National Origin-Based Antidiscrimination for Nonimmigrants Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. NADLER. Madam Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 330, I call up the bill (H.R. 1333) to transfer and limit Executive Branch authority to suspend or restrict the entry of a class of aliens, and ask for its immediate consideration.

The Clerk read the title of the bill.

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Mr. NADLER. 1333.

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Mr. NADLER. Madam Speaker, I yield myself 3 minutes.

Madam Speaker, H.R. 1333, the National Origin-Based Antidiscrimination for Nonimmigrants Act, or NO BAN Act, is an important step toward reining in executive overreach and preserving the power of Congress to establish our Nation's immigration laws.

Section 212(f) of the Immigration and Nationality Act, the INA, authorizes the President to suspend the entry of noncitizens when the President finds that their entry would be detrimental to U.S. interests.

From 1952, when this provision was enacted, until January 2017, Presidents of both parties invoked section 212(f) to exclude only narrow groups of individuals, such as human rights violators, North Korean officials, and individuals seeking to overthrow governments, for reasons that would clearly serve the national interest.

But former President Trump abused this authority, twisting it in ways that were never intended. He first used it to deliver on his campaign promise to ban Muslims from the United States, an immoral and disastrous policy that traumatized children and families and made us no safer, while weakening our standing in the world.

The former President then used this section to rewrite immigration laws with which he disagreed. For example, the INA expressly provides asylum eligibility to any individual who arrives in the United States ``whether or not at a designated port of arrival.'' However, President Trump invoked section 212(f) to deny asylum to persons who cross the southern border between ports of entry, in direct conflict with the statute. Fortunately, the judiciary agreed that this was unlawful and stopped the policy from taking effect.

H.R. 1333 will prevent such executive overreach by amending section 212(f) to ensure it is used in a manner consistent with its intended purpose and historical norms.

Although President Biden has repealed the egregious orders of the Trump era, including the Muslim ban, we must pass the NO BAN Act to ensure that this authority is never abused again. In advancing this legislation today, we uphold our Nation's founding ideals and reaffirm our commitment to the rule of law.

This should not be a partisan issue. Members on both sides of the aisle should agree that no President, Republican or Democratic, should be permitted to usurp the powers of the legislative branch enshrined in the Constitution. The separation of powers is fundamental to our democratic Republic, and it must be protected.

I would like to thank my friend and colleague, Representative Judy Chu, for her leadership and her steadfast commitment to this issue. Her efforts led to the introduction of the NO BAN Act, and I urge all of my colleagues to support this important legislation.

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Mr. NADLER. Madam Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Chu), the author of this legislation.

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Mr. NADLER. Madam Speaker, I yield 2\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Rhode Island (Mr. Cicilline).

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Mr. NADLER. Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson Lee).

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Madam Speaker, I thank the chairman for his leadership, and I thank Congresswoman Judy Chu for her leadership.

Madam Speaker, I rise with great enthusiasm for the National Origin- Based Antidiscrimination for Nonimmigrants Act, and that is the NO BAN Act.

I proclaim a breath of fresh air, and that was the election of 2020 and the inauguration of President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, who made it very clear what our position is as it relates to those who come to this country.

First of all, they did not turn a blind eye to the Statue of Liberty, which acknowledges the fact that we are a refuge for those who are fleeing persecution. They also understood that we are not a country that discriminates against individuals simply because of their religion. That is what the NO BAN Act represented. It had nothing to do with terrorism.

I wonder why President Trump never said anything about domestic terrorists? Why didn't they have a structure to ban them, the very terrorists that jumped this Capitol on January 6th?

I am reminded of a little 15-year-old on the day that the ban was issued. When I was flying in from Washington, I went straight over to the international terminal because my staff had called me and others had called me. This little boy, innocent, with legal documents, a tourist visa, coming to visit his family, innocently indicated who he was. And, of course, by law, those CBP officers had to detain him.

