Free Flow of Information Act of 2006

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the pending amendment be set aside.

Mr. President, I send an amendment to the desk.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. President, this bill we are debating today, the immigration bill, will place a significant cost on the American taxpayers. I am particularly concerned that the provisions of this bill will impose a heavy strain on our social security system. That concern is why I am offering amendment number 3985.

The American public needs to understands what this bill would do. If enacted, it would allow the immigrants who receive amnesty to qualify for social security based on work performed prior to their amnesty. It allows people to qualify for social security based on work they did while they were illegally present in the United States and illegally working in the United States. Let me repeat that.

People who broke the law to come here and broke the law to work here can benefit from their conduct to collect social security. This bill is the pathway that allows that.

In some cases, illegal immigrants may have stolen an American citizen's identity. They may have stolen an American's social security number to fraudulently work. But it is that illegal conduct and fraudulent work that they will be allowed to use to qualify for social security.

Does this bill punish the people who stole an American citizen's identity? No, it does not. It rewards them. Does this bill consider the impact that the crime of identify theft had on the victim whose social security number was stolen? No, it does not. This bill gives them the full benefit of citizenship, with respect to social security benefits and rewards criminal conduct without any consideration for the victim.

There have been many media reports recently about illegal immigrants stealing Americans' social security numbers. To understand the potential scope of this problem, you have to un1erstand that every year employers are advised that nearly 800,000 employees do not have valid, I matching social security numbers. In too many cases, the number used belongs to someone else. And so, for a moment, I want the Senate to stop. I want my colleagues to think. And to consider the impact this theft and fraud has on the victims.

Rarely, does the Senate ever really consider the impact that crime has on the victim. Today Should be different. And so I am going to take a few moments to share with my colleagues a few of the stories of the victims of identity theft. In order to protect their privacy, I will only use the victim's first name.

Identify theft by illegal aliens has created many problems for Americans. Sometimes those problems involve the Internal Revenue Service. For example, Audra has been a stay-at-home mom since 2000. Over the last 3 years, the IRS has accused her of owing $1 million in back taxes. This is a picture of the first letter she received from the IRS saying she owed back taxes. Since that first letter, she has received many more.

Her story is clear. She has not worked in 6 years. Yet the IRS says she owes taxes for working the last three years. What she first thought was a mistake, later became clear. It was a case of identity theft. Her social security number was being used by at least 218 illegal immigrants, mostly in Texas, to obtain jobs.

Audra has obtained copies of the 218 W-2s that were used in 2004 by illegal immigrants using her Social Security number. This is a picture of the stack of those W-2s. In Audra's own words, she said, ``It was so overwhelming I couldn't be frustrated--I was just completely beyond that.'' She filed a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission. Her file at the Federal Trade Commission is very thick. Here is a picture of many of the documents in her file on this chart.

Identity theft by illegal immigrants has made it hard for some Americans to find a job of their own. When my staff spoke to Audra, she explained to them that she was not able to find a job of her own because of the theft of her Social Security number. This is a photo of the letter Audra received denying her employment because she is actually already employed by that same employer. Obviously, she is not, but someone else with her Social Security number is employed at that place of employment.

Audra is not the only American affected in this way. A few years ago, a woman named Linda applied for a job at a chain retailer, but her job application was turned down. Why? Because her potential employer told her that she was already working for that very same retailer. She, of course, knew better. She could not get a job because someone else had stolen her identity. Without knowing it, the thief also stole the job she could have been hired to do.

That is not what America should be about. People who want to work should be able to work. Identity theft by illegal immigrants has damaged many Americans' credit, making it hard for them to buy the basic necessities. In some cases, the victims of identity theft are denied social service benefits such as unemployment because records show they already have a job even though they are not working. In some cases, government records show they have many jobs all across the country.

I want to tell my colleagues about Caleb, who works in northern Nevada. He lives there with his wife and two children. Caleb is actually one of my constituents. This is a picture of Caleb and his daughter at the kitchen table. Caleb works hard as a construction worker to take care of his family. In December of 2003, Caleb was unable to find work because of the seasonal difficulties northern Nevada's construction industry faces. So Caleb applied for unemployment benefits. He was denied unemployment benefits. Why? Because he was told he was already working as a landscaper in Las Vegas. Many of my colleagues are probably not aware of the geography of Nevada. I am pretty confident that Caleb was not living in Reno and working in Las Vegas because that would mean he would have over a 1,000-mile commute every single day. Caleb and his wife contacted the employer of the identity thief. They learned that the person who used his Social Security number had previously given the employer at least 10 different Social Security numbers, and that person's resident alien card had expired.

In this picture, Caleb has many of the documents, including a copy of the expired resident alien card used by the person who stole his identity.

Not only does identity theft by illegal immigrants create problems for adults, it is also creates problems for young children, children who will likely have to deal with the consequences of someone stealing their Social Security number well into adulthood.

For example, Kelly's daughter is quite ambitious. Based on where she lives, and on where she works, she drives 80 miles each day to work at a steakhouse. I am sure her parents were surprised to learn about her commute since she does not even have a driver's license yet. In fact, Kelly's daughter has gotten off to quite an early start in life in the work world--considering she is only 5 years of age. Her Social Security number was being used by an illegal immigrant to work.

Stories like this are all too common. Many Southwest States such as Utah and Arizona, and even my home State of Nevada, have experienced a crime spree involving illegal immigrants using stolen identities of children. In one case in Utah, a child apparently owns a cleaning company and works as a prep cook at two restaurants in Salt Lake City. That is a lot of responsibility, especially for an 8-year-old boy. Another boy from Salt Lake City supposedly works for an express air freight company, quite an important job for an 11-year-old.

These stories are shocking. It is clear that illegal immigrants are purchasing false papers and using stolen Social Security numbers to obtain jobs. They are victimizing hard-working Americans, Americans who want to work. They are also victimizing these young children. The current Social Security policy and this bill will only make matters worse by granting benefits to those who are working here illegally.

I am offering an amendment to correct this problem. My amendment will help reduce this kind of document fraud. My amendment will also preserve the integrity of the Social Security system by ensuring that people are not able to receive Social Security benefits based on their prior unlawful activity.

I will explain my amendment to the American people and to the Senate. Under current law, individuals who work in the United States illegally and later obtain legal employment status can use their illegal work history to qualify for benefits. For example, if an illegal immigrant works in the United States for 9 years, and then receives legal status under this bill, the immigrant would qualify for full Social Security benefits after just 1 year of legal work. Essentially, the illegal immigrants can go back to the Social Security Administration and ask them for credit for his or her illegal work.

What is important to understand is that in order to go back to the Social Security system, the illegal immigrant must get legal status in some way. This bill is an avenue that gives them that legal status. This bill opens the door for illegal immigrants to get Social Security based on their illegal work history. My amendment closes that door.

I know some of my colleagues may argue that the illegal immigrants paid into the system, and as a result they should be able to collect benefits based on paying into the system. To those colleagues who feel that way, I say this: First, the crime of identity theft and Social Security fraud are not victimless crimes. The victims of these crimes are American citizens and legal immigrants. My staff has spoken to

some of these victims. Some victims' Social Security records are such a mess that the Social Security Administration has wiped out all of the work history from the victim's account. That is the only way they believed they could get a handle on the fraud associated with these folks' accounts. By wiping out all work history, the victim's own legal work history is also deleted. Basically, the victims is forced to start over to qualify for future Social Security benefits.

The Social Security Administration advised the victim that the victim's records are so bad that their only option was to erase the victim's work history. The victims can rebuild their accounts if they can produce their old W-2s. How many people in America can produce them? Some, maybe. If you are like me, and keep records forever, you will not have a problem. But for most Americans, who do not keep their past W-2s and old records, it will be impossible to prove their work history. As a result, some victims end up losing their ability to collect their Social Security based on their own legal work history.

