Family Friendly Employers Act of 2005

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

(Mr. McGOVERN asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Gingrey), my colleague, for yielding me the customary 30 minutes.

Mr. Speaker, let me begin by saying that every single Member of this House is concerned about gang violence in our communities and throughout our country, and every single Member of this House is dedicated to trying to make our communities and our Nation safer. However, some of us want to pass not a press release but tough legislation that will indeed make our communities safer.

So, Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong opposition to H.R. 1279, the so-called Gang Deterrence and Community Protection Act. It is bad policy wrapped in a bad bill that will simply not do the job the sponsors claim it will do.

Do not let the title of the bill fool Members. It has nothing to do with deterrence or community protection. This bill does nothing to address the causes of gang activity. Instead, its primary purposes include unjustifiable punishment and ineffective enforcement of the law.

The bill unjustifiably expands death penalty provisions, removes judicial discretion over transferring juveniles to the adult court system, and imposes ineffective mandatory minimum sentencing.

Mr. Speaker, Time magazine focused on the spike in gang activity in Los Angeles in the September 3, 2001, edition. In that story, Father Greg Boyle, a Catholic priest who worked in a

gang-infested area of East Los Angeles, said that California's anti- gang strategy, which has been copied across the country, ``is bankrupt. You have the three strikes law and jail and so on, but you can't terrify a kid into being hopeful about his future.''

The following quote is even more telling: ``We don't need new laws. We have a penal code a foot thick. You can't just work gangs with police suppression. You need prevention and intervention programs, too.'' Mr. Speaker, that statement was not made by a social worker or community activist. No, Mr. Speaker, it came from Sergeant Wes McBride, founder of the California Gang Investigators Association and a 28-year veteran of anti-gang policing.

After reading this legislation, it is clear to me that this bill will do nothing to deter gang activity and, instead, will sentence American youth to lives of crime and violence instead of proactively intervening in our communities to prevent our children and our youngsters from joining gangs in the first place.

This legislation contains several provisions that unjustifiably expand the Federal death penalty. Despite numerous studies that have documented both the exposure of innocent individuals to the death penalty system and its discriminatory nature, the proponents of this bill want to make this already-flawed system worse.

Mr. Speaker, let me say this clearly. I am opposed to the death penalty. I do not believe the death penalty deters future crimes. It has been proven that the death penalty unfairly targets minorities. It has also been proven that innocent people have been sent to death row and have been put to death. Inclusion of the death penalty in this bill is wrong and should be stripped out.

Since 1973, 119 innocent people have been released from Death Row. A study performed by the Criminal Justice Reform Education Fund reported that over two-thirds of all capital convictions and sentences between 1973 and 1995 were reversed because of serious error during trial or sentencing. How can we expand the death penalty system, especially to include juveniles, when it is proven to be faulty, discriminatory, and not an effective deterrent to violent behavior?

Let me remind my colleagues that President Bush signed the Justice for All Act into law on October 30, 2004. This law, which was approved overwhelmingly by this body, improved the fallibility of the death penalty system by making DNA technology available to our criminal justice system in order to improve its ability to exonerate the innocent, as well as identify and convict the guilty. However, the important provisions in the Justice For All Act that would improve the fallibility of the death penalty system are not even being funded. As if that were not bad enough, the bill before us today would actually create new death penalty provisions.

In effect, Mr. Speaker, with this bill, we are adding more death penalty cases to an already-broken system that is desperately in need of repair. By not funding the protections provided under the Justice for All Act and by expanding the death penalty to new cases, this bill makes the death penalty system worse, not better.

Another provision that I strongly disagree with is the transferring of juveniles to the adult court system. Research performed by the Department of Justice has shown that youths tried as adults are more likely to commit a greater number of crimes upon release and that these crimes will be violent. Youths sent to prison with adults end up victims of rape, assault and become high repeat offenders. When these prisoners are released and attempt to reenter society, what are their options? It is most likely they will pick up where they left off and contribute once again to the cycle of gangs and violence.

Moving a youth into the adult court system and prison system will not reduce the amount of youth crime and gang activity. If anything, it will make it worse.

Another flawed aspect of H.R. 1279 is its emphasis on mandatory minimum sentencing. Mandatory minimum sentencing will not prevent youths from joining gang or reduce violent crime among youths. Mandatory minimums were originally created to decrease the disparity in sentencing of like offenders. However, the Judicial Conference of the United States and the U.S. Sentencing Commission has found mandatory minimums ``require sentencing courts to impose the same sentence on offenders when sound policy and common sense call for reasonable differences in punishment.'' In other words, judges are prevented from assessing what type of punishment fits the crime.

Removing sentencing power from judges and shifting discretion to prosecutors will not prevent any youth from joining a gang, committing his first crime or becoming a repeat offender. In fact, this is exactly what the U.S. Supreme Court concluded in January when it ruled to allow Federal judges to deviate from sentencing guidelines. I submit, Mr. Speaker, that this bill's host of harsh mandatory sentences is directly in defiance of the Supreme Court ruling.

