On the recordJanuary 13, 2015
I thank the gentlewoman. Madam Chair, this is one of those moments where the best thing you can do is kind of scratch your head and say, What the heck are they thinking? We have a bipartisan bill, a Homeland Security bill that, as was said before by Mr. Farr, if it was put up for a vote, would pass almost unanimously, if not unanimously. But no, they couldn't help themselves. They had to take one more shot at the President and a bigger shot at immigrants. And so the bill is weighted down with attacks on immigrants. Mostly Latino immigrants, I would say, would be affected, and that is personal to me. So what this bill now would say if it gets all these amendments on it--and, by the way, I want to say that I am opposed to the bill with the amendments and not opposed to the bill in its clean fashion, and I think that is the way most Members think. What this bill now says is that, for instance, if you are in the military, serving our country, your spouse can be deported while you are away. That is really sad and insulting. We are going to have now new bumper stickers on the other side on their cars that will say, ``Support our troops and deport the spouses.'' It will be sad, and it will be horrible what we are doing. Now, our opportunity here is to defeat these amendments. Our opportunity here is to understand that if we have a gripe with the President using his constitutional power, deal with that. But don't take it out on every immigrant in the Nation.…
