Political Quotes

“this is an amendment offered along with Senator Mikulski on the Polish visa waiver program. This is an issue I have talked about on numerous occasions along with Senator Mikulski. We have concern that one of our best allies--in fact, one of our staunchest allies--has great concerns about the way they are being treated in the United States with respect to the visa waiver program. The visa waiver program is available to 27 countries around the world. That allows citizens from those countries to travel in the United States for vacation and visiting families, et cetera, without requiring a visa. This is a program which is given to countries which we have a special relationship with and which are able to meet certain criteria laid out in the law and have been certified by the Department of State as having met that criteria. Poland, so far, has not been able to meet the criteria that has been laid out in statute, although I will say that when Senator Mikulski and I introduced this in the last session and pushed for its adoption, I think we energized the administration and State Department to get to work and try to find a way for us to meet the Poles halfway with respect to getting them into the visa waiver program. I am very pleased to see that last year, they were again writing letters, putting on pressure, threatening to bring this bill up for purposes of passage. We brought it up in the 108th Congress and tried to pass it.…”