Mr. Speaker, we know that intervention programs work in the majority of cases. For the most violent and dangerous individuals, we already have laws on the books that address these actions. But we have a real chance through prevention and intervention programs to make a difference in the lives of these young people. Instead of expanding death penalty provisions and trying juveniles as adults, we need to address the problem of youth crime and violence through early intervention and treatment methods. Programs like Head Start and the Job Corps have proven to be an effective means of deterring crime.

Studies of Head Start demonstrate that $3 is saved for every $1 spent on the program by reducing the future cost of crime, remedial education and welfare. This is clearly more cost effective than spending $9 billion over the next 10 years for prison bed construction and inmate upkeep, which happens to be the cost impact of H.R. 1279 estimated by the Sentencing Commission.

Job Corps programs deter crime by guiding at-risk youths and adults to getting a job or full-time study. About 75 percent of Job Corps participants move on to a full-time job or study and are one-third less likely to be arrested than nonparticipants. This approach makes sense as a crime deterrent, and it is also economically beneficial.

Youth crime and gangs are an issue in many cities around the country. In my home city of Worcester, Massachusetts, I helped coordinate a community-wide forum this past fall to address the issue of gang violence. Local police, city government officials, the district attorney, the sheriff's office, and hundreds of individuals were among the attendees. Also participating in this event was the Boston Ten Point Coalition, a nationally recognized leadership foundation whose mission is to reach out to at-risk youth and gang members in hopes of reducing violence in the community.

One particular item the Coalition discussed was the Adopt-A-Gang program, in which city churches keep their doors open and serve as a support center for troubled youth. The churches work with local law enforcement to communicate messages of nonviolence and zero tolerance for crime to these youths. And I am happy to say that the churches of the city of Worcester, along with the city government, the police department and local businesses are currently working with the Coalition to implement this program.

Hands-on, coordinated efforts like the Adopt-A-Gang program are how youth crime can be deterred, not through codification of a so-called gang-buster bill like H.R. 1279. Early prevention programs like Head Start reduce crime; expansion of death penalty provisions will not. Recruitment efforts by Job Corps deter gangs; prosecuting young people as adults will not. Collaborative interventions like Adopt-A-Gang program protect our community; mandatory minimum sentencing will not.

Mr. Speaker, none of the provisions in this bill have proven to be effective ways of dealing with gangs and violent youth behavior. Instead of taking a comprehensive approach to the problem, H.R. 1279's ``punishment first, prevention last'' methodology does not dedicate any efforts toward early intervention, education or rehabilitation.

Ask any cop. Aggressive policing alone will never break the cycle of

gang violence. However, one of the things this bill also does not address is the shortage of police officers across the country. The Federal Government is cutting the COPS program. Local communities all across this country are laying off police officers at a time when we should be increasing the number of police who are on our streets. Intervention and preventive programs like Head Start, Job Corps and the Ten Point Coalition are crucial to any hopes of deterring gangs.

Mr. Speaker, for the past decade, this House has worked in a bipartisan manner to effectively draft and pass comprehensive juvenile justice legislation. This bill is a sharp break with that tradition. Getting tough should mean passing legislation that works, not just passing legislation that sounds tough.

Mr. Speaker, finally, let me just say that 16 Democratic amendments were not made in order by the Committee on Rules last night. Why? I have no idea. According to our schedule, we are going to be done today by around 4 p.m. Surely it is not because we do not have the time to be able to debate some of these important amendments.

This is the kind of legislation where people from different communities, from urban areas and from rural areas who are dealing with this issue of gang violence have important ideas. They brought them forward in the Committee on Rules last night. Yet, last night, the Committee on Rules said to 16 Democrats that you will be shut out of this debate. I do not think that is the way we should be discussing a bill like this.

So, Mr. Speaker, I would ask my colleagues to oppose H.R. 1279 and oppose the rule.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume to respond to my colleague by saying that all the groups he has mentioned, and so many more, also support the COPS program, too, which the President has cut by $40 million. We can talk all we want about using all this harsh rhetoric, but the bottom line is, there are laws already on the books if you commit a violent crime in this country. Right now, if you commit a murder, you will go to jail.

One of the things that is most troubling to me as we talk about how we make our communities safer, there is no talk about the fact that we are cutting funds for our local police departments. We need more police on the streets. That is not the only answer here, but clearly, the answer is not cutting the COPS program, which the Republican majority in this House is doing, and the President has suggested in his budget.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Eddie Bernice Johnson).

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

I always enjoy listening to the distinguished chairman of the Committee on Rules, the gentleman from California (Mr. Dreier). He mentions that a handful of Democratic amendments were made in order, and I guess we all should be grateful on this side of the aisle because usually we get shut out totally. But the fact of the matter is 16 Democratic amendments were not made in order. Sixteen amendments have been shut out from this debate. If this issue was so important, and it is important, then why can we not take the time to debate all the various ideas? As I said, according to the schedule, we may be out of here at 4 o'clock today. I am willing to stay until 5, or even until 6 or even until 7 to give these other people an opportunity to have their concerns voiced on this floor.

We all represent communities, unfortunately, that have been touched by gang violence. All of us have dealt with community leaders, with our local police, in trying to figure out how best to deal with this violence. We all have good ideas. I think, especially on an issue like this, as many people who have these ideas should be able to bring them to the floor and to be able to debate them. But, unfortunately, 16 amendments have been totally blocked from consideration on this bill.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Scott).

