On the recordSeptember 16, 2010
Mr. President, I would like to share some thoughts about the surprising decisions that were noted in some of the media that the majority leader, certainly with the support of the administration, plans to introduce a very significant, very controversial, unacceptable amnesty amendment to the Defense authorization bill. The proposal is called the DREAM Act. A lot of people think this is legislation that we need to deal with, and some have supported it over the years. It has been coming up for quite a number of years and never passed. So what do we have now? We have a scheme to bring it up, not having had it go through the committee process. The bill was introduced March 2009. I assume that is what Majority Leader Reid plans to bring up, but we have not been given the amendment language. So they have got this DREAM Act proposal. They want to add it to the Defense bill, and put it on a bill that is so important they think the Congress will pass it anyway. Pass it as part of the Defense bill. We are weighing down the Defense bill--I am on the Armed Services and Judiciary Committees where both of these matters have come up. They want to weigh down this armed services bill with controversial legislation that ought not to be on it, to jeopardize it and put us in a position where a lot of good people who otherwise want to support the bill will not be able to do so, No. 1. No. 2, let's talk about the DREAM Act. The American people have every right to be unhappy with this Congress.…