At the same time, this bill would open the door to give Social Security benefits based on illegal work history. If Members oppose this amendment, Members are saying they want to reward illegal conduct with Social Security benefits while American citizens cannot collect their rightly earned benefits. This is simply unfair. That is not what America is about.

Second, Social Security is a system based on expectancy. For the illegal immigrants who paid into the system using a stolen Social Security card, they never did so thinking they would earn a retirement benefit. They did so, and I don't blame them, simply to get a job. They could not have possibly ever envisioned we would pass this bill in the Senate. They could not ever have thought that the Senate would let them go back and petition for Social Security benefits. They never had a reasonable expectation we would do this and, as a result, that they would be able to receive those benefits in the first place.

Third, for the vast majority of perpetrators who engaged in this kind of identity theft, the only way they would ever be able to petition the Social Security Administration is if we pass this bill. It is reasonable to oppose, as a condition to amnesty, a requirement that the people receiving amnesty give up or surrender their rights to petition for Social Security benefits for their previous illegal work.

I ask my colleagues to consider the message the Senate is sending to the victims if we do not agree to my amendment. The victim has already paid a heavy price. If the Senate does not agree to my amendment, the government will be saying: We reward the criminal and want to continue to punish the victim.

We will also be inviting future fraud. How, you might ask? If my amendment is not agreed to, there will be no way, none, for the Social Security Administration to determine who actually did the work associated with a particular Social Security number. If my amendment is not agreed to, this bill will create an incentive for people to engage in a second kind of fraud, one that is based on fraudulent use of W-2s to petition for illegal work credit. There would be no way for the Social Security Administration to give proper credit for that work if more than one person petitions for that credit.

I ask my colleagues to consider the burden this will place on the Social Security Administration itself. As of 2003, there were 255 million records in the Earnings Suspense File. That file is where Social Security places records when the name and social security number that is used do not match. How can the Social Security Administration process tens of millions of petitions to receive credit for illegally performed work? Without my amendment, the Social Security Administration will be inundated with petitions with no way to know how to handle them.

The promise of Social Security is for citizens and legal residents of the United States. Social Security was not intended for individuals who enter our country illegally, purchase fraudulent green cards and documentation on the black market, and use them to get jobs. It is wrong to allow people who have broken our laws to receive such a reward, especially when such activity places such a heavy toll on victims.

We should not now reward individuals who have knowingly engaged in illegal activity. We should not adopt a policy that will reward this illegal behavior while at the same time continuing to subject the innocent to further victimization. Rewarding illegal behavior is insulting to those immigrants who have played by the rules to qualify for benefits. It is also insulting to hard-working Americans who are paying into the Social Security system.

My amendment allows immigrants to begin accumulating credit to qualify for Social Security only after they have been assigned a valid Social Security number. It does not allow illegal immigrants to receive credit for their past illegal work. This approach is responsible and it is common sense. Especially when it comes to how the Social Security Administration will function.

I hope one of the principles we can reach consensus on is that illegal behavior should not be rewarded at the expense of victimizing American citizens. I cannot go home to Nevada and tell the people we allowed Social Security benefits to go to people who have worked in the United States illegally, especially when Nevadans are too often the victims of this kind of crime.

Mr. President, I will close now by making one additional observation. Under current law, it is a felony to steal and use somebody's Social Security number. Under this bill, we are waiving that felony. That, in and of itself, is amnesty for the crime of identity theft. I do not think that the Senate should go beyond granting amnesty for criminal identity theft. It is one thing to say that the perpetrator of the crime cannot be prosecuted for that felony, but it is quite another to allow the perpetrator to collect Social Security benefits. It is fundamentally unfair to do both when there are victims, like the ones I have talked about today.

So I hope people will see the common sense of this amendment and will, in a bipartisan fashion, overwhelmingly adopt this amendment. I urge my colleagues to adopt this amendment.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I say to the Senator, could I spend 5 minutes responding to a couple things, and then I would be willing to yield to the Senator for 5 minutes in morning business.

Just to respond to a couple of things the Senator from Massachusetts talked about, that section 614 and a provision in section 601 in this legislation on page 395 would ensure that aliens who received legal status, amnesty, whatever you want to call it, cannot be prosecuted for document fraud. He said they weren't receiving amnesty. If there was a felony they were committing, and now they can't be prosecuted, that sounds like amnesty to me.

A couple other points he brought up: Legal aliens who were here and who overstayed their visas have a legal Social Security number. They are paying into the system with a legal Social Security number. Even though they are here illegally, they would still be able to collect benefits.

Another point I want to address that the Senator from Massachusetts brought up concerned the Social Security Administration. These illegal workers would come to them and petition for the benefits, and they would have to prove that they actually worked where they worked, they paid in the taxes, and things like that. Let's try to think about the burden that this would place on the Social Security Administration itself.

Currently, there are 255 million earning suspense files. Those are the ones where the Social Security number and the work don't match, 255 million. Try to imagine how many of these are going to come forward with the Social Security Administration where people are trying to prove something to gain benefits. They are going to be overwhelmed. What is that going to do to the normal processing for people who have problems with their Social Security benefits? All of us have case workers back in our States who deal with seniors who have legitimate Social Security problems. Sometimes there are mistakes made. We have had people who have actually received a letter where the Social Security Administration told them that they had died. It was kind of a surprise to them. But they called us, and we were able to bring them back to life. We jokingly refer to these cases as Lazarus cases. It is a situation where they need speedy help. If the Social Security Administration is burdened with all of these millions of potential cases, it just boggles the mind how people could be against this amendment.

The next point I want to make is that the Senator from Massachusetts said that this illegal immigrant who is now legalized or regularized, whatever term you want to put on it, cannot go to the Social Security Administration, and they have to prove with documents. We have seen the kind of fraudulent documents used in the country today. These documents are not that difficult to produce, to defraud. There is a great incentive for them to do that. Once again, it will be an extra burden on the Social Security Administration trying to prove or disprove whether these documents are real.

The last point I want to make, the Senator said the people they are regularizing in this bill have to pay a fine. They have to pay back taxes. We have heard that over and over again: They have to pay back income taxes. They don't have to pay back Social Security taxes, the FICA taxes they didn't pay, only the income taxes. So let's be completely open and honest about what this bill does and about what my amendment seeks to correct.

When we are considering this amendment, we absolutely must consider what it is going to do to the Social Security Administration, what it is going to do to the trust fund and, mostly, what it is going to do to the victims. Rewarding illegal behavior while we are not taking care of the victims in the United States fundamentally is unfair.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, will the Senator yield?

Mr. President, I wish to ask my friend from Arizona a couple of questions about the bill and about my amendment in particular. The bill does not require that the people whose status is adjusted pay all back taxes. The bill only requires that people pay any back income taxes. There is no mention of FICA taxes in the bill. Is the Senator aware of that distinction?

First, if the alien is self-employed, that is not correct. Remember, the employer pays half and sends in those funds.

That is correct. But the bottom line is if they owe back FICA taxes under this bill, they do not have to pay those back taxes.

I have another question for my friend from Arizona. Is he aware that it is a felony to use someone's Social Security number?

Under this legislation, we forgive that felony. We grant amnesty for that felony.

Right. But, Mr. President, in Sections 601 and 614 of the legislation, it actually ensures that aliens who receive legal status cannot be prosecuted for document fraud, including the false use of Social Security numbers. Is the Senator aware of that?

