Maxine Waters: “allow me to shock the Members on the opposite side of the aisle and join with them in support of this amendment. Mas…”

“allow me to shock the Members on the opposite side of the aisle and join with them in support of this amendment. Mas vale tarde que nunca. It means, better late than never. And while my colleague here, the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Scott), is absolutely correct, we have put the cart before the horse, I suppose it is never too late to try and correct our errors. I do think that we should have been involved in studies a long time ago. We are basically forever speculating and coming up with anecdotes without a basis of facts for our decisions. So I am hopeful that we will get the support of our colleagues in this Congress so that we can study. While this is limited to the link between illegal aliens and gang membership, we need more studies on gangs, period. We need to find out, number one, where the young people are coming from. What is it about gang membership that entices them to want to be a part of that gang? What are their parents like? Are they the children of those who are already incarcerated? If we had an opportunity to support them getting back into school, moving out of neighborhoods, et cetera, what would happen? So, again, even though this is a little late in coming, I do support the amendment, and I ask for an aye vote.”