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

The gentleman from Washington just said that our local law enforcement would appreciate the support of the Federal Government.

I could not agree with him more. Then why are we cutting community policing programs? I mean it does not make any sense to me. And why did the Committee on Rules last night deny the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Capuano) and the gentleman from

New York (Mr. Weiner) the right to offer an amendment that reauthorizes the Community Oriented Policing Services, the COPS program for fiscal year 2006, 2008? That was denied. We could have had a vote on the floor today on that amendment and a full debate, and that was denied in the Committee on Rules.

The gentleman from New York (Mr. Crowley) had an amendment that would require that the purchase of firearms, ammunition and explosives to be made in person and to require records to be kept on how the purchases were made. The reason why this is an important amendment because more and more we find out that gangs are purchasing weapons over the internet. Yet that was not even made in order. I know the gun lobby does not like that amendment, but even so, if we want to make sure that gang members have a more difficult time getting access to firearms, we certainly should have debated that amendment.

The gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson-Lee) had an amendment that would make it illegal to transfer a firearm to any individual that the Federal Government has designated as a suspected or known gang member or terrorist. I am trying to find where the controversy is with that amendment. Yet the Committee on Rules would not allow that amendment to be made in order on the floor today.

The gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson-Lee), the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Scott), the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Delahunt), and the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Waters) had an amendment that strikes the section of the bill that allows the Attorney General to charge as adults those juveniles who commit violent crimes and are at least 16 years old. We can disagree on whether or not juveniles should be tried as adults, but, nonetheless, it is an important enough issue that we should have debated it on the floor here today and let Members decide that. And yet that was not made in order.

The gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Eddie Bernice Johnson) had an amendment that establishes funding for prevention and intervention programs for the suppression of youth and gang violence. That was deemed to not be made in order.

The gentleman from California (Mr. Schiff), the gentleman from California (Mr. Cardoza), the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Watson), and the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Linda T. Sanchez) had an amendment that authorizes the expansion and the enhancement of law enforcement and community-based prevention and intervention programs targeting criminal street gangs, gang members and at-risk youth. That was ruled out of order by the Committee on Rules. I mean, I can go on and on and on. There are really good ideas here, and yet, for whatever reason, the Committee on Rules last night said they are not going to have their day on the House floor. And I do not understand why, and nobody who has spoken on the other side has explained to me why those amendments were not made in order, not even the Chairman of the Committee on Rules. We have the time. This is an important issue. These amendments should have been made in order. And, quite frankly, I think it is a disgrace and does a great disservice to a lot of people in this country who care about this issue that these Members were denied their right to offer these amendments.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

What shocks me is that we have people who get up and talk about the importance of supporting our local law enforcement officials, and at the same time, we are supporting budgets that cut money to our local law enforcement agencies.

Mr. Speaker, I include for the Record a letter from the National Council of La Raza opposing this bill. I also include for the Record a statement that has been signed by the American Bar Association, the American Civil Liberties Union, Chamber of Commerce of the United States, the Children's Defense Fund, the Commission on Social Action of Reform Judaism, Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, the National Urban League, Murder Victims' Families for Human Rights, the NAACP, the National Federation of Independent Business, and the United States Conference on Catholic Bishops, all in opposition to this legislation. I also include for the Record, Mr. Speaker, a letter that has been signed by the President of Catholic Charities USA, also opposed to this legislation. And I include for the Record, so that it is there, the 16 amendments that the majority of the Committee on Rules decided to not make in order today on this important legislation.

National Council of La Raza,

Washington, DC, May 9, 2005.

Re Oppose provisions in the ``gang buster bill'' H.R. 1279

that prosecute youth as adults and impose mandatory

minimum sentences.

Dear Member of Congress: On behalf of the National Council

of La Raza (NCLR), the largest national Latino civil rights

organization in the U.S., I urge you to oppose provisions

contained in the ``Gang Deterrence and Community Protection

Act of 2005'' (H.R. 1279) which is on the suspension calendar

this week. Please be advised that NCLR will recommend that

votes relevant to the Latino community and final passage of

the bill be included in the National Hispanic Leadership

Agenda Congressional Scorecard.

The Latino community is directly affected by gang violence,

consequently NCLR is committed to finding a solution to

combat it; however, the approach in H.R. 1279 is ineffective,

irresponsible and simplistic, given that it does nothing to

get to the root causes of the problem, and it further

exacerbate youth violent behavior. H.R. 1279 will if enacted

into law, would have a disparate impact on Latino youth and

their families. This bill would undermine overa11 public

safety, given that it imposes excessively severe measures

aimed at only punishing and not reforming youth violent

behavior. Specifically, NCLR strongly opposes two

provisions--the prosecution and transfer of youth into the

adult system and the inclusion of various mandatory minimum

sentences for a broad category of offenses that are labeled

``gang crimes'' and numerous other offenses.