Mr. President, I agree with the Senator from Arizona that many people are paying into the system. They paid into the system with no expectation of getting social security's benefit because they didn't know we would be enacting a bill like this. They paid into the system simply because that was the price to pay to get a job in the United States. The immigrant knew they were using an illegal Social Security number but without regards of the impact of the victim. I have reviewed case after case related to identity theft and Social Security fraud. These cases are occurring all over the United States. In every case, in every State, where someone's Social Security number was stolen by an illegal immigrant to use to find work, the victim's credit history is destroyed. Sometimes their work history is too. Earlier I talked about Caleb, a gentleman in Nevada. The illegal immigrant who used Caleb's Social Security number was not trying to harm that person but he did. Caleb applied for unemployment but couldn't get it because the agency said he was working when, in fact, he wasn't. He lives in Reno. They said he was working in Las Vegas. It was an illegal immigrant using his Social Security number in Las Vegas.

I never said this amendment is going to prevent identity theft. What I have said is that it is not right for somebody to steal somebody else's identity--granted for the noble purpose of getting a job--and reward the theft by giving work credit that counts towards Social Security. We should consider the victims who are forced to deal with the terrible consequences of the crime.

I will make two other points. The chairman of the Finance Committee supports this amendment. One of the reasons the chairman of the Finance Committee supports this amendment is because the Social Security Administration will not be able to make determinations with respect to the earnings suspense files that the Senator from Arizona referenced. As of 2003, there were 255 million instances where the social security number did not match the name given the employer. This bill will legalize those who are in the workforce today--the 7 million or so in the workforce out of the 12 million who are in the country. The effect of this amnesty over the next 10 years, will require the Social Security Administration to hire nearly an additional 2,000 employees to handle the cases of people who worked illegally, received amnesty under this bill, and are now applying for this benefit. A benefit they earned illegally.

Point No. 2 is, it is going to cost $1.7 billion in administrative costs--$1.7 billion in administrative costs. It does not include any future costs in benefits that the United States will have to pay. Some may say that the immigrants will have earned the benefit. But the Senate does not even know what amnesty will cost. The cost estimates for these policies are not known. My amendment is absolutely the right thing to do. Illegal immigrants did not expect to ever receive this benefit. They were using somebody's Social Security number or a made up one. They did so to get a job. I can appreciate that. I appreciate somebody trying to come to this country to better themselves. I don't believe we should reward the conduct of identity theft by giving people the right to claim the work history for purposes of Social Security.

Our Social Security trust fund is already in trouble. We all know that. This will further put the Social Security trust fund in trouble. The costs could be potentially huge. We don't even know that in this bill. That is why I think we should adopt this amendment.

Mr. President, we look forward to this. What was, then, the time allocation requested? Is it 25, 10, 10, 5? Is that what the Senator suggested?

So that is 25.

Then I think we would get 15.

Have we added all that up?

We have until 10 o'clock, and that time is divided.

If the Senator wants to speak for a few minutes, we can arrange that. I will withhold.

Can I ask unanimous consent we defer the vote at 10 clock until 10:05?

Fine.

Mr. President, we send an amendment to the desk on behalf of myself, Senator McCain, and Senator Graham.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

How much time remains?

We have 11 minutes?

I yield myself 4 minutes.

Mr. President, as we all know, yesterday the Senate voted to eliminate the H-2C immigrant's ability to self-petition for green cards after 4 years. I believe that vote was a mistake because it will have a devastating effect not just for temporary workers but for all workers and, basically, for all Americans.

The amendment we offer today would correct the mistake and take the good language from the Cornyn amendment to improve the underlying bill. This amendment will require that the Labor Department certify that no U.S. worker will be displaced by H-2C workers when they adjust to permanent status, as the Cornyn amendment requires. This amendment also restores the ability of H-2C workers to obtain a green card without being dependent on the generosity of the employers.

The self-petition feature of our temporary worker program is innovative and essential to workers' rights. All Americans lose if it is eliminated from the bill.

The reason temporary worker programs failed in the past, going back to the time of the Bracero Program, is because they did not protect workers' rights. For this new program to work without harming U.S. workers, H-2C workers must have the full set of rights. That is why our bill includes extensive labor protections for temporary workers.

Effectively, then, at the time after the 4 years, the individual will be able to make the petition for the green card, and they will also have to have a certification by the Department of Labor that there is no American able and willing to perform that job. There will have to be that kind of a finding. The self-petition gives that worker some rights and respect as an employee instead of being subject to the dangers we have seen in the past of exploitation by an employer that knows that worker can never get a chance to have a petition and can never get on the path for a green card without the employer giving the thumbs-up signal.

When that power relationship between the employer and the employee exists, we have seen exploitation in terms of wages, working conditions, and other unfortunate problems with regard to women.

This seems to be a solid compromise. It takes the framework of the Cornyn amendment, but it will also ensure that these petitioners are going to have to demonstrate there is that gap in terms of the labor market that they are able to fill and that there is not someone out there in the American labor market prepared to take that job. It seems to me to be a very important principle, a very concrete proposal, one I hope we can have accepted this morning.

I withhold the remainder of my time.

I will take 3 minutes for the membership, if they have a chance to review the amendment.

On page 1, second paragraph:

The Secretary of Labor determines and certifies that there

are not sufficient United States workers who are able,

willing, qualified, and available to fill the position in

which the alien is, or will be employed. . . .

So the Secretary of Labor has to make the certification that they will not be replacing an American worker.

Then, how are they going to be able to give the assurance they have had the 4 years that are included in the first paragraph, that ``the alien has maintained such nonimmigrant status in the United States for a cumulative period of not less than 4 years of employment''?

These are listed and include: records maintained by Social Security, records maintained by the employer, employment work verification, records maintained by the Internal Revenue Service, records maintained by other government agencies.

What we are saying, in the four different categories, those categories are government-held records or the employer-held records, not the employee-held records.

I don't know how it could be much clearer exactly what this amendment does. It is very clear. It is the certification that there is no American that is able, willing, and qualified. And to be able to prove it, there are government-held records or employer-held records, not the petitioner's records, not his stubs, but government-held records.

We have tried to craft this in a way which is going to be fair. We are not interested in people trying to ``jimmy'' the system. We have had too much of that in the past.

I get back to the final theme. This legislation tries to learn from past experience. In 1986, we had amnesty but there was supposed to be tough employer sanctions if they hired unemployed. We had vast industries that produced fake identification cards. The system never functioned. It never worked.

What we have tried to do is avoid that. We have a tamper-proof card. We will have vigorous employment. But, also, to learn the lessons of the Bracero Program, we are not going to have the exploitation of these workers by their employers. That is what we do when we deny the opportunity of an employee ever to be able to make a petition. We say you have to be in there for 4 years, with solid record of employment, solid record of achievement, solid record of commitment to work. Then you can make your petition. You have to meet that requirement.

What time is left?

I yield that time to the Senator from Arizona.

Mr. President, I have tried to point out this will be a judgment decision that will be made by the Secretary of Labor as to whether there is an American fit, willing, and able. And if there is, they cannot petition.

Now, the Senator says: Well, it is all then up to the employee. But the idea of the whole guest worker is the employer. Why is it good for the employer, who is going to go out and petition and say: Look, I need someone to come work for me. They advertise for 45 days. Then they find out they have someone from overseas who will do that. So the employer is the one who is petitioning there. Didn't have any problem with that.

Now, when we get into the situation after 4 years, they can make the petition on this, if there is a vacancy, according to this proposal, but if there is not a green card available, they do not get it. They might have to wait a year. They might have to indicate 2 years. This is not automatic. There are only a certain number of green cards that are available under this category. They may wait 1 year. They may have to wait 2 years. So it is much more difficult. This is still weighted far against the worker than the employer.

What we were always trying to do in the development of the legislation is to have balance and fairness in terms of the authority and responsibility and the legality on this. I think what we have offered addresses what I understood to be the Senator's concern; that is, that there are going to be American workers out there when this person is getting a green card. Therefore, it is going to be adverse to the American workers. We say, if there is one, they don't get it. That is decided by the Secretary of Labor. And they have to be able to prove their work history through documents and records that are either held by the Government or by the employer. It seems to me that is about as lock safe and secure as you can have in this business. I would hope we would accept this amendment.

