High Risk Rural Roads Safety Act of 2011

Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word.

I want to express my support, Mr. Chairman, for the intent of my colleague from New York in calling attention to the major deficiency in this bill.

But, Mr. Chairman, I feel compelled also to express my extreme disappointment about what has just occurred on this floor. Our colleague was on her feet ready to offer her amendment. She was on her feet ready to offer this amendment. Somebody may have thought that she was a couple of seconds late in doing that. But even if that were true, we expect the basic comity that a colleague who has been waiting here for an hour to offer this amendment, has been waiting in turn, that we would have the basic comity to allow her to offer that amendment.

I can't believe what we've just witnessed.

I would be happy to yield to the gentleman from Alabama.

I certainly hope so.

That's good, Mr. Chairman. I am very pleased to hear that.

Let me go ahead and say something about my colleague's intent, because there is a major deficiency in this bill, and we need to address this, although it's extremely hard to address without the presence of viable offsets.

State and local grants in this legislation are 55 percent below the enacted 2011 level. They are 70 percent below the enacted 2010 level. Moreover, these State and local grants are block granted. Individual programs, such as State grants and urban area grants and port grants and transit and rail grants, could be cut even farther because at the Secretary's discretion she is going to have to choose within this block grant as to what kind of money goes to individual programs.

At the full committee markup of this bill, Congressman LaTourette and

I rise merely to express my support also for Mr. Honda's amendment. I think it is entirely appropriate to permit appropriated funds to be used for immigration integration, and that, indeed, has been our past practice.

I yield back the balance of my time.

I move to strike the last word.

Madam Chairman, Mr. Sessions' amendment frankly has been known to us only a short period of time, and we are not certain that all Members who might have an interest in this have been alerted. I wonder if the gentleman would yield for a question or two on this.

Mr. Sessions, would you be willing to yield?

My recollection is that this amendment was placed in the bill some years ago when there was an active dispute about contracting out some services at CIS.

Could you tell us, what precipitates your trying to remove this language now? As I understand it, your amendment would not require the contracting out, but it would simply remove the prohibition. Is that right?

Reclaiming my time, I understand the operation of the A-76 process. And I also understand that there are times when contracting out makes sense and other times when it does not. But given the fact that the gentleman is not mandating any particular approach to any particular jobs but is simply removing the prohibition, leaving this essentially to the judgment of the Department, I will not object to this. I do wish that there had been a better opportunity for Members who had an interest in this, possibly had a stake in this, to be here and respond, but with the gentleman's explanation, I will not object.

Madam Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Chairman, I rise in opposition to this amendment.

Madam Chairman, the gentlewoman's amendment strikes language permitting the use of previously appropriated and specifically designated DHS funds for land acquisition along the southwest border for environmental mitigation.

I feel I need to take a moment just to provide a bit of context. Since 2006, our subcommittee, which I chaired from 2007 to 2010, has increased funding for border security by over $2 billion annually. We invested well over a billion for fencing and other tactical infrastructure alone during this period.

Now, responding to concerns about possible environmental problems associated with such a massive construction undertaking, much of which has taken place on environmentally sensitive lands, Congress provided modest amounts to mitigate these potential environmental consequences: $50 million in fiscal 2009 and $40 million in fiscal 2010. Some of this mitigation effort involves acquiring land from willing sellers for buffer zones to protect fragile habitats, principally along the Rio Grande Valley in Texas.

Since the Department doesn't have the statutory authority to acquire land for the purpose of environmental mitigation, we came to an agreement among Democrats and Republicans last year in the context of negotiations over an omnibus 2011 bill to grant the limited authority to transfer these specific funds to the Department of Interior for land acquisition. Obviously, Interior has the statutory authority to acquire land for this purpose.