Section 115 of the bill allows for the prosecution and

transfer of youth into the adult system. The latest research

shows that transferring youth to adult status is a failed

public policy approach, resulting in the opposite of what

this bill is purporting to do. It will increase--not

decrease--youth violence. The research shows that young

people prosecuted as adults, compared to those prosecuted as

juveniles, are more likely to: (a) commit a greater number of

crimes upon release; (b) commit more violent crimes upon

release; and (c) commit crimes sooner upon release. The

research also shows that youth held in adult facilities,

compared to youth held in juvenile facilities, are five times

as likely to be sexually assaulted by other inmates, twice as

likely to be beaten by staff, 50% more likely to be assaulted

with a weapon, and eight times as likely to commit suicide.

With these kinds of risks, it does not make sense for the

House to pursue legislation that includes the power to

prosecute juveniles as adults in federal court for activities

that the states are already well-equipped--indeed, better-

equipped--to handle than the federal system. Also, putting

the transfer decision at the sole discretion of a prosecutor,

not a judge as the law currently requires, violates the most

basic principles of due process and fairness.

Section 103 of the bill includes and expands mandatory

minimum sentences for a broad category of offenses that are

deemed ``gang crime.'' Under this bill, the mandatory minimum

sentences for these crimes range: from 5 to 30 years.

Although the offenses are serious and individuals who are

convicted should be properly held accountable, mandatory

sentences often prevent judges from determining the

appropriate punishment. When judges are restricted by

mandatory sentences, they cannot assess an individua1s

culpability during the crime or other factors that have

bearing on recidivism, thus resulting in inappropriate

sentences.

Although mandatory minimums were intended to reduce the

racial disparities that were associated with indeterminate

sentencing, in practice they exacerbate and mask such

disparities by shifting discretion from the judge to the

prosecutor. Prosecutors retain the power to plea bargain by

offering defendants plea agreements that avoid the mandatory

penalty. Studies have shown that this discretion results in a

disparity in sentencing outcomes based largely on race and

quality of defense attorney. According to testimony from the

U.S. Sentencing Commission, in 1999, 39% of those receiving

mandatory sentences were Hispanic, 38% were African American,

and 23% were White. Hipanics comprised 44% of those subject

to five-year mandatory sentences in 1999, 37% of the ten-year

mandatory sentences, 20% of the 20-year mandatory sentences,

and 8% of the mandatory life sentences. The reality for

African American defendants is even bleaker.

NCLR respectfully asks you to oppose legislation that

prosecutes and transfers youth into the adult system and that

includes and expands mandatory minimum sentences. These

provisions will only exacerbate youth violent behavior, at a

time when data from the FBI's Uniform Crime reporting program

that breaks down the age of people arrested for serious

offenses in 2003 showed that the number of people under 18

arrested declined by 30%. Instead, NCLR calls for a

comprehensive research--based approach that gets at the root

causes of youth violence--which includes but is not limited

to prevention, treatment, and effective alternatives to

incarceration. If you have any questions please contact

Angela Arboleda, NCLR Civil Rights Policy Analyst, at (202)

776-1789.

Sincerely,

Janet Murguia,

President and CEO.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

I will be asking Members to vote ``no'' on the previous question. If the previous question is defeated, I will amend the rule to allow the House to consider the Capuano-Weiner amendment on the COPS program. This amendment was offered in the Committee on Rules last night but was defeated on a straight party-line vote. This amendment will reauthorize the Community Oriented Policing Services, the COPS program, for the next 3 years. The COPS program, created as a result of the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994, focuses on crime prevention at the local level. This program puts law enforcement professionals on the streets and assigns them a beat so they can build mutually beneficial relationships with the people that they serve. By earning the trust of members of their community and making those individuals invest in their own safety, community policing makes law enforcement more efficient and makes America safer.

Mr. Speaker, if we are really serious about stopping the growing gang problem that is occurring in this country, we need to start at the local level, and we need to include prevention as well as enforcement. I know of no better program to meet this worthy goal than the COPS program.

Members should be aware that a ``no'' vote will not prevent consideration of the gang deterrence bill and it will not affect any of the amendments that are in order under this rule. But a ``no'' vote will allow us to add this important amendment that is one of our most effective tools in the war against violence.

Mr. Speaker, as I said at the beginning, if we are truly interested in dealing with the gang problem in this country, we need to do more than pass legislation that sounds tough. We need to have legislation that is tough, that will do the job. We need to do more than a press release here.

I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on the previous question.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the amendment be printed in the Record immediately prior to the vote on the previous question.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I object to the vote on the grounds that a quorum is not present and make the point of order that a quorum is not present.

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 268 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern), pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only.

Mr. Speaker, this is a structured rule providing for consideration of H.R. 1279, the Gang Deterrence and Community Protection Act of 2005. The rule provides 1 hour of general debate equally divided and controlled by the chairman and ranking minority member of the Committee on the Judiciary.

It waives all points of order against consideration of the bill. It provides that the amendment in the nature of a substitute recommended by the Committee on the Judiciary, and now printed in the bill, shall be considered as an original bill for the purpose of amendment, and it makes in order only those amendments printed in the Committee on Rules report accompanying this resolution.

