Political Quotes

“a remarkable coalition of agricultural employers and farm workers has come together behind the Craig-Kennedy amendment. I commend them for all of their efforts. I simply wanted to spend a few minutes and talk about a bit of lineage behind this whole effort. To some extent, this began on the afternoon of July 23, 1998, when I had the opportunity to join with my friend and colleague Senator Gordon Smith and we offered an amendment to overhaul this program. It was, in fact, entitled the AgJOBS amendment. It had the strong support of Senator Craig at that time. We received 68 votes for that legislation. I think it was an indication then, as we see today, how the system works for no one. To a great extent, we see so many who feel we have lost control of our borders. The system surely does not work for the honest agricultural employer, and the vast majority certainly meet that test, and for many farm workers who work hard and contribute every single day. The system simply does not work for anyone. So what Senator Smith and I tried to do that July day in 1998 was to begin to address the foundation of a sensible immigration policy based on the proposition that what we have been doing does not work for anybody. It does not work for our country. We live under a contradiction every day with respect to immigration. We say we are against illegal immigration. One can hear that in every coffee shop in the United States.…”