Ted Budd: “I thank my friend and colleague from Virginia for yielding. I really thank him for his leadership on this issue. The…”

“I thank my friend and colleague from Virginia for yielding. I really thank him for his leadership on this issue. The last time I spoke on this floor on immigration, I talked about three principles: One, Americans have the right to determine who becomes citizens through laws; two, the people who do come here should be in the best interest of American citizens; and three, that we have the right to enforce those choices. The people who do come here should be in the best interest of American citizens. That is key. What we are doing now isn't there yet. We allow, today, one individual to get a green card. Then he is able to sponsor his immediate family and relatives. And then the relatives can sponsor their relatives. Then the relatives of those relatives can sponsor their relatives and so on, until there is no one in the family left to sponsor or no one left who even wants to come to the United States. Potentially, this could go on forever. This is called chain migration, and 65 percent of our green cards are awarded through this chain migration. That is about 700,000 people every year gaining permanent residence in our country through no other criteria than that they happen to be related to someone who lives here. We have no idea whether these individuals are going to be economically successful. We have no idea whether they will contribute to our country. We don't even look at those characteristics for chain migration.…”