It provides that the amendments printed in the report may be offered only in the order printed in the report, may be offered only by a Member designated in the report, and shall be considered as read, shall be debatable for the time specified in the report, equally divided and controlled by the proponent and an opponent, shall not be subject to amendment and shall not be subject to a demand for a division of the question in the House or in the Committee of the Whole.

It waives all points of order against the amendment printed in the report, and it provides one motion to recommit, with or without instructions.

Mr. Speaker, it is time for Congress to get tough on gang activity. If we can get tough on drugs and if we can get tough on identity theft, terrorism, child abduction, we can get tough on gangs by creating the tools to put gang members behind bars and get them off the streets.

Gang activity is a real problem, a continuously growing problem. All cities with a population of more than 250,000 people have reported gang activity. Best estimates indicate that there are at least 750,000 gang members in the United States. They represent the ills of our society with links to drug trade, human trafficking, identity theft, assault and murder. Gang members continue to break our laws, reject rehabilitation efforts, and they are branching out beyond our cities into suburban and, yes, even rural, communities.

Mr. Speaker, we cannot solve our problems by simply throwing around money, nor can we simply categorize gang activity as isolated incidents. We cannot eliminate gangs by prosecuting incident by incident. We need to enforce our laws in language gang members can understand: you do the crime; you do the time.

With the support of the Fraternal Order of Police, the National Sheriffs' Association, the National Association of Police Officers and many other, more specialized, law enforcement organizations, H.R. 1279, the Gang Deterrence and Community Protection Act of 2005, will make the necessary changes to prosecute gang criminals.

The Gang Deterrence and Community Protection Act designates high- intensity gang areas, and it authorizes funds to combat their illegal activity for special State and Federal enforcement task forces. It authorizes $20 million per year over 5 years to help States hire prosecutors, purchase technology, purchase equipment, and train law enforcement.

Most importantly, it increases penalties to deter violent gang crimes such as murder, rape, kidnapping, and assault. The penalties include death or life imprisonment for murder, 30 years for kidnapping or rape, and 20 years for assault. In addition, this legislation includes juvenile justice reform to ensure that adult crimes, with adult motives, are prosecuted with adult penalties.

The Gang Deterrence and Community Protection Act would give the Attorney General discretion on whether or not to try a juvenile in Federal court as an adult if they are 16 or 17 years old. Mr. Speaker, let me be clear, this legislation does not and will not apply adult standards to anyone younger than 16.

According to the Department of Justice ``Homicide Trends Report,'' between 1976 and 2002 one out of every three murders were committed by a juvenile for gang-related reasons. That means 16- and 17-year-olds are making adult, criminal decisions that equal tragedy for our neighbors and our friends.

More than half the States have enacted laws that mandate the prosecution of juveniles as adults for certain violent crimes, most notably murder. My own State of Georgia has laws that give prosecutors discretion on whether to treat juveniles as adults involving violent and repeat offenses.

Children by the legal definition making adult criminal decisions affect everyone. We need to pass strong anti-gang laws to help prevent troubled teenagers from becoming violent gang members.

As gangs spread and grow, we are seeing more drug activity. These are not simply high schoolers caught with marijuana. We are seeing gangs produce and trade dangerous drugs such as methamphetamine and cocaine. For example, in February, the Atlanta police, United States Drug Enforcement, the MCS Drug Task Force and other law enforcement agencies discovered Georgia's first ``superlab'' in my district, in Smyrna, Georgia, the 11th. With 39 pounds of meth crystal and 250 gallons of the drug in liquid form, one mistake could have destroyed an entire neighborhood.

By strengthening laws against gangs, we are helping fight the supply side of our war against drugs. Gangs are not just a city threat when they jeopardize suburban neighborhoods.

Mr. Speaker, gang activity is as important to the war on crime today as the battles against organized crime in the 1960s and 1970s. This legislation goes beyond national gangs like the Bloods and the Crips and would actually make progress in breaking down membership before these smaller gangs expand into a national nightmare.

Like our war against terrorism, our law enforcement on the State, local, and national levels need to communicate, to share intelligence, and to share resources. We need stronger sentencing to deter crime, and we need to identify potential hot spots before they become major problems.

With passage of the rule, and the underlying bill, we will have the power to take back our communities.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume to clarify and to remind my colleagues on the other side, who are suggesting we should be adding more social programs to this legislation, that this is not a social programs bill. It is a law enforcement bill. If they would like to work with the chairman of the Committee on the Judiciary to craft a bill that would authorize arts and craft classes for gang members, certainly they can do that.

I would also like to mention that we currently have spent over the past 4 years, 2001 to 2004, over $2.1 billion on juvenile social programs aimed at prevention. And even with $2.1 billion, we have continued to see this dramatic rise in gang violence.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Forbes), the distinguished author of the bill and member of the Committee on the Judiciary.

Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from California (Mr. Dreier), the distinguished chairman of the Committee on Rules.

