John Cornyn: “it really boggles my mind we are having a debate over such a commonsense and straightforward amendment coming up on the…”

“it really boggles my mind we are having a debate over such a commonsense and straightforward amendment coming up on the anniversary of 9/11. To say the Department of Homeland Security cannot share information about potential fraud and crime and potentially disclose organized criminal activity and potentially even terrorist activity because of the provisions of this underlying bill--I cannot believe we are having that debate. But we are. Hopefully, our colleagues will join us in accepting this amendment which will reconcile this bill with other provisions of the law that we have amended and reformed over the last few years, which have improved information sharing between our intelligence community and our law enforcement agencies, which have made us safer. I don't think it is any accident that while there have been terrorist activities taking human life in places such as Madrid and London and Beslan and other places, we have been fortunate enough to avoid another travesty such as occurred on September 11. Part of it is because of information sharing. This amendment would not deter any alien from applying for legal status. If we are going to say that once that application is denied for whatever reason that it can't be used to investigate potential crimes and fraud and potential terrorist links, that doesn't do anything to encourage or discourage people from coming forward. This is somebody whose application has already been denied.…”