James Traficant: “Mr. Speaker, the only substantive difference between the Senate bill and H.R. 849 is the time period the Department of…”

“Mr. Speaker, the only substantive difference between the Senate bill and H.R. 849 is the time period the Department of Transportation will have to develop the regulations that prescribe the processes, the procedures and the information a displacing agency must use to determine whether a displaced person is ineligible for assistance because of immigration status. The House bill provided 6 months; the Senate bill provides 1 year. These regulations will, in large part, determine whether this policy change is implemented fairly, that is all displaced persons must demonstrate the immigration status, or whether we are creating a new tool to, in fact, discriminate. The administration believes it needs a full year, the Senate responded to those concerns, and I am satisfied with changing the time period for the rulemaking involved and also the fact I want to thank the gentleman from California [Mr. Kim], the gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. Shuster] and the gentleman from California [Mr. Packard] for agreeing for key safeguards the Democrats insisted must accompany the policy that illegal immigrants will not be eligible for assistance under this act.”