(Mr. DREIER asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

The gentleman from Virginia who just spoke is a brilliant lawyer, and I know he is not missing any points; but I want to say it is very important that the rest of our colleagues understand, we know that all of these crimes mentioned here today are illegal. But the point is, this bill addresses the dismantling of the systems that support gangs, and I think it is very important that we keep that in mind.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Washington (Mr. Reichert), 8 years King County sheriff and 30 years as a police officer.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Forbes), the bill's author.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

As we bring debate on this rule to a close, I must stress the importance of strengthening our communities' efforts against gang crime. Like other forms of organized crime, gangs are at the center of drug violence, identity theft, bank robberies and many of the deadly shootings we read about in the local papers. We need to act in one strong voice to indicate that our laws have a purpose, that our prosecutors and law enforcement officers mean business. Gangs are a national problem, and they will not go away by simply putting them into an arts and crafts program or opening up a gymnasium to let them play midnight basketball. We can prevent the formation of gangs by strengthening our families, and we can deter their crimes by breaking their organization and putting them in jail. Gangs are no longer simply found in the largest cities but have made their way into our rural and suburban communities as well.

Gangs are a problem which need a resolution because the cost is in human lives. One of the more important aspects of the Gang Deterrence and Community Protection Act is mandatory minimum sentencing. With mandatory sentencing, law enforcement will gain leverage over the lower-level gang members, leverage that will put pressure on a gang member to ``roll over'' on their leadership. With cooperation comes the ability to take down an entire gang network, which is the desired effect of this legislation. If there is no threat of doing hard time, there is no incentive to cooperate with law enforcement investigators. In fact, minimal sentencing of much shorter time is often viewed by low-level 16- and 17-year-old gang members as a badge of honor, so- called ``earning your bones.'' They come out of prison in 6 months to 2 years and move up the gang chain of command. Plain and simple, mandatory minimum penalties are an important piece in protecting the public from violent gangs by taking down the system that supports them.

Mr. Speaker, mandatory sentencing, this is not a new concept. In fact, the Child Abduction Prevention Act of 2002 contained 20-year mandatory minimums for child abductions and earned the support of 178 Democrats at final passage. Mandatory minimum sentences were part of the 2003 PROTECT Act, which passed this body by a vote of 400 to 25. The Identity Theft Penalty Enhancement Act contained mandatory minimum sentences, and it passed on suspension. An amendment to the intelligence bill that contained mandatory minimum sentencing to assure appropriate penalties for serious offenses such as possession of atomic, biological and chemical weapons passed 385 to 30. Mandatory minimum sentencing has been widely supported by this House and I believe works to deter crime. Getting tough on crime requires tough and uniform enforcement. We cannot afford to relent in our efforts to deter gang crime and enforce our laws. We need to address this problem while we have the opportunity and before it grows further out of control. We need to invest in new technology, unify our intelligence and strengthen our sentencing so law enforcement will have the tools to get gangs off the street.

Mr. Speaker, I urge support for this rule and passage of the underlying bill.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the previous question on the resolution.

Mr. Speaker, it is with a great deal of pride that I rise today to support both this rule and the underlying bill and to point out to my good friend on the other side that this is a bipartisan bill, and it is a bill that is designed to reach a major problem in our country today, which is the rise of violent gang crime.

When I listen to some of our opponents talk about this bill, they always use the term ``antisocial behavior,'' and I can tell you from studying gangs for over 10 years, it is not antisocial behavior that we are talking about. Let me, Mr. Speaker, tell you what we are talking about. We are talking about machete attacks, witness intimidation, extortion, cold-blooded assassination, rapes, cutting off people's fingers, cutting off their arms, cutting off their heads.

But what concerns me the most, Mr. Speaker, is the metamorphosis I have seen in violent gang activity across our country. First of all, there has been a huge change in numbers. My good friend from Georgia mentioned earlier that, as we sit here and debate this bill, there is probably between 750,000 to 850,000 gang members in the United States. To put that in perspective, if they were an army from a foreign country, it would be the sixth largest army in the world. And that is not waiting to get in our borders, but already here.

Their violence has increased enormously. In some of these gangs, in order to be able to get in, if you are a woman, you have to be raped in, for 30 minutes by six different individuals. If you are a male, you have to be either beaten in or, to some of the gangs, you have to murder somebody to get into the gang.

And they have become national and international in scope. No longer are we talking about the old Jets and Sharks from West Side Story; we are talking about gangs that are across the country that have boards of directors outside the prisons, boards of directors inside the prisons, and they are ordering violent activity. They may be in Los Angeles, but they are ordering the violence in another part of the country.

Their recruitment is now reaching as low as the elementary schools, and their motivation to join is no longer just a fear or a want to belong to something. Today, many people feel if they do not join the gang, they will be beaten or intimidated by the gang. So it is the presence of the gang and the fear and intimidation of the gang that is drawing them there.

Also, one of the things that concerns us most is that many of these gangs have become the most proficient smugglers of individuals and weapons in the country, and it is a small linkage between the gang activity that we are seeing and their connection with organized terrorist activity.

What this bill says is that, if you join a violent criminal gang and you commit a gang crime, you will go to jail for a long time, or you will help us bring down that network. What this bill says is that, if you are a gang leader, you can no longer order violence in one part of the country by a 16- or 17-year old and expect to go scot-free, because the Federal, State and local government is coming after you. It also says that we are going to use the combined strength of the Federal, State and local government to protect citizens in our own borders from the domestic terror they face from gangs.

