Howard Berman: “I will be very brief. There is only one response to my friend the chairman. If the issue is about papers and the only…”

“I will be very brief. There is only one response to my friend the chairman. If the issue is about papers and the only reason we haven't gone to conference committee is because the papers haven't been delivered, I do have Senator Frist's phone number, and I am happy to provide it. I cannot conceive that it is a matter of paperwork and process that is keeping us from going to conference committee on one of the most serious domestic issues this country has faced. Secondly, in response to the following speaker, the reason we cannot quite unite to do something here, apparently, is because we are not going to unite on a fool's errand. Everyone on your side of the aisle, from the gentleman from Colorado (Mr. Tancredo) to the chairman to others, has acknowledged over and over again we are not going to deport 12 million people. You are not going to have local law enforcement pick up the task for you of deporting 12 million people. A meaningful response is border security, because there are people there who are national security issues and there are people who are aiming to hurt us who want to cross this border illegally, and dealing with 12 million people who are operating under false identifiers, some of whom are bad people, and finding some system to either isolate and narrow that group or have them come forward, and most important of all, to get an employer verification system in place. None of these bills does anything about it.…”