Mr. President, I rise today to introduce the Immigration Fraud Prevention Act of 2009, on behalf of myself and Senator Kennedy, to prevent the exploitation of people, citizens, and non-citizens…
Mr. President, I rise today to introduce the Immigration Fraud Prevention Act of 2009, on behalf of myself and Senator Kennedy, to prevent the exploitation of people, citizens, and non-citizens alike, who are preyed on when seeking immigration assistance.
The Immigration Fraud Prevention Act would prevent and punish fraud and misrepresentation in the context of immigration proceedings. The act would create a new Federal crime to penalize those who engage in schemes to defraud aliens in connection with Federal immigration laws.
Specifically, the act would make it a Federal crime to wilfully and knowingly defraud or obtain or receive money or anything else of value from any person by false or fraudulent pretences, representations, or promises; and to wilfully, knowingly, and falsely represent that an individual is an attorney or accredited representative in any matter arising under Federal immigration law.
Violations of these crimes would result in a fine, imprisonment of not more than 5 years, or both.
The bill would also authorize the Attorney General and the Secretary of Homeland Security to use task forces currently in existence to detect and investigate individuals who are in violation of the immigration fraud crimes as created by the bill.
The act would also work to prevent immigration fraud by requiring that Immigration Judges issue warnings about unauthorized practice of immigration law to immigrants in removal proceedings, similar to the current law that requires notification of pro bono legal services to these immigrants; requiring the Attorney General to provide outreach to the immigrant community to help prevent fraud; providing that any materials used to carry out notification on immigration law fraud is done in the appropriate language for that community; and requiring the distribution of the disciplinary list of individuals not authorized to appear before the immigration courts and the Board of Immigration Appeals, BIA, currently maintained by the Executive Office of Immigration Review, EOIR.
Unfortunately, the need for Federal action to prevent and prosecute immigration fraud has escalated in recent years as citizens and non- citizens attempt to navigate the immigration legal system. Thus far, only States have sought to regulate the unauthorized practice of immigration law.
Since immigration law is a federal matter, I believe the solution to such misrepresentation and fraud should be addressed by Congress.
By enacting this bill, Congress would help prevent more victims like Vincent Smith, a Mexican national who has resided in California since 1975. His wife is an American citizen, and they live with their 6 U.S. citizen children in Palmdale, CA.
Mr. Smith would likely have received a green card at least two different times during his stay in California. However, in attempting to get legal counsel, Mr. Smith hired someone whom he thought was an attorney, but was not. As a result, Mr. Smith was charged more than $10,000 for processing his immigration paperwork, which was never filed. Mr. Smith now has no legal status and faces removal proceedings.
Another victim of immigration fraud is Raul, a Mexican national, who came to the United States in 2000. He also married a U.S. citizen, Loraina, making him eligible to apply for a green card. Raul and his wife went to Jose for legal help. Jose's business card said he had a ``law office'' and that he was an ``immigration specialist.'' But Jose was not a specialist and charged Raul $4,000 to file a frivolous asylum petition. While Raul thought he was going to receive a green card, he was instead placed into removal proceedings.
From California to New York, there are hundreds of stories like these. Many immigrants are preyed on because of their fears--others on their hope of realizing the American dream. They are charged exorbitant fees for the filing of frivolous paperwork that clog our immigration courts and keep families and businesses waiting in limbo for years.
Law enforcement officials say that many fraudulent ``immigration specialists'' close their businesses or move on to another part of the state or country before they can be held accountable. They can make $100,000 to $200,000 a year and the few who have been caught rarely serve more than a few months in jail. Often victims of such crimes are deported, sending them back to their home countries without accountability for the perpetrator of the fraud.
Most recently, hundreds of immigrants were exploited by Victor M. Espinal, who was arrested for allegedly posing as an immigration attorney. Nearly 125 of Mr. Espinal's clients attended the New York City Bar Association's free clinic to address their legal and immigration options. According to prosecutors, Mr. Espinal falsely claimed on his business cards that he was licensed and admitted to the California bar as well as the bar in the Dominican Republic.
Organizations such as the Los Angeles Country Bar Association, National Immigration Forum, American Immigration Lawyers Association, and American Bar Association have been documenting this exploitation for many years. Today, I ask my colleagues to join me and Senator Kennedy in putting an end to it.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.