Mr. President, I think my time has expired.

Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.

Madam President, I move to reconsider the vote, and I move to lay that motion on the table.

Madam President, we are trying to move along. I see my colleague and friend behind me, the Senator from West Virginia, Mr. Byrd, who has been here patiently waiting to address the Senate on this issue generally. That might work, as we are just trying to reaffirm the language on this Inhofe amendment.

Madam President, the Inhofe amendment is enormously important. It is complicated. Members on both sides, including the author of the amendment, are working in good faith to try to work this out. To my knowledge, it has not been worked out. Hopefully, after 25 minutes we will be able to tell the Senate whether it is worked out, whether we will have to have side-by-side amendments. But at this time, we will not enter into a short time agreement.

Hopefully, as we have been making progress in other areas, we will have a chance to do that in this area as well.

Mr. President, I want to cooperate and have cooperated with the Senator. I think it is premature to establish a time on the Ensign amendment. I don't think it will be an undue period of time. But it would be difficult now to agree to a specific time. I hope we would be able to agree after a while. I welcome the chance to continue this. I think this discussion has been enormously valuable and helpful. We can proceed in whatever way the leader wants to proceed. Right now, we would not be in a position to agree to a 1-hour time limitation on the Ensign amendment, half an hour on each side. But we will well work to try to get a reasonable time, if that is the decision.

Mr. President, identity fraud is a major problem, a major issue in this country, and it ought to be dealt with. We ought to do whatever is necessary to make sure we are going to deal with this issue. I think most of us have seen the various national publications and magazines talking about identity fraud. It is there with the use of credit cards. We have it on telephone calling. We have it for purchasing over the Internet, obtaining access of financial records, and with individuals making illegal withdrawals.

All of that is bad and wrong and violates the law, and we ought to deal with that. But we are talking about individuals who are not involved in identity fraud and have paid into the Social Security fund. Should they have that payment they have made into the fund denied to them? So I am with the Senator from Nevada in trying to deal with identity fraud, but I separate myself from him when he says all illegal immigrants are involved in the identity fraud and, therefore, they should not get credit for what they have paid in in terms of Social Security.

Now, who are we talking about? Basically, we are talking about individuals who have the opportunity to try to earn their position, the opportunity to be an American citizen, who have to pay a fine, have to go to the end of the line for those who are coming into the United States currently, who have to demonstrate they have paid all of their taxes, who have to demonstrate they have been free from violating the law. There are all of those conditions that are set up. But once they have achieved all of those conditions, then they have the possibility of citizenship 11 years from now.

So the issue is, should they be denied the credits they have paid into Social Security? The Senator from Nevada thinks they should.

Well, first of all, who are these people? First of all, his proposal would deprive, for example, widows and surviving children of needed Social Security benefits, even if the widows and children are U.S. born. We will have circumstances where the children are American citizens. The widows might be American citizens.

Now, let's say this individual regularizes their position and has paid into Social Security. If that person dies, their survivors would be eligible for survivor benefits, but not under the Ensign amendment. It is interesting, some 85 percent of immigrant-headed households include at least one U.S. citizen. Under the Ensign proposal, citizen children may not be eligible for survivor benefits if their parents had gained legal status or even citizenship but die before they gained the 40 hours of coverage.

The Ensign amendment effectively would deprive the immigrants who have become legal residents of the right to receive Social Security credits for the payroll tax payments they made on the work they performed when they were undocumented. Some do now.

The 1986 act permitted 3 million people--they received the amnesty. That was amnesty. We did not move ahead in terms of the enforcement against the undocumented afterwards. But that was amnesty. Now they are able to receive the benefits today. We are going to say to them, we are evidently going to cut you off from being able to get any credit because I don't see in the Ensign amendment where they are going to respect their position.

It is important to focus on who would be hurt by this highly punitive proposal. Only immigrants who have attained legal status are eligible to receive Social Security. So everyone this amendment would affect will be legal residents under the terms of the bill. Many of them will even be citizens by the time they apply for Social Security. Those are the hard-working men and women this amendment seeks to penalize.

Those are the individuals who really want to be Americans, be part of the American family. They are going to have to pay the penalty, pay their back taxes, abide by all of the laws, continue to believe in their faith. And then they will have the opportunity to go to the end of the line. And then, in 11 years, they will be able to achieve citizenship. They will be working during this period of time.

They are paying into Social Security. And, finally, when they become citizens--11 years from now--the Ensign amendment is going to say: Well, all right, you paid. You have waited your turn. You paid the penalties all the way along. But you are not going to be able to benefit from paying into Social Security because of identity fraud. Well, I have difficulty assuming that all of those who have paid into Social Security have been a part of identity fraud.

Before this bill passed, these workers were undocumented. But once in the country, they complied with the rules of the workplace and paid Social Security taxes on their earnings. Their payroll tax payments and the matching contributions of their employers were paid to the Social Security Administration on a timely basis. Those dollars are sitting in an account at the Social Security Administration today. Social Security has a record of receiving these payments. There is no dispute about that.

The issue raised by this amendment is whether these workers should be given credit in Social Security for the hard-earned dollars they paid into the system. Shouldn't the payroll tax payments they made count toward determining the level of retirement benefits and disability benefits they have earned when they reach retirement age or become disabled?

Now, the amount of benefits a worker receives depends on how many years the individual worked and how much payroll tax he or she paid in. I believe it would be terribly wrong to arbitrarily deny these hard- working men and women credit for all the payroll tax dollars they paid into Social Security on the wages they earned. But that is exactly what the Ensign amendment would do.

Most undocumented workers do pay Social Security taxes. Stephen Goss, Social Security's chief actuary, estimates that ``about three-quarters of other-than-legal immigrants pay payroll taxes''--three-quarters of them.

The amounts paid in by them are substantial. Payments into the Social Security system by undocumented workers total $7 billion a year. Unfortunately, most of these workers do not have genuine Social Security numbers, so the money goes into what they call the Social Security Administration's earnings suspense file. This money is identified by the employer who submitted it but not by the individual worker it belongs to.

Each year, Social Security identifies approximately 130,000 employers who submitted W-2s that cannot be matched to a worker. So the undocumented immigrants account for the vast majority of the funds in the suspense file. The unidentified W-2s closely track their geographic distribution and types of employment to that which undocumented workers typically hold. According to an analysis by the GAO, three of the categories of business with the largest numbers of inaccurate W-2s were restaurants, construction companies, and farm operations.

In order to get credit for the payroll taxes he paid in when he was undocumented, a worker would have to prove how much he paid in while working for a particular employer and when it was paid. The burden of proof would be on the worker, and the worker would only receive credit for payments that the Social Security Administration could verify.

Whatever rules and regulations Social Security established, we are for. They ought to be accurate. They ought to be tough. They ought to be fair. But we are not prepared to say that every individual who paid in, who is now in the process, over this 11 years--here, they are paying in. I want to be a citizen. I am paying my fine. I paid my back taxes. My sons have joined the military serving in Afghanistan. We are going to church every single week. And I am paying into Social Security. I wait 11 years, and I finally become a citizen. Under the Ensign amendment, no, no, you are not going to receive any of that. You are not going to receive a cent of that.

So we are all for Social Security establishing whatever requirements are necessary to ensure the integrity of the fund and the accuracy of the work effort by individuals. But I think the only reason for the Ensign amendment is to deny the legal residents the Social Security benefits they have earned and paid for. Their money sits in the Social Security Administration waiting to be matched with an eligible beneficiary. Once those workers establish eligibility, how, in all fairness, can we deny them credit for their past contributions?