Mr. Speaker, I would suggest that if this bill fails, we might as well put a sign on a billboard that says ``Coming to a neighborhood near you soon,'' because that is the growth we are seeing in violent gangs.

My good friend just raised in his opposition to the bill the support of the California Gang Investigators Association. They support this bill. The Fraternal Order of Police supports this bill. The National Latino Peace Officers Association supports this bill. The National Association of Police Organizations supports this bill. The major chiefs of law enforcement departments across the country support this bill. The National Troopers Coalition supports this bill.

Mr. Speaker, I hope we will support this bill and make it into law and protect our citizens.

Mr. Speaker, I think, if one is around here long enough, they get to the point where they do not believe they could be shocked by anything. But when I heard the other side a while ago say that they believe that giving arts and crafts to violent gang members will do more to deter crime than empowering law enforcement agents and locking up gang members in jail, that, I have to admit, still shocks me.

Mr. Speaker, I include for the Record a letter from the National Latino Peace Officers Association, which supports all the provisions of this bill and asks that this bill be passed; from the Fraternal Order of Police that supports this bill and asks that it be passed; from the National Association of Police Organizations, which supports this bill and asks that it be passed; from the National Sheriffs' Association, which supports the provisions of this bill and asks that it be passed; from the Law Enforcement Alliance of America, which supports the provisions of this bill and asks that it be passed; from the National Troopers Coalition; from the California Gang Investigators Association; from the Los Angeles Deputy Sheriffs office; and from the Major County Sheriffs' Association.

And, Mr. Speaker, we will have a lot more as the day goes on.

Major County Sheriff's Association,

Alexandria, Virginia, April 20, 2005.

Hon. James Sensenbrenner, Jr.,

House of Representatives, Committee on the Judiciary,

Washington, DC.

Dear Chairman Sensenbrenner: On behalf of the Major County

Sheriffs' Association, I am writing to express our support

for H.R. 1279, the ``Gang Deterrence and Community Protection

Act of 2005.'' This much needed legislation takes a necessary

step toward addressing the growing epidemic of gang violence

that is affecting our entire nation and has even stretched

into some of our most rural communities.

The Department of Justice estimates there are currently

over 25,000 gangs and over 750,000 gang members who are

active in more than 3,000 jurisdictions across the United

States. Gang activity has been directly linked to the

narcotics trade, human trafficking, identification

documentation falsification and the use of firearms to commit

deadly shootings.

H.R. 1279 would address the growing problem of gang

violence by creating a rational strategy to identify,

apprehend and prosecute gangs across the nation.

Specifically, the bill would provide for the designation of

High Intensity Gang Areas (HIGAs) to identify, target and

eliminate violent gangs in areas where gang activity is

particularly prevalent.

The bill would also create a statute to prosecute criminal

gangs similar to the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt

Organizations statute (RICO) that has proven so effective

against organized crime, and would provide more than $385

million over the next five years in grants to support

Federal, State, and local law enforcement efforts against

violent gangs, and to coordinate law enforcement agencies'

efforts to share intelligence and jointly prosecute violent

gangs.

Finally, under H.R. 1279, several categories of gang-

related offense would be subject to mandatory minimum

sentences of at least 30 years in prison for cases of

kidnapping, aggravated sexual assault or maiming.

The ``Gang Deterrence and Community Protection Act of

2005'' is a comprehensive piece of legislation that addresses

both the enforcement and prosecution aspects of the battle

against gang violence.

Thank you for your time and attention, as well as your

continued support of law enforcement.

Sincerely,

Sheriff Michael J. Bouchard,

MCSA Vice President--Legislative Affairs.

Sheriff James A. Karnes,

MCSA President.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of this rule and the underlying legislation. I want to congratulate my colleagues, the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Gingrey), for his management of this rule; and the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Forbes) for the hard work that he has put into this effort.

It is amazing, as we listened to those numbers that the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Forbes) used, talking about the fact that this would be the sixth largest army on the face of the earth, between three- quarters of a million and 850,000 gang members, 21,500 gangs out there; the fact that it has become such an international entity.

It is clear that we need to do everything that we can to take action.

Mr. Speaker, I believe that this rule will provide us with an opportunity to do just that. At the close of his statement, the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern) bemoaned the fact that we do not have enough amendments to be made in order by Democrats. The fact of the matter is the gentlewoman who just spoke, my very good friend from Dallas (Ms. Eddie Bernice Johnson), is going to have an amendment made in order under this rule.

The gentleman from Texas (Mr. Cuellar) is going to have an amendment made in order under this rule. The gentlewoman from California (Ms. Watson) is going to have two amendments made in order under this rule. The gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Scott) who is sitting here on the floor along with the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Waters) is going to have an amendment made in order under this rule.

The fact is six of the 10 amendments that are going to be made in order under this rule are being offered by members of the minority, creating an opportunity for us to consider a wide range of alternatives in dealing with what everyone acknowledges is an extraordinarily serious problem.

