Charles Norwood: “I yield myself 2 minutes. In response to the last speaker, number one, had the gentlewoman been here earlier, the…”

“I yield myself 2 minutes. In response to the last speaker, number one, had the gentlewoman been here earlier, the gentlewoman would have heard about why this is not an unfunded mandate. Number two, if the gentlewoman believes local law enforcement should not help the Federal Government find terrorists in this Nation, which people who cross our borders illegally they are amongst, I ask the gentlewoman to drop a bill so that local law enforcement does not help the Federal Government in bank robberies and murders and drug enforcement and everything else that local law enforcement helps the Federal Government do. It is ridiculous to say that the 750,000 local law enforcement people should not be involved in this Nation trying to find some of the people who, for example, committed terror in this country on 9/11. Yesterday we passed over $4.5 billion for homeland security, including $690 million for custody management, funds to dramatically increase detention bed space, $88 million for an institutional removal program, $211 million for transportation and removal of undocumented aliens, and an earlier amendment today authorized another $40 million to help willing State and local law enforcement. There is also $6 billion in the pipeline for first responders. Many of them are local law enforcement. And this is voluntary. If the City of Houston does not want to play, they do not have to.…”