doesn't prove that proposition, there are plenty more that do.
I understand that our leader has urged Speaker Ryan and Majority Leader McConnell to get Senator Durbin's and Senator Graham's Dream Act up for a vote. I think it will pass. I think it will pass with more than 60 votes. I think we, at least--the decent Members of the Senate-- can lift that cloud of fear, threat, and anxiety. I think we should. I think we should do it soon. And if Majority Leader McConnell is not interested in bringing this to the floor, I understand that Senator Schumer has made it pretty clear that he is going to insist on attaching this bill to some other measure as we move forward this year.
I completely support him. This President said that he loves these kids and wants to approach this issue with a big heart. Huh. The White House, which, the last I heard, the President of the United States runs, put out talking points telling these kids to get ready to depart. Get ready for departure from this country. Really? That is the big heart--to threaten 800,000 kids who have played by the rules, who have done what the Government of the United States asked them to do, to get ready to depart? Because of what--some crime they committed? No. They committed no crime, but because their parents brought them here as kids.
Jean came here from Peru. He was brought to the United States by his parents when he was a few months old. He is 23 now. If he were to go back to Peru, he would have to move to a village where he has never lived, that is not in a safe area, that he does not know because he has been here for over 20 years--22 and change if he is 23 now.
Rodrigo Pimental came here from Portugal at 10 months old. Rhode Island has a very vibrant Portuguese community, of which we are really proud. His parents came to join that community, pursue a better life, start a small business, and succeed. Rodrigo doesn't even remember Portugal. He has a computer science degree--a college computer science degree. He says the United States is his home. What is the gain for our country in telling Rodrigo Pimental, with his computer science degree from college, that he needs to go back to Portugal because at 10 months old his parents brought him here in search of a better life? Where the heck is the justice or the decency in that?
These are all Rhode Island kids whom I am talking about. There are hundreds of thousands of stories around the country.
Lesdin Salazar from Guatemala was brought to the United States by her parents at age 7. We are going to break up that family and send her back to Guatemala because why? Because at age 7 she didn't successfully talk her parents out of bringing her here? Or maybe she should have left her parents then: Oh, parents, boy, it would be illegal to go to the United States without the proper paperwork. I can't be a part of that. I am staying in Guatemala. You go.
Is that the expectation we have for a 7-year-old, that we would now punish her with deportation and with breaking up her family? That is the big heart of this President?
I will tell my colleagues about one of her memories. She doesn't remember much of Guatemala, but she does remember sitting in her living room with her parents watching President Obama announce the DACA Program. She says that her family cried tears of joy when that happened--at last, a path forward from the problem that was not of her own making. She does not understand why the United States is giving so many children an education here and then sending them back to other countries, breaking up their families, and I don't, either. It makes no sense.
Krissia Rivera came to Rhode Island from El Salvador. She came when she was 8. Oh, so maybe that is old enough that she could have broken up with her parents back then or talked them out of coming here. She lived first in Maryland. Interestingly, she went to the same school the President's son now attends. She came to Rhode Island and graduated from college. She is currently in medical school at Brown University-- obviously somebody we want to get out of our country. She is scared.
She feels exposed. I would like to have one person come to the Senate floor and tell me what Krissia Rivera did at age 8 that was so wrong that we are willing to take somebody who will have a Brown University medical school degree and throw them out of our country for no reason. Explain that to me. I will tell my colleagues, there is a lot that is embarrassing about the way our President behaves. This is pretty bad, particularly in the wake of the way he behaved after Nazi flags were paraded through Charlottesville, VA--the city of Thomas Jefferson's great university.
He spent the next couple of days winking at White supremacist Nazi types, equating their behavior with the behavior of the protesters who came out. I would hope that if neo-Nazis were walking through Providence, I would go out and protest. Am I as wrong as the Nazis? I don't think so. But President Trump appears to think so--it was just two sides having an evenhanded dispute. I don't think so.
When the President reacted to Charlottesville the way he did, he was winking at the worst impulses in our society: bigotry, hatred, discrimination of people based on color and religion--things that we have fought back against for generations. Fighting back against those evils is part of what makes us Americans. But does President Trump fight back against those evils? No. Just a little wink, a little pat on the head along the way: Keep it up, boys; I don't mind that much. No difference between you and the people who come out because they are outraged to see Nazi flags flying in Charlottesville, VA.
And now this. And now this. Who the hell is President Trump talking to when he does this? Who gets the wink this time? If this isn't another wink to bigotry and hatred and discrimination, I don't know what is. No one can explain to me why an 8-year-old, who is such a good person that she will come to a new country and come all the way to Brown University's medical school, is to be punished for not having broken up with her parents at age 8 when they brought her to this country. It makes no sense.
I see the distinguished senior Senator from Illinois here on the floor. The battle for the DACA Program and for the Dream Act has been a cause of his political life. There is no person in this
Chamber to whom more credit is due for this program than Senator Durbin. So with great respect, as well as affection, I will yield the floor to him.
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