So let me, Madam Chairman, read the section of the chairman's report so everyone knows how noncontroversial this provision is that Mrs. Lummis seeks to strike. And I am quoting, ``In order for the Department to execute interdepartmental agreements with the U.S. Department of the Interior to complete environmental mitigation activities, the committee includes a general provision, section 547 in the bill, permitting the transfer of previously appropriated environmental mitigation funds under BSFIT to the U.S. Department of Interior to carry out this purpose. The authority is narrowly tailored and controlled to ensure that funds will only be transferred: in accordance with a written agreement between the Secretaries of Homeland Security and the Interior; where the Secretary of the Interior has submitted an expenditure plan 15 days in advance of the proposed transfer, detailing the actions proposed to be taken with amounts transferred; where the Secretary of Homeland Security has certified that the actions outlined in the expenditure plan cannot be legally executed under the authorities of CBP or any other component of the Department of Homeland Security and the actions are determined to be necessary for mitigation of construction, operation, and maintenance activities related to border security.''

Madam Chairman, as a government we have many responsibilities and priorities. These include, of course, securing our borders, something I have worked on a lot in these past 4 years. It also includes protecting our natural and cultural resources. The sort of interagency agreement that Homeland Security and Interior have entered into for environmental mitigation is exactly what we should be encouraging, especially because this arrangement is explicit that Interior cannot take any action that CBP does not first agree to. Let me repeat: Interior cannot take any action that CBP does not approve.

I urge my colleagues to honor this agreement, a reasonable arrangement, and defeat this amendment.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Will the gentleman yield?

The gentleman has raised the issue of accountability, so I would like to call his attention to section D on page 90, and ask him for his assessment of this. We worked this out carefully, as I said earlier, worked it out with the chairman in a cooperative way. And it addresses directly the question of accountability. The Secretary of the Interior, in consultation with the Secretary of Homeland Security, shall submit to the Committee on Appropriations of the Senate and the House of Representatives not later than 15 days before any proposed transfer under this section, an expenditure plan that describes in detail the actions proposed to be taken with the amounts transferred.

Does that not meet the gentleman's standards of accountability?

Madam Chair, I demand a recorded vote.

Madam Chair, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

Madam Chairman, I was intrigued with this amendment. I didn't quite understand the import of it. So I have done a little research, talked to the Department of Homeland Security about the extent of their activities with this task force and what the affect of this amendment might be. So I would like to offer a little reality check here and suggest that this amendment is not merited.

This amendment, for starters, will not save any money. It simply prohibits the Department of Homeland Security and its employees from, in any way, planning for the effects of climate change.

Now the debate isn't about whether or not one believes that climate change is being caused by human beings. The fact is that whatever the cause, climate change is occurring in certain parts of the world. Both the U.S. Coast Guard and the Navy have testified before congressional committees that their operations are greatly affected, particularly in the Arctic region.

The Department of Homeland Security has identified other specific climate change-related impacts on DHS missions. These include, as you might expect, disaster response activities and the protection of critical infrastructure.

Now given the historic flooding that's occurred along the Mississippi as well as the worst tornado season we've experienced since 1950 with over 1,200 tornadoes and 500 deaths, it's understandable that DHS might just want the best available information on climate change.

Now I want to clarify any misinformation here. There are no DHS employees nor are any DHS funds dedicated full-time to climate change. One person at the department has spent a limited amount of time representing DHS at these task force meetings and activities--one person. So prohibiting funds going toward this effort is not going to save any money.

But there are several DHS components, including FEMA and the Coast Guard, that have been able to leverage cross-government expertise from the task force on both climate issues and on long-range planning generally. I would think that's exactly what they should do.

So what this amendment would do, rather than saving any money, it would simply prevent DHS persons from meeting or even talking to each other regarding the task force.

Now it's prudent and necessary for DHS to be able to work with its partner agencies to plan for the effects of climate change on their missions, and it's proper and important that our government agencies be able to talk to each other about the changes they are witnessing and the accommodations to their missions that might need to be made.

So, Madam Chairman, again, the Carter amendment will not save one dollar. Instead, it will prevent DHS from engaging in contingency planning with partner agencies across government. This is a debate, if it's about anything, it's about ensuring good government and intelligent planning and