I want to take a moment to talk about three other amendments that are made in order under this rule that are very important, and I urge support for those amendments. They are being offered by the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Goodlatte) and the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Norwood). The fact is many of the problems that are gang-related stem from an issue which we have just begun to deal with by passing the REAL ID Act and that has to do with the problem of illegal immigration. We know when we look at the number of gang-related homicides that have taken place in Southern California in the last 5 years, in the county where I live, Los Angeles, we have had 307 gang-related homicides. And now the number of those murders is spilling over into San Bernardino County.

One of the things that we found, tragically, is that much of this is directly related to the problem of illegal immigration. An overwhelming majority of the people who come into this country illegally, Mr. Speaker, come here for one reason and one reason only and that is to feed their families, to make sure that they can make a better life for their families. But of the remaining 2 percent who come in, tragically many of them have been perpetrating crime and tragically they are attracted to gangs.

As was said earlier by the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Forbes), many of these gangs are managed from inside of prisons, outside of prisons, boards of directors, and there is an international component to this which must be addressed. So I will say that the amendment of the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Goodlatte), which I think is a very good one, will actually call for an additional 5 years of incarceration if, in fact, the gang member, the criminal, is found to be here illegally.

One of the things we need to make sure that we do, Mr. Speaker, is that as we increase that level of incarceration for that illegal immigrant felon, it is essential that we make sure the Federal Government provide the resources for that incarceration. That is something that must be done. It is done under the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program, the SCAAP program; and we have to make sure that we provide those resources there, but it is correct and very important for us to do what we can to ensure that those people who are here illegally and perpetrate crimes against our fellow citizens are penalized for that.

I believe we have a very good piece of legislation here. It will help us turn the corner on what is a very serious problem. We also need to do everything that we can to, as has been pointed out by a number of people, train and provide incentive and create opportunity for young people so they are not attracted to the gang life and a life of crime.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues' support of this very fair and balanced rule and, as I said, urge support for the underlying measure and urge support for the Goodlatte amendment and the two Norwood amendments.

I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time.

Mr. Speaker, if you listen to the debate, you might not think it is illegal to use a machete to chop somebody's hand off or to, last night, gang-rape a handicapped child in the park, murder for hire, cold- blooded murders. You might not think those are illegal. In most jurisdictions in the country, certainly in the jurisdictions that I represent, it is already illegal to take a

machete and chop somebody's hand off, and I have not heard complaints from the local police that they need a new Federal law to help deal with those crimes.

Mr. Speaker, this bill was introduced just about 2 months ago, incidentally the same day that a juvenile justice coalition released just another study showing how trying more juveniles as adults will actually increase crime. The rule, of course, does not allow us to address that issue, where juveniles, the marginal juveniles, the ones not now tried as adults in State court, would be tried as adults under this legislation. I have not seen any study that contradicts them, but all of the studies I have seen show that that will actually increase the crime rate because when they are tried as adults, they are also locked up with adult criminals and come out worse than they went in.

No amendments in this rule are allowed to address the death penalty, which has been shown to be racially discriminatory, which has been shown to have no effect on crime and shown to be so inappropriate that the Supreme Court with seven Republican appointees sitting on the court ruled that, for juveniles, the death penalty was unconstitutional. We have not had an opportunity under the rule to address that, not even the fact that under the bill you can have a capital prosecution for accidents, accidental actions. It does not require an intent to kill someone. It could have been an accident. There was no amendment allowed for that.

There is no amendment to allow the little money in the bill to go to local law enforcement. Virtually all of the money goes to Federal law enforcement. If you are going to have an effect on gangs, the money ought to go to where the gangs are actually fought, on the local.

Mr. Speaker, we have not had the amendments to actually address the kinds of problems that are in the bill. It came out at the last minute. My colleague from Virginia has mentioned all the people supporting it. I know one letter we received talked about the need for all of the money in the bill going to law enforcement and help get the money for law enforcement in the bill to the localities, and you look in the bill and there is no money. It is all for Federal law enforcement, Federal prosecution. Virtually nothing for local law enforcement. If you look at the title of the bill, you think you are doing something. In fact, you are doing nothing.

Mr. Speaker, the impact of this bill is going to round up a few low- level people committing little crimes, some even misdemeanors, and they will be getting 5- and 10-year mandatory minimum sentences. If we are going to do something about crime, if you ask anybody that knows what they are talking about what to do about juvenile crime, they will tell you prevention and early intervention. Keep the kids out of trouble and if they get in trouble to begin with, get them right back on track. There is no money in here for prevention.

We have heard a crack about arts and crafts for gang members. Let me tell you something. Arts and crafts for gang members will do more to reduce juvenile crime and gang membership than the provisions in this bill, and everybody knows it.

I have got to admit that the sound bites and slogans are stronger on the other side, but all of the studies show that this bill would do virtually nothing to reduce juvenile crime and is certainly not an effective use of the taxpayers' money if your goal is to actually reduce crime. You need to put the money into prevention and early intervention. We lead the world in incarceration already. If you are going to get any more crime reduction out of the next dollar we are going to spend, it ought to go into prevention and early intervention to keep the kids out of trouble; 850,000 kids are not going to come out of gangs because we pass this legislation. They are in gangs now because they have nothing to do in the afternoon. We need to defeat this bill and do something serious about juvenile crime.