Dan Burton: “Mr. Chairman, it never ceases to amaze me how these debates get distorted, at least in my view. They have to get a lot…”

“Mr. Chairman, it never ceases to amaze me how these debates get distorted, at least in my view. They have to get a lot of this information when students enroll in school anyhow. They have to provide birth certificates. They have to provide other information. They have to provide health information. This is not a large additional cost. Yet they are using this, in my view, as a red herring to stop finding out what the real problem is. In 1992 we spend $13.2 billion on primary and secondary education for illegal aliens. In 1992, the estimated cost for illegal immigrants, for the period 1992 to 2002, will be $221.5 billion. Yet every single time we come to this floor to try to get a handle on the illegal immigration problem, the liberal mentality says we cannot do that. Yet people across this country are concerned about their tax dollars being used wisely. They are concerned about the national debt. And yet one of the biggest expenditures we have that is adding to this deficit is taking care of illegal aliens coming across this border for health care purposes, educational purposes, and social purposes.”