Comprehensive Immigration Reform
Floor Speech
Mr. POLIS. I thank the gentleman from Florida. I will speak briefly, and then I will have more later.
Mr. Speaker, there are so many activists in our country who are fasting, who are sitting in offices, who are writing their Congresspeople, who are demanding action--action to unite their families, action to stop the deportations of family members--and answers to emerge from this indefinite state of limbo that has frozen the lives of so many would-be Americans that H.R. 15 and comprehensive immigration reform would address.
Today, I am disappointed that our Republican friends didn't show up to discuss and to debate the most pressing issue of our time--immigration reform. We extended an invitation to our friends on the other side of the aisle to join us today and have a discussion. Sadly, there is no one here to yield to. There are no solutions from the empty Chamber on the right. Some responded that they were double booked. Others responded that they had other engagements. Some simply didn't respond at all. The American people, Mr. Speaker, are demanding a response.
Just as House Speaker Boehner plans to close for business on Friday while hundreds of millions of Americans continue to have to work another week before Christmas, we have Reverend Samuel Rodriguez, who will mark the 40th day of his fast for immigration reform. He is chair of the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference. He will be 40 days and nights--approaching fast--without solid food.
As the reverend said recently:
There are 11 million people here right now who require intervention. We looked the other way when they came in. We use them on our farms; we use them in our hotels; and we use them in our restaurants. Then we have the audacity to deport them. It is morally reprehensible to play politics with 11 million people.
So said Reverend Samuel Rodriguez in his nearing his 40th day in fast.
Yet, in the entire first part of the 113th Congress--in the entire first session, in the entire year of 2013--there was only one vote on the floor on any measure relating to immigration. Was it a bill that would address even part of the immigration problem or any piece of the meal that was being promised? No. It was a bill to defund DACA, to defund the Deferred Action program, subjecting hundreds of thousands of DREAMers to deportation--a bill that Republicans voted for and that passed in this body.
Thankfully, it didn't become law. The Deferred Action program continues. Thank goodness that it provides at least a temporary reprieve for hundreds of thousands of aspiring Americans, but we owe to all Americans the restoring of the rule of law, allowing people to get on with their lives.
I yield to my colleague from Miami (Mr. Garcia), the chief author of H.R. 15, the comprehensive immigration reform bill in the House.
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Mr. POLIS. I thank the gentleman from Florida.
Mr. Speaker, what is particularly frustrating is that Congress is going home on December 13, not to work for the remaining 2 1/2 weeks of the year. I think most Americans would love to get off a week early for Christmas. They don't have the opportunity to set their own schedule at work. So it is not like there is not time to do this, Mr. Speaker. We can stay here next week.
It is not like there is not support on the floor to pass immigration reform, Mr. Speaker. There is. There is support today to pass H.R. 15, comprehensive immigration reform, brought to the floor. We could then send it to President Obama's desk. What a Christmas gift to our country that would make, a Christmas gift in the form of reducing our deficit by over $200 billion, creating over 6 million jobs for American citizens, restoring real security, and finally gaining operational control over our southern border and stemming the tide of people who are immigrating here illegally, requiring workplace authentication to make sure that employers no longer hire people under the table for cash outside of our system, strengthening Social Security and Medicare by making sure that people working here pay into our important programs that retirees stand to benefit from.
Immigration reform is not only demanded, but widely popular. Six in 10 Republicans support a path to citizenship for immigrants currently living in the United States; and a vast majority of every group--age, gender, ethnicity--here in this country knows that our immigration system is broken.
When we look at ourselves in the mirror at night, Mr. Speaker, how can we be proud of a system that betrays our values as a Nation of laws and a Nation of immigrants, a system that rewards lawbreaking, a system that encourages illegal activity, a system that, as my good friend and colleague Ms. Lofgren from California likes to say, effectively places two signs at our southern border: one says ``help wanted'' and the other says ``keep out''?
