Xavier Becerra: “Mr. Chairman, again I must say that we have an amendment that sounds reasonable on its face, as something that we would…”

“Mr. Chairman, again I must say that we have an amendment that sounds reasonable on its face, as something that we would want to make sure we could do to try to help curtail illegal immigration. And certainly the gentleman from Tennessee, whom I serve with on the Committee on the Judiciary, has always proven himself as someone who is interested in trying to do the right thing. Again, I do not doubt whatsoever that he is, again, attempting to do so. This is an amendment that I know he had in committee that did not pass. It did fail in committee. I would say that the reason it failed was because, as the hospitals had expressed to us and as others have said, this would cause a dramatic chilling effect within our medical care system. What we would have is a situation where people may in fact not go for treatment or take a family member for treatment for fear of what would happen as a result of trying to approach a hospital.”