Do you know what was worse? He was not able to see anyone at that time, but more importantly, he wound up in Chicago.

And so I rise to support the NO BAN Act, and I indicate that there is a policy. The border is closed. The Vice President will be working on a broader plan for dealing with the border. The shelter in Houston was a temporary shelter. It was an emergency shelter. It was rightly closed when other beds were found. 130 of those children were reunited with their families. This bill is important.

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Mr. NADLER. Madam Speaker, I yield an additional 15 seconds to the gentlewoman from Texas.

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Madam Speaker, I am delighted that this bill includes an important provision of mine offered last year during the committee markup, which requires the administration to report to Congress on the impacts, positive, negative, and unintended of any action by the President pursuant to executive orders.

We know that banning Nigeria was the wrong thing to do, and I support the NO BAN Act.

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Mr. NADLER. Madam Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Lofgren), the distinguished chairperson of the Immigration and Citizenship Subcommittee.

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Mr. NADLER. Madam Speaker, I yield an additional 15 seconds to the gentlewoman from California.

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Mr. NADLER. Madam Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the distinguished gentleman from New York (Mr. Jeffries).

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Mr. NADLER. Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentlewoman from Washington (Ms. Jayapal).
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Mr. NADLER. Madam Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from California (Mr. Correa).

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Mr. NADLER. Madam Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Pelosi), the distinguished Speaker of the House.

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Mr. NADLER. Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Beyer).

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Mr. NADLER. Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentlewoman from Illinois (Ms. Schakowsky).

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Mr. NADLER. Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentlewoman from Michigan (Mrs. Dingell).

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Mr. NADLER. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Madam Speaker, let me say that I agree with some of what I heard from the Republicans. They said there is a lot of nonsense spoken on the floor today. Indeed, there was. Everything they have said about this bill is nonsense. They have said there is no Muslim ban. Everybody knows there was a Muslim ban. The President said he was going to impose a Muslim ban, and then he did.

When Nydia Velazquez and I went to Kennedy airport, when Jan Schakowsky went to the airport in Chicago, when other people went to the airport, what did we find?

We found Muslims being kept out of the country. People with perfectly valid visas, perfectly valid green cards, people whose relatives were waiting for them here because they had perfectly valid entry certificates, were being kept out of the country, and they couldn't even speak to their lawyers.

That is the next bill we will be considering on the floor in a few minutes.

That is what we found. And that has been in effect for a long time. It is un-American. It is unconstitutional. It is against the ethics of this country.

As the Speaker said--I think it was the Speaker who said it--the motto of the country is E Pluribus Unum; from many, one.

This situation, this Muslim ban, denies that. This says E Pluribus--I don't know the Latin from a few, not from all.

Madam Speaker, we must pass this bill. More than 400 organizations and industry leaders support this bill. They include Muslim Advocates, the ACLU, Airbnb, Asian Americans Advancing Justice, the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society.

Yes, the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society. Why? Because the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society remembers its futile efforts when Jews were turned away from this country to go back to the Holocaust; when the St. Louis was turned back to go back to the Holocaust; when the State Department deliberately wouldn't even use the quota. The quota was 150,000, and they kept it down to 6,000 because of the anti-Semitism of some officials in the State Department. And the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society--which was formed to aid Jewish immigrants, but has long since broadened its mission to aid immigrants from any country--knows what happens and doesn't want to see it happen again. That is why they are supporting this bill.

Other organizations and industry leaders that support this bill include the Service Employees International Union, because so many of their members were born abroad; the National Immigration Law Center, MoveOn, and United We Dream.

Members on both sides of the aisle should agree that no President, Republican or Democrat, should be permitted to usurp the powers of the legislative branch enshrined in the Constitution. The separation of power is fundamental to our democratic Republic and must be protected.

For all these reasons, that is why passage of H.R. 1333 is so vital. I urge my colleagues to vote in support of this bill.

Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

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