Mr. President, I rise to introduce legislation to ban Bisphenol A, BPA, from food and drink containers. I am pleased to be working with Congressman Markey on this issue, and he will be introducing identical legislation in the House. I would also like to thank my colleague Senator Schumer, who has agreed to cosponsor this legislation.
I believe this is a good and necessary bill. The science shows that BPA is added to food and drink containers, and leaches into these foods and beverages, especially when heated in a plastic container.
Make no mistake, chemicals are everywhere, even in our food. In many cases, we know very little about their safety. I strongly believe that the time has come to utilize a precautionary standard in all food and beverages with respect to chemical additives. If you do not know for certain the chemical is benign, it should not be used.
Bisphenol A, known commonly as BPA, is one such example. It is used in consumer products all around us: plastic containers that store food, compact discs, water bottles, canned soups and other canned foods, even baby bottles.
More than 100 studies suggest that BPA exposure at very low doses is linked to a variety of health problems, including prostate and breast cancer, obesity, attention deficit and hyperactivity disorder, brain damage, altered immune system, lowered sperm counts, and early puberty.
The National Toxicology Program in the Department of Health and Human Services has cited ``some concern'' that Bisphenol A may affect neural development in fetuses, infants, and children at current human exposures.
The solution is simple. My legislation will ban the use of Bisphenol A from food and drink containers. This ban will be effective 180 days following enactment of the legislation.
The bill will create a waiver process, in case a company demonstrates that it is technologically impossible to replace BPA in that time frame. A manufacturer can receive a one year waiver, which is renewable, while they work to remove BPA from their product. They must submit a plan to remove BPA, and their product must be labeled as containing BPA.
The legislation also directs the Food and Drug Administration to routinely review the ``List of Substances Generally Regarded as Safe.'' If new evidence emerges that suggests a chemical is not safe for use in a particular manner, it will be removed from the product.
Scientists have raised alarms regarding BPA for some time. It is an endocrine disruptor, mimicking estrogen when it is exposed to a cell.
Scientists at Stanford University accidentally discovered BPA's estrogen-mimicking effects in 1993. A mysterious estrogen-like chemical skewed results of their lab work, and they finally realized that BPA was leaching from laboratory flasks.
We know that BPA is found in almost everyone. Data from the National Health and Nutrition Survey, NHANES, conducted by the Centers for Disease Control found BPA in the bodies of 92.6 percent of the people surveyed. The study did not examine the exposure of children under 6. But it did find that levels were highest in young children, a troubling finding given that exposure to BPA is potentially most dangerous during these critical early years of development.
We know a major source of this exposure: the cans that contain our food,
the containers we eat from, even the baby bottles used to serve formula.
The Environmental Working Group commissioned an independent lab to study BPA in cans in 2007. They tested 97 cans of some of the most popular consumer products. Their findings will alarm any consumer: 53 of the 97 cans tested had detectable levels of BPA; 20 of the 53 cans with BPA have high enough levels that consuming that canned product would expose a person to levels near those that have been found to impact laboratory rats; 1 in 10 cans contained enough BPA to expose a pregnant woman or child to more than 200 times the Government's safe level. The same is true for 1 out of every 3 cans of infant formula.
For women who regularly eat canned food, their exposure level throughout a pregnancy may exceed safe doses.
These are not exotic products, but the canned goods that are in pantries across this county: meal replacement shakes, canned soups, vegetables, and canned pastas, like ravioli.
Baby bottles are also a common exposure source. Multiple studies have confirmed that many of the most popular brands of baby bottles leach BPA. A coalition of health and environmental groups, in their recent report ``Baby's Toxic Bottle'', identified several popular brands of baby bottles that leach BPA when heated: Avent; Disney, Dr. Brown's, Evenflo; Gerber; Playtex.
Now every parent knows that milk served to babies is often heated, at least to room temperature. And these bottles, when heated, leached between 5 and 8 parts per billion of BPA, a level that is within the range that has been shown to cause harm in animal studies.
We know that BPA is a hormone disrupting chemical, and may act like estrogen when in the human body. While the science is still emerging, research is connecting Bisphenol A with a variety of serious health effects. These include: early onset of puberty; hyperactivity; lowered sperm count; miscarriage.
