David Perdue: “I would like to make a few comments about the current immigration system. That seems to be the topic of the day…”

“I would like to make a few comments about the current immigration system. That seems to be the topic of the day recently. I want to tell you some of us have been working on this for years. Some in this body have been working on it at least the last decade. Three times in the last 11 years, this body has tried to solve this problem unsuccessfully. I believe one of the problems with each of those solutions or attempts at a solution was they tried to be comprehensive. People are misusing that word today when they talk about what we are trying to do on this side. These three attempts, over the last 11 years, attempted to solve not just the illegal situation and the temporary work visa situation, but they also tried to solve the legal situation. They tried to solve all of this. Today, what we are trying to do on our side is to solve just the illegal immigration system before we even talk about DACA. The legal situation is this: 1.1 million green cards are given out every year today. That is up from 300,000 in 1965, when this bill--the law we operate under today--was first passed. What we believe is, if we get this done, then the next step would be to move to the temporary work visas, where we give out 2.2 million temporary work visas every year. Those need desperate work. Both sides agree to that. Some categories probably need to be increased; others need to be streamlined. There might need to be a new category created, but that needs speciality work.…”