This legislation before the Senate sets out a difficult process for undocumented workers seeking to become legal residents. Most of them have very little money. Yet the legislation will require them to pay thousands in fines and fees. It would be wrong to deny them credit for the Social Security tax dollars they have paid from their often meager wages.

Once these workers are legal residents, if they become disabled, shouldn't they be entitled to receive disability benefits based on the payroll taxes they contributed to Social Security? And if they die prematurely, leaving minor children, shouldn't those children--who in many instances are American children--shouldn't those American children be eligible to receive survivor benefits based on the payroll taxes they contributed to Social Security? And when, after a lifetime of hard work, they reach retirement age, shouldn't they be able to receive a retirement benefit based on all the years of payroll tax payments they contributed to Social Security?

This is not a handout. This is not welfare. Social Security is an earned benefit. If these immigrant workers earned it, they should receive it like everyone else. The Ensign amendment would take their hard-earned money and give them nothing in return. That is not the way America operates.

Allowing these workers to receive the Social Security benefits they have earned not only helps them, it serves the interests of the larger American community. They are living amongst us. As I say, many of the children were born here. If they cannot rely on the Social Security benefits they have earned when they become elderly or disabled, on what source of support will they rely? Certainly, the people of this great Nation would not leave them destitute. We all benefit when the earned benefits of Social Security are there for those in need.

So I urge my colleagues to reject this amendment.

Mr. President, I have been here on the floor since the Senator started, and in response, I would be glad to inquire of those who are interested. I think there are some members of the Finance Committee who are interested in this amendment and want to be heard since it deals with the Finance Committee jurisdiction. So I will inquire and report back to the floor manager.

Several Senators addressed the Chair.

Mr. President, if the Senator will yield, if there is offered side-by-side, that would be voted on after the Inhofe amendment at 4 o'clock. So there is an hour and a half allocated time for debate on the Inhofe amendment, and as I understand, there would be approximately 45 minutes evenly divided.

I thought Senator Akaka's amendment was agreeable or acceptable.

Senator Akaka would like 25 minutes.

If I could suggest, why don't we vote at 4:15. That gives 45 minutes to Vitter.

Mr. President, will the Senator withhold for a moment.

Mr. President, I will take 2 minutes. Then I will yield back the time. And then I think we will be prepared to vote.

Mr. President, first of all, I commend the Senator for raising this issue. He has been a constant

advocate for the families he has spoken about today. And he has communicated with us in the Immigration Committee on so many different occasions about the fairness and the importance of the family unifications and the uniqueness of service that so many of these parents were involved in at a very difficult and challenging time during World War II.

So the Senator from Hawaii deserves great credit for bringing this to the attention of us in the Senate. I speak for the Senator from Pennsylvania, who urges the acceptance of this amendment. This will help provide some very important family reunification. It is entirely warranted and entirely justified.

We thank the Senator for bringing this issue again to our attention and for his continued advocacy on this issue. We will do everything we possibly can to make sure this is carried at the conference as well.

Mr. President, I yield back the remainder of my time.

I move to reconsider the vote, and I move to lay that motion on the table.

The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Mr. President, I thank the Senator.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, as I understand the amendment, on page 350, you strike lines 8 through the rest of the page; am I correct?

Well, this is on the intent of Congress, the basic kind of understanding, the intent of Congress be interpreted in a manner that recognizes the difficulties encountered by the alien in obtaining evidence. As I understand, you strike that. And then you strike the burden of proof provisions through the top of 351, once the burden is met, the burden shall shift to the Secretary of Homeland Security. So those provisions are dropped. The essence of your amendment is to tighten up verification in terms of the applicant.

And that is effectively the purpose of the amendment. In your description and in the language, you talk about bank records, business records, sworn affidavits from nonrelatives who have direct knowledge of the alien's work, including name, address, phone number of the affiant, the nature and duration of relationship. You also talk about remittance records and that the burden is on the alien applying for the adjustment, the burden of proving by a preponderance of evidence that he has satisfied the employment requirements.

I am going to urge that we accept that amendment. We want to make sure, those of us who support this proposal, that we are going to reach those people who are defined in the legislation. And we want to make sure that it is accurate.

We are not interested in people gaming the system or in the identity theft problems and other kinds of challenges and false documents. We have made a very strong effort because if we have that and we lack the verification of information and lack the verification in terms of the individual and we are going to have continued forgery of documents, this is going to be a disaster. But we have given strong emphasis in terms of legality and veracity, and we are going to have the biometric identification cards. We are going to try to do this correctly and by the book, so to speak.

The Senator has redrafted provisions we had in the legislation to ensure the applicant is going to provide the best information and that the best information has to be reliable and dependable in order to be able to participate in the system. I think it is useful and valuable. At the appropriate time, I will urge our colleagues to accept the amendment.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. President, I ask that Senators Murray and Cantwell be added as cosponsors to my amendment.

Mr. President, it has long been evident that our immigration system needs reform. The debate on immigration has been a long time in coming, and I am pleased that this body is moving forward on this important topic in such a comprehensive fashion. For our work on immigration to be truly comprehensive, however, we must address those issues that have received less attention in the debate as well as the front page issues.

My amendment is regarding one of those issues that has not received widespread attention but is of great importance. As a World War II veteran, this amendment is important to me personally, to Filipino- Americans, and to veterans. My amendment would grant the children of Filipino World War II veterans special immigrant status for the purpose of family reunification. Making this small change to our nation's immigration policy would go a long way toward making our immigration laws more just, and I am hopeful that my colleagues on both sides of the aisle will join me in supporting this amendment.

Before I begin a discussion on the specifics of my amendment, I would first like to thank my dear friend and colleague, the senior Senator from Hawaii, Daniel Inouye, for cosponsoring this amendment. In the 101st Congress, Senator Inouye authored section 405 of the Immigration Act of 1990, which provided for the naturalization of Filipino World War II veterans. Senator Inouye has a long history of being involved in this important effort and it is an honor to have his support on my amendment today. In addition, Representative Ed Case has introduced a similar bill, H.R. 901, in the House of Representatives.

To understand the significance of this amendment, it is important to first provide some background about the historical circumstances that got us where we are today.

On the basis of 1934 legislation enacted prior to Philippine independence, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt issued a 1941 executive order. Through this order, President Roosevelt invoked his authority to ``call and order into the service of the Armed Forces of the

United States, . . . all of the organized military forces of the Government of the Commonwealth of the Philippines.'' This order drafted over 200,000 Filipino citizens into the United States military. Under the command of General Douglas MacArthur, Filipino soldiers fought alongside American soldiers in the defense of our country.

Throughout the course of World War II, these Filipino soldiers proved themselves to be courageous and honorable as they helped the United States fulfill its mission. There was no question when they were fighting that they would be treated the same as American troops. For example, Filipino soldiers fought side-by-side with American soldiers in the Battle of Bataan and the Battle of Corregidor. When Bataan fell and the Bataan Death March began, Filipino soldiers were forced to march more than a hundred kilometers from Bataan to Tarlac along with their American comrades. Filipino soldiers faced hardships in concentration camps, and they endured 4 years of occupation by the Japanese. In every sense, Filipino soldiers proved their allegiance to our country through thick and thin.

These Filipino soldiers are war heroes, and they deserve to be honored as such. They served active duty service on behalf of the U.S. military, which should qualify them for the same benefits as other veterans of active duty. Congress betrayed these veterans by enacting the First Supplemental Surplus Appropriation Rescission Act in 1946, which included a rider that conditioned an appropriation of $200 million, for the benefit of the postwar Philippine Army, on the basis that service in the Commonwealth Army should not be deemed to have been service in the Armed Forces of the United States.

Commonwealth Army members were those called into the service of the U.S. Armed Forces for the Far East. These members served between July 26, 1941, and June 30, 1946. Similarly, Congress enacted the Second Supplemental Surplus Appropriation Rescission Act, which provided that service in the New Philippine Scouts was not deemed service in the U.S. military.

