Senate Floor Speech
Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison
May 25, 2006 -- Page: S5162

COMPREHENSIVE IMMIGRATION REFORM ACT OF 2006 -- CONTINUED

MRS. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, we have been debating for the last 2 weeks a bill that is going to change the course of our country. The debate has been good. We have had the ability to offer amendments. Yet, the bill has not changed to the degree it needs to change, to do the job that we must do to assure that we secure our borders. This bill has not yet changed to ensure that we have a temporary worker program that works, that does not discriminate against American workers, and that is fair. If this bill had gone through that process, we could then start dealing with the people who are here in a fair and responsible way.

Mr. President, we have benefitted from the immigrants in our country for hundreds of years--people who come here legally and work hard. They make better lives for themselves and their families, and they contribute to our country in the process. They have assimilated into America the ``E Pluribus Unum'' motto: Out of many, one. That has been the factor that has brought us together for all of these years.

In the last 10 years, we have watched as millions have ignored our laws. They have come into our country illegally, leaving those who have waited their turn, who have waited for the legal process to work, to wonder if, in fact, they would ever be rewarded for their correct behavior.

After 9/11, we all knew that our security was at risk. We have been forced to reexamine the laws of our country as they relate to our borders. Yet nearly 5 years after our country was attacked by people who came in through a porous border, we still have a porous border. We need immigration reform, and we must do it right.

There are some good points in this bill. Securing our borders is a part of this bill. I voted against the Budget Act point of order yesterday because I want to spend the money on border security, and it is going to cost money. But that is not the only part of this bill. The rest of the bill has caused an imbalance that cannot stand if we are to look at the big picture for our country.

Edwin Meese, the former Attorney General of the United States, warned in a New York Times editorial op-ed that we are in danger of repeating the mistakes of 20 years ago when Congress passed the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986, granting amnesty to those who were in this country. We are in danger of making the same mistake today.

Temporary workers are very important for our country. They provide U.S. companies with labor that keeps our economy thriving, and the workers have the opportunity to make better lives for themselves. We also need to make sure that we have some path for people who want to work in this country, but do not want to be citizens. It is important that we balance the rights of American workers' as we take this major step.

The Hagel-Martinez guest worker program does grant amnesty, and it forces guest workers into a citizenship track after 6 years, even if that is not what the worker wants or what they intended. In the polls that I have seen, most of the people coming to this country to work do not want to give up allegiance to their home countries, and they still love America. They don't have hostility toward America because they are not citizens. The arguments that I have heard indicating that we want every temporary worker to be a citizen so that they will be loyal to our country, I believe does not hold water. You can be friendly to our country, appreciate and respect our country but not have to go into the citizenship track to do that. People have been doing it for a long time.

We do not have the capability in this bill that I tried to put in it yesterday with my amendment that would allow another choice--a choice for people who do want to work in our country, go home, and who do not want the citizenship track.

Mr. President, I will not be able to vote for the bill before us today, but I do hope I can vote for a bill that comes out of conference committee, one that will be balanced and one that represents the interests of the American people, as well as treating fairly the foreign workers who come to our country.