The chemical industry will try to reassure consumers that BPA is safe, and that studies have found these health effects only in laboratory animals exposed to BPA in high doses.
But new evidence that goes beyond laboratory rat models is emerging. Last year, researchers at the Yale School of Medicine linked BPA to problems in brain function and mood disorders in monkeys, for the first time connecting the chemical to health problems in primates.
The Yale scientists exposed monkeys to low levels of BPA, which the Environmental Protection Agency, EPA, have deemed safe for humans.
Researchers found that this chemical exposure interfered with brain cell connections vital to memory, learning and mood.
The researchers stated that the findings suggest that exposure to low-dose BPA may cause widespread effects on brain structure and function.
In September of last year, the Journal of the American Medical Association, JAMA, published a study that links BPA levels in people to several serious health problems.
The study examined the BPA concentrations found in 1455 adults who participated in the 2003-2004 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, NHANES, a study which detected BPA in more than 90 percent of Americans tested. Using this data, researchers linked higher BPA concentrations to adverse health affects, including: cardiovascular disease; type II diabetes; clinically abnormal concentrations of some liver enzymes.
The Los Angeles Times reported on the study on September 17th, stating ``that the quarter of the group with the highest BPA levels-- levels still considered safe by the FDA--were more than twice as likely to suffer from diabetes and cardiovascular disease as the quarter with the lowest levels.''
This is the first large scale study to be done examining human exposure, and I believe it must be taken very seriously.
Industry continues to insist that BPA is not harmful. But one study shows us why we should be skeptical about research coming from chemical companies.
In 2006, the journal Environmental Research published an article comparing the results of government funded studies into low dose exposure to BPA with studies funded by the BPA industry.
The results are astounding; 92 percent of the Government funded studies found that exposure to BPA caused health problems in animals.
However, none of the industry funded research identified any health problems in animals exposed to low levels of BPA.
This raises serious questions about the validity of the chemical industry's studies. It also illustrates why our Nation's regulatory agencies should not and cannot solely rely on chemical companies to conduct research into their products.
The Food and Drug Administration agrees that the science is incomplete. The FDA's Science Board released a report in October 2008 that raised serious questions about the previous FDA assessments that found BPA to be safe.
In response, the FDA has asked for more studies and more research. More research is fine, but I feel strongly that we must not leave a dangerous chemical on the market while scientists learn exactly how dangerous it is.
Sufficient evidence exists for us to act now. I believe strongly in taking a precautionary approach to our chemical policy; people should be protected from chemicals until we know that they are safe for use.
There is a great deal wrong with the regulatory system in this country and the way we address dangerous chemicals. Our system is essentially backwards. Chemicals are added to products before we know much about them. To be removed from the market, a chemical must be proven to be exceedingly dangerous.
That means that while we wait for evidence of harm to develop, our children are using dangerous products, and possibly eating contaminated food.
I believe it should be the reverse. We should follow the lead of the European Union, and Canada, and remove chemicals until we know them to be safe. We should not be waiting for proof of danger, which too often comes in the form of birth defects, cancer, and other irreversible health harms.
While we continue to work to change our regulatory system, the time has come to apply this precautionary principle to BPA. Without question, there is more scientific work to be done. But we must not continue to expose our citizens to these risks while we wait to confirm BPA's dangers beyond a reasonable doubt.
The Canadian government has already taken this approach with BPA, moving to eliminate polycarbonate baby bottles that contain Bisphenol A last year. Canadian officials stated that because safe alternatives are readily available, this ban is a prudent way to reduce risk for vulnerable infants.
Many large retailers and producers, including Toys ``R'' Us, Nalgene, and Wal-Mart have agreed to no longer sell or produce baby bottles or plastic water bottles containing BPA. And just last week, the leading manufacturers of baby bottles announced they would no longer sell baby bottles made with BPA.
This is great news. I commend them, but we should not be forced to rely on retailers to product American consumers from health hazards.
The Congress agreed with this precautionary approach and banned six plasticizing chemicals, called phthalates, in legislation last year. Like BPA, phthalates have been linked to a variety of health problems in young children. Instead of doing nothing with the evidence mounts, Congress chose to step in and protect children from this risk.
The time has come to do the same with Bisphenol A.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.