New Philippine Scouts were Filipino citizens who served with the U.S. Armed Forces with the consent of the Philippine Government. They served between October 6, 1945, and June 30, 1947.

This generation of veterans is predominantly in their eighties. Of the 200,000 Filipino veterans that served in WWII, there are close to 49,000 left. Some of these veterans receive U.S. benefits, some do not. By 2010, it is estimated that the population will have dwindled to 20,000.

With the passage of the Immigration Act of 1990, the courage of the many Filipino soldiers who fought alongside our troops during World War II was finally recognized by our Government, and Filipino veterans were offered the opportunity to obtain U.S. citizenship. According to the former Immigration and Naturalization Service, about 15,000 Filipino veterans live in the U.S. and became citizens between 1991 and 1995 under the authority of the Immigration Act of 1990. Between that time, about 11,000 veterans who live in the Philippines were successfully naturalized. These thousands of Filipino veterans clearly wished to spend their golden years in the United States, and I am pleased that the 1990 Immigration reform efforts offered them the opportunity to do so.

Unfortunately, the offer did not extend to the adult sons and daughters of these veterans. As a result, the brave Filipino veterans who fought on behalf of America, and who now live in America and continue to contribute to America, must do so alone. Due to a backlog in the issuing of visas, many of the children of these veterans have waited more than 20 years before they were able to obtain an immigrant visa. Unfortunately, many more are still waiting.

It is no secret that U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services in the Department of Homeland Security is facing significant backlogs. However, it is not as widely known that prospective family-sponsored immigrants from the Philippines have the most substantial waiting times in the world before a visa is scheduled to become available to them. What this means, is that these honorable Filipino veterans who faced numerous dangers to defend this Nation now face the prospect of spending the last years of their lives without the comfort and care of their families.

It is a shameful disgrace that the sons and daughters of these brave soldiers are now last in line to become citizens of our country. This is no way to honor Filipino soldiers who bravely fought on the front lines with American soldiers during World War II.

As a World War II veteran myself, I am proud to have answered my nation's call to active duty. During my time of active service, I was driven by a love for my country, and I was comforted by the love of my family. The support that a soldier's family offers during military service is an invaluable buoy to a soldier's spirit.

A family's role in caring and supporting for a soldier becomes even more important after active military service is completed. I was lucky to be surrounded by my family after my service. My heart goes out to those who were separated from their family for years and years due to bureaucratic backlogs.

As the ranking member on the U.S. Senate Committee on Veterans' Affairs, I have seen firsthand the difficulties that veterans can face when readjusting to civilian life after serving in a war. For many veterans, the difficulty of returning to a home that has changed while at war is eased by being surrounded by the familiar faces of loved ones. While that window of opportunity has unfortunately passed for our World War II Filipino veterans, there are still many important ways that families enrich the lives of veterans after the initial readjustment phase. Being surrounded by the love and care of family, especially for World War II veterans facing their twilight years, offers a special source of support.

Action on this issue is long overdue, and it would be very meaningful for the Senate to pass my amendment during debate on the immigration bill. As you may know, Filipino Americans are celebrating their centennial this year. Late last year, the Senate accepted by UC S. Res. 333, a resolution to recognize the centennial of sustained immigration from the Philippines to the United States, and acknowledge the contributions of the Filipino-American community to our country over the last century.

The Filipino-American community has grown and thrived over the last hundred years. Today, Filipino-Americans are the third largest ethnic group in the State of Hawaii and represent one of the fastest growing immigration groups in the country. Filipinos have made contributions to every segment of our community, ranging from politics and sports, to medicine, the military and business. One of the foremost issues for Filipino Americans is our Nation's commitment to Filipino veterans, and passing my amendment would be a significant way to honor Filipino veterans during a historic year for the Filipino American community.

Over the years, I have listened to the stories of countless Filipino World War II veterans who have been separated from their families and who are patiently waiting in line. Every veteran has a unique story to tell, but those Filipino World War II veterans who have not yet been reunited with their family members share a universal bond of heartache.

Another important commonality among Filipino World War II veterans is hope. Those Filipino World War II veterans still separated from their families are hopeful that we will use this opportunity to rectify the unjust oversight in current law. The poignant truth behind this matter is that if we don't act now, we may not have another opportunity.

This weekend I am participating in the first annual ``A Time of Remembrance'' event, which honors the families of the American fallen. Family members from all 50 States will come to the National Mall at noon this Sunday, May 21, 2006, to recognize the important contributions our fallen heroes have made on behalf of America. I am proud to take part in this event, which points out the very real ways that families are impacted when soldiers courageously leave their family and fight to defend freedom. For those World War II veterans who are still with us, this event points to the importance of honoring them now, before it is too late.

Let us prove those wrong who say that we are waiting until enough veterans die before we right this injustice. These veterans have been waiting for 60 years to have their benefits reinstated. Unfortunately, our efforts to provide them with the benefits they were promised, the benefits they fought for, have been unsuccessful because opponents have cited the payment of such benefits as too costly.

The Filipino Veterans from World War II have already made extreme sacrifices. They should not be forced to endure the further sacrifice of life without their loved ones. It is time that the United States fulfill its responsibility to these veterans. The least we could do is help to unite these aging veterans with their families. We are a nation that keeps its word . . . not a nation that uses people for our own purposes and then casts them aside.

Ensuring that our World War II Filipino Veterans can enjoy and be supported by their family members in their twilight years is a simple yet profound way of honoring these war heroes.

My amendment has received strong support from Filipino veterans, the Filipino-American community, and the Asian-American community. The Japanese American Citizens League, the Organization of Chinese Americans, and the Asian Pacific American Legal Center have all endorsed my amendment. In addition, the American Coalition for Filipino Veterans, which represents over 4,000 Filipino Veterans across the country, has wholeheartedly endorsed my amendment with a letter of support that states:

S. Amdt. 2049 will be a timely benefit to address the

veterans' loneliness and will provide them with a partial

measure of U.S. veterans recognition that they were unjustly

denied in 1946.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the full text of the letter of support be printed in the Record.

My amendment has received a letter of support from the Asian American Justice Center. I ask unanimous consent that the full text of the letter from the Asian American Justice Center to be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, I urge my colleagues to honor their valiant contributions to our Nation by supporting my amendment.

Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. President, I would like to ask for a voice vote.

Mr. President, less than 24 hours after the Senate voted to protect American workers and to put them first when it comes to competition for jobs in this country, the Senator from Massachusetts has now offered an amendment that would literally gut the amendment that was adopted yesterday and put American workers in the back seat and foreign workers who wanted to come here and participate in a guest worker program in the front seat.

President Bush has spoken time and time again about a guest worker program that matches willing workers with willing employers. But Senator Kennedy's amendment would do nothing of the kind. It would allow people

to come to the United States and to self-petition without having an employer sponsor their petition, and it would not require proof that an American citizen is unavailable to perform that type of job.

Yesterday, the Senate--wisely, in my view--changed the underlying bill to require that American workers be put first before a guest worker could be provided a job and that, under the provisions of this bill, No. 1, they had to identify a job so they would not be here unemployed; and No. 2, that job first be offered to qualified American workers. Then, in that event no American workers were found available to perform that job, of course the guest worker provisions of the bill would kick in.

To make matters worse, the Kennedy amendment would allow an alien who has worked a total of less than 40 days in the United States--yes, that is about 6 days a year--to obtain a green card. That employment, 1 day out of every 60, could be self-employment. For some, that track record of employment should be sufficient evidence that the worker is invaluable to the American economy. What that means is that up to 200,000 unskilled workers a year would be eligible for a green card, irrespective of economic conditions, irrespective of whether that worker has actually been employed for the preceding 4 years and, most importantly, irrespective of whether there are unemployed U.S. workers available to fill those jobs.

