On the recordFebruary 12, 2018
Mr. President, I wish to personally thank the Presiding Officer for all the work he has done to come up with what I believe is the right framework for fulfilling the promise to solve and create a viable solution for the DACA population and to deal with the other things that are critically important as we take this first major step in immigration reform after decades of failure. Last year, I and Senator Lankford, who will be speaking after I do, decided we really wanted to get a discussion around a legal path to citizenship for a significant portion of the population of the illegally present. The deferred action program that was implemented by President Obama is what we used as kind of a baseline for determining how we could actually define that population and set terms so we could ultimately accept them into this country, and they could ultimately get citizenship. The proposal we have outlined today--and I should also thank Chairman Grassley for his leadership. I have served on the Judiciary Committee for 3 years during my first term in the Senate and for 3 years on the Immigration Subcommittee. Under his leadership, we have crafted a framework that is consistent with what the President has proposed. It is also consistent with what virtually anybody who has been around here for any amount of time has voted for in one form or another.…