That is the state of our current immigration system: confusing, expensive, job destroying, companies can't acquire the men and women they need to remain competitive so they are forced to expand overseas in other countries in offshore jobs rather than expand here in the United States.
Thankfully, Mr. Speaker, the answer is simple. Groups from across the spectrum--faith-based groups including evangelical and Catholic Americans, businesses including small family farms to large international companies that employ hundreds of thousands of people, law enforcement--all support H.R. 15. Based on the Senate bipartisan comprehensive immigration reform bill, that would solve all of these issues that we have before us, create jobs for American citizens, and reduce our deficit.
And as we talk about the budget, at least frankly, Mr. Speaker, this week we are debating something very important for our country. In other weeks, my colleague, Mr. Garcia, and I have taken to the floor when there has been nothing that has even been done that entire time that had any consequence to anybody. At least this week, Mr. Speaker, we are discussing something important. I don't bemoan that. I think it is legitimate to discuss the budget of our country this week. That is why I think we should stay here another week and discuss immigration next week.
This is an important discussion. But as we look for what we call ``pay-fors''--how do we pay for making sure the Medicare reimbursement rate doesn't go down as scheduled at the end of the year, how do we pay for reducing the sequester, how do we pay for the investments that we want to make--guess what, comprehensive immigration reform would fill our coffers with over $200 billion of revenue. Now, how about that as a pay-for for what we call the ``doc-fix'' and making sure we don't reduce Medicare reimbursement rates or any of the other items that are on the budget table this week?
That is the kind of contribution that H.R. 15 and immigration reform can make.
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Mr. POLIS. Each of those deportations, Mr. Speaker, cost you and I, cost American taxpayers, approximately $15,000. So guess who is paying for the 2 million deportations? Guess what is one of the growing causes of our deficit spending? Our broken immigration system.
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Mr. POLIS. I would like to point out that my friend from Miami, Florida, placed out some of the arguments that we hear our friends making as to why immigration reform is not happening. We did not present those as a straw man. We invited our friends from the other side of the aisle to come make the arguments themselves. There is no one here in this Chamber, despite our invitation, to represent why we are not staying here next week to vote on immigration reform. So we are guessing why. We are guessing, saying maybe it is because they don't like long bills. I don't know. A short bill can be pretty bad, too, if it is a bad bill. You can have a good short bill or a bad short bill, a good long bill or a bad long bill. I mean, you know, when you want to address border security, you need to make sure that you devote enough of the bill to border security to do it.
So we are here guessing at their reasons because our friends on the Republican side of the aisle are not here to explain, despite our invitation, why they are not bringing immigration reform up. And if they are not ready for H.R. 15 or comprehensive, why at least we are not making some kind of down payment on it next week, why we are not doing something, for instance, for the DREAMers, the kids that are currently in a deferred action program so that they can have some degree of certainty to get on with their lives. Why we are not making sure that we have working permits for the people who are already here and already have jobs and are an important part of our economy. We could be doing any of that next week. But instead, Mr. Speaker, the House is being sent home on vacation while most Americans have a full additional week to work before Christmas.
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Mr. POLIS. We have the chair of my committee to file a rule here on the floor the House. Sadly, it is not a rule for comprehensive immigration reform, but it is a rule for something very important, the budget, which hopefully we will be able to agree on in the next 2 days. And as we discussed earlier before the chair of the Rules Committee joined us, I think we all agree that passing the budget is a very good use of our time here on the floor.
Some of us, Mr. Speaker, in this hour, have talked about the need for immigration reform. We have in the past criticized the apparent urgency with which asbestos bills were somehow rushed out of committee and brought immediately to the floor when we weren't able to move forward on immigration, but this week we are working on something more important.
We need to continue our work to bring up immigration reform. I am speaking from the side of the Chamber traditionally used by Republicans. I had hoped to give this spot up to a member of the majority party, a Republican, who we hope to continue to extend this invitation to debate immigration reform and bring forward an immigration reform bill.
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