Senator Kennedy had suggested that, by requiring an employer to determine that a qualified worker is not available, that would somehow subject foreign workers to exploitation. But let me be clear: Worker exploitation and abuse will not be tolerated under our laws and should not be tolerated under any circumstances. This amendment has nothing to do with protecting foreign workers against exploitation. What it has everything to do with is whether we are protecting American workers first.

With that, I will reserve the remainder of my time and yield the floor.

Mr. President, we split the time between 9 and 10 o'clock, but it was on the pending amendment. The Senator from Massachusetts has yet to call up the amendment. The only speakers who have been heard have been in opposition to the amendment, but the amendment has not yet itself been called up.

I want to make sure the balance of the time reserved is still preserved so we do not lose an opportunity to respond to the debate by the Senator from Massachusetts.

Mr. President, I yield myself 3 minutes.

Mr. President, the amendment Senator Kennedy is proposing guts the worker protection amendment agreed to by the Senate yesterday. It would do so by allowing workers to self-petition for legal permanent residency if they produce some documents which might indicate they are currently employed, but they will be necessarily retrospective in nature. In other words, you do not have a document necessarily that shows you are employed today or will be employed tomorrow. You may have a pay stub from the last week or the last month. So there is no way to determine whether the individuals who are self-petitioning, under this proposal by the Senator from Massachusetts, are actually going to be working.

No. 2, if they are working, there is no protection for American workers--first, that the Secretary of Labor certify that there were no sufficient U.S. workers willing, able, and qualified to perform those jobs.

If the proponents of this bill are serious when they say that certain provisions are needed because immigrants will do work that Americans won't do, then they should support the amendment agreed to yesterday and vote against the amendment that has been proposed this morning.

President Bush, again, has said the concept of a temporary worker program is to provide additional legal workforce for jobs that there are not enough Americans to perform. Yet this proposed amendment simply sidesteps that requirement entirely.

It further represents a shell game insofar as it would only require those workers in this country during an initial 4-year period to work about 6 days a year in order to obtain a green card.

This is about truth in advertising. If, in fact, the bill is going to represent something even close to what we have been told the purpose of it is, as represented, we need to make sure the actual language of the bill conforms to that and not pull a fast one on the American people by taking away the

very protection for American workers that the proponents of this bill have said are an important part of their legislation.

I yield the floor and retain the remainder of my time.

Mr. President, may I inquire how much time I have remaining?

Mr. President, I appreciate the clarification that the Senator from Massachusetts and the Senator from Arizona have made. This language has been somewhat fluid, and now I have it in front of me. I think I understand it, and I think I understand what the differences are between our two arguments.

Basically, it does retain a certification requirement by the Department of Labor. But the one who decides what the job requirements are and whether the foreign worker actually meets those job requirements is the worker him or herself and not an employer. This is, I believe, insufficient to protect American workers because, essentially, the foreign worker is the judge of his own abilities and also the judge of the job requirement for which the Department of Labor is supposed to certify there are not sufficient Americans available to perform. I think it bears, if not the same, I would say similar defects to the original underlying bill that was amended yesterday to reinsert American worker protections.

Let me speak a minute or two about the nature of what this position is. We are now talking, as Senator Dorgan said, about the so-called future flow, people who are not here yet. This has been described as a guest worker program. Senator Kyl and I will be offering an alternative to this so-called guest worker program which we describe as a temporary worker program because I believe this guest worker program is misnamed, mischaracterized, and is in no sense a guest worker program. That is because when you invite guests into your home, you expect at some point they might actually leave.

Under this guest worker program, as designed, that never happens. It invites as many as 200,000 individuals a year, under the Bingaman amendment, who can then come into the United States and work for a period of 4 years, and then, under the approach by the Senator from Massachusetts, self-petition for legal permanent residency and then get in line for American citizenship without regard to whether the American economy is in a boom or a bust. In times when the economy is very flat or when we are in recession, it is much more likely that American workers are going to be competing with foreign workers admitted under this so-called guest worker program.

I do believe calling this a guest worker program, when in fact it is a path to a legal permanent residency and citizenship, is a misnomer. In addition to damaging the prospects of American workers during times when our economy is not doing well and when there are not a lot of jobs available, it also hurts countries such as Mexico and Central American countries that have seen a massive exodus of their hard-working citizens to the United States, never to return.

What we need to do, for the benefit of America as well as the benefit of countries such as Mexico and those in Central America, is to reinstate this historical notion of circular migration; in other words, create a framework where people can come to the United States, qualify to work for a period of time, and then return home with the savings and skills they have acquired working in the United States.

A person who works at even modest pay in the United States under a temporary worker program can, in many

instances, go back home and live like a king in some of these countries, where their money goes a lot further and where their investment in a home or a small business will thereby create opportunity not just for them but also other citizens in those other countries.

I believe if we are ever going to narrow the gap between opportunities available in countries such as Mexico and those in Central America and South America and other countries--which is the basic reason why people leave to come to the United States, to find jobs and work, and we all understand why--we need to find some way of reinstating this pattern of circular migration so people do maintain their contacts and ties with their country and their culture and their family because otherwise we will never be able to satisfactorily address this phenomenon of illegal immigration, no matter what kind of caps we put on it, no matter how many folks we put on the border, no matter whether we build an actual wall or a virtual wall.

Unless we find some way of reducing the development gap between countries that are the net exporters of human labor and a country such as America, which is the importer of human labor from all over the world, we are never going to get to the bottom of this problem.

So that is another reason why I believe this amendment should be defeated. We will have further discussion later on transforming, I hope, the so-called guest worker program to a true temporary worker program and reinstating circular migration in a way that both benefits America and benefits those countries from which those workers come.

Mr. President, I reserve the remainder of our time and yield the floor.

Mr. President, I yield to the Senator from Arizona 5 minutes.

Mr. President, is it correct we have 3 minutes remaining?

Mr. President, where we have come from since yesterday afternoon is, we had a basic bill that provided no protection for American workers because it allowed foreign workers to self-petition without a job, without any type of certification there were no Americans available to fill the job, and we then adopted an amendment that would install some worker protections by requiring both of those things: that, No. 1, there is a job available; and, No. 2, there are not sufficient Americans to fill that type of job.

Now, under the amendment of the Senator from Massachusetts, we have gone from no worker protection to what I would call illusory worker protection--illusory worker protection--because this puts the decision to define the job requirements in the hands of the foreign worker. It also puts in the hands of the foreign worker--the self-interested individual, by the way, who is going to be staying or leaving depending on whether they meet these requirements--it puts in that foreign worker's hands the total and unilateral determination of what the job requirements are and, No. 2, whether that same foreign worker meets those job requirements; whereas, for everyone else in America, it is the employer who determines whether the prospective employee meets the job requirements.

The last thing I would say is, for every other category of visa, worker visa in America, under our naturalization and immigration system, there has to be some form of employer sponsorship. And this deviates from that pattern which I believe is important, and this represents an unprecedented break with that in a way that I think damages the prospects of American workers.

So I urge my colleagues to vote against the amendment.

I yield the floor and yield the remainder of our time.

Mr. President, the discussion this morning is once again on a subject called guest workers. I don't happen to think we ought to have a guest worker provision in this legislation. The discussion now is, if it exists in the legislation, what are the conditions under which guest workers can petition for citizenship, and so on and so forth. I hope we are not done with the question of whether there should be so-called guest workers or, as some call it, future flow, the soft- sounding words. They could call it tourism for all that matters.

What this is about is grafting onto this bill to deal with the question of illegal immigrants coming into this country--because we have quotas, and those who come in illegally are a pretty serious problem, the 11 million or 12 million people we think are here illegally--this is grafting onto this bill that deals with illegal immigration a proposal that people who live outside this country and have not come to this country before now are to come into this country as so-called guest workers or future flow. What are those people going to do? They are going to come into this country and they are going to work. It is as if the 11 million or 12 million are not enough, we need more.

