Political Quotes

“I thank the gentleman for yielding. I'm glad that we can make this change of bringing together these deserving countries. I hope the bipartisan efforts coming from the Committee on the Judiciary, from both Chairman Smith and from senior member Howard Berman, will be a foundation on which to consider additional immigration reforms, reforms that are desperately needed to help families and businesses across this country. I rise today in support of H.R. 3992, a bipartisan proposal that would make Israel eligible to participate in the E 2 ``Treaty Investor'' visa program, which is now available to 79 other countries. Although larger reform of our immigration laws has remained elusive, there are small places where we can work across the aisle to pass commonsense legislation and achieve incremental, but important, results. H.R. 3992--introduced by my friend, Representative Howard Berman, along with Judiciary Chairman Lamar Smith, Foreign Affairs Chairwoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, and Immigration Subcommittee Ranking Member Zoe Lofgren--is just such a bill. This bipartisan bill allows citizens of Israel to come to the United States on E 2 visas for ``treaty investors'' if those individuals make substantial investments in businesses in the United States. And, those visas would only be available if Israel provides similar visas to U.S. citizens seeking to invest in businesses in Israel. As I just mentioned, the E 2 visa program is currently available to citizens of 79 other countries.…”