The original proposition by the President was an unlimited number. The original proposition in the bill brought to the floor of the Senate was 400,000 a year, plus a 20-percent escalator. I tried to knock that out, and my amendment got clobbered, so I was unsuccessful. My colleague from New Mexico took the 400,000 down to 200,000. Actually, the substitute bill took it down to 325,000, then down to 200,000. However you calculate it, we are talking about millions of people who do not live in this country, who live outside of this country, who will come into this country for the purpose of taking jobs.

Here is the strategy. The strategy in the country these days, and it is a strategy embraced on the floor of this Chamber, is to export good jobs and import cheap labor. I don't hear any discussion on the floor of this Senate about American workers--none. You can go to the newspapers and see a discussion. You can see the headlines about American workers who are losing their jobs because their employers are moving the jobs to China or Bangladesh or Indonesia or Sri Lanka; and yes, some of those Americans are finding other jobs, and the headlines also tell us those jobs pay less than the jobs we used to have. We lost 3 million to 4 million jobs in just the last 4 or 5 years.

Alan Blinder, a very respectable mainstream economist, former Vice Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, has just written a piece and said this: This issue of exporting American jobs even as there is this urge to import cheap labor--he said this about exporting American jobs--he said there are 42 to 54 million American jobs subject to offshoring.

He said 41 to 54 million American jobs are subject to being moved out of this country in search of cheaper labor--at 33 cents an hour in China, perhaps Indonesia, Sri Lanka, wherever they would move to. He said that not all of the 40 million to 50 million jobs will leave this country by employers, not all will be moved out of this country by employers, but even those who stay are subject to the competition of lower wages abroad. Therefore, there will be lower wages, less health care, less benefits, and less retirement benefits.

That future for the American worker on one side, and on the other side we have this urge to import cheap labor.

Where does that urge come from? My understanding is the price the Chamber of Commerce requires to support this bill is that there be additional guest workers attached to it.

What is the purpose of that? That is the purpose of bringing in the back door folks who are willing to assume the bottom-end jobs.

The President and others say these are jobs the American people will not take. I don't think that is the case at all. They may not want to take them at current wages, at the bottom of the economic scale. We haven't changed the minimum wage for nearly 9 years. This Congress will not change the minimum wage. The President doesn't support it. If we change the minimum wage and perhaps pay what the jobs are worth at the lower economic level, at the bottom of the economic ladder, perhaps then we wouldn't need to import cheap labor. This is about importing cheap labor on the back side. That is what guest workers is all about. I know they call it ``future flow'' and guest workers. It is not about making 11 million to 12 million people legal

who are already here illegally. But more needs to be done. Allowing people who would normally be illegal and stamping them as ``legal'' is kind of a ``let's pretend'' approach.

I understand the Senate has already voted on my amendment, and I lost pretty handily, as a matter of fact. But I think there is more to do on this. The bill is still open for amendment. For example, we have a so- called guest worker provision which says let's pretend that illegal immigration is legal immigration. Should we have that provision that lasts forever and is permanent, or should we sunset it after a few years and have a real honest study by people who might evaluate how many Americans are losing their jobs as a result of this back door, cheap labor coming as replacement workers?

How many Americans are losing their jobs? I see very little discussion on the floor of this Senate in this debate about immigration which, after all, is all about jobs, among other things. I see very little discussion and Members standing up on the floor of the Senate saying: Let us wonder what this means to American workers. What does it mean to the steel worker? What does it mean to the punch press operator, to the fabricator or how about the farmer? What does it mean to manufacturing? Very few people are talking about American workers. It is all about immigration and how many additional guest workers we can bring into this country under this piece of legislation.

My understanding is that we will be on this bill for another week. That will give us time to revisit this so-called guest worker provision and see if we can write a piece of legislation--yes--which deals sensitively, without diminishing the dignity and worth of others who have been here some long while. Some have been here for 25 years. Some immigrants came here many years ago. They have children and grandchildren here. I don't want to, in any way, diminish their worth or their dignity or their value. We should deal with them in a way that is sensitive.

I don't think this Senate should jump on the notion advanced by business interests and the Chamber and others that we don't have enough cheap labor in this country, and we need to bring more through the back door as we are exporting good jobs abroad.

You talk about a recipe for economic trouble ahead, probably not for the people who wear blue suits in the morning and wear neckties all day and have jobs such as Senators and Congressmen. I do not know of anybody in this Chamber who has lost a job because their job was outsourced. Nobody here has lost their job because their job has been outsourced. It is other folks--folks working on the manufacturing line someplace, and they are called up one day and are told: You know what, our entire company is leaving. We are going to China because you can produce an Etch A Sketch in China for much less money. But the jobs have gone to China. Etch A Sketch is one example of hundreds of examples of jobs that go to China.

Those are the folks who pay the price. Those are the folks who have the burden of this sort of new economy. The ``world is flat'' economy-- move American jobs to China. The other folks who stay here, the folks who work at the bottom rung of the economic ladder, struggling to advance and pay their bills and take care of their families, they are now told: By the way, we also need to not just export jobs, but we need to import cheap labor.

I think is a recipe for disaster for this country. I don't think it works.

Our country became a great country and a world economic power because we built a burgeoning middle class, and that middle class had good jobs that paid well. There is no social program in this country as important as the good job that pays well, which allows people to work and take care of their families. There is no social program as important as that. These good jobs are shrinking away. You can go through the entire list, industry after industry, telling workers: We are going to move your job elsewhere, and we are going to shrink the jobs that remain here to $8 or $10 an hour. And by the way, what we would like to do is bring people through the back door whom we might be able to employ for $6 or $7 an hour.

That is the construct which is occurring throughout the country today, and I think it is fundamentally wrong.

My hope is we continue these discussions about guest workers. We will have other opportunities to offer amendments. I will have some, and perhaps we can get back to where we should be and that is dealing with the central question of our country's border; protect us first against terrorism; and, second, to enforce the quotas we have that allow people to come into this country legally. We have quotas with which we accomplish that. Seal this country's border so we have border protection and an orderly flow of people in and out of this country; and, second, enforce standards against employers that routinely and knowingly hire illegal workers.

I was here when we passed Simpson-Mazzoli. In fact, I went back and reread some of the debate on the floor of the Senate and House.

What was said was we are fixing immigration. Back then, there really was amnesty. Amnesty was given to a good number of millions of illegal immigrants. We said to employers: Don't you dare hire illegal workers. If people come into this country illegally to take Americans' jobs, don't you dare hire them. If you do, you will be subject to fines and penalties that are significant.

Guess what. There has been no enforcement at all. Last year, one company was subject to enforcement action in the entire United States of America; the year before, three companies in the entire United States. The message implies Katy bar the door; hire illegals if you like; pay substandard wages because they are illegal; don't worry, nobody is going to look; nobody is going to fine you; and nobody is going to enforce the law.

That is why this entire thing has failed. Twenty years later, we have the same language. You can change the names and it is the same language--going to get tough, going to fix this issue.

The fact is, if we don't decide, first, to secure our borders and, second, to have real sanctions against those who want to hire illegal immigrants for substandard wages, this will not work. All we are doing is playing let's pretend. We play that often around here. It is not going to work.

What we ought to do is stare truth in the eye on this issue and decide that we are going to do what is necessary to evaluate what the immigration issue is, how to fix it and go about the business of doing it. Instead, there is all this energy to see not only how we deal with the immigration issue but how we add a new guest worker program to bring people into this country who otherwise would be illegal and how do we bring new people into this country to take the jobs that American workers need. That doesn't make much sense to me, and it is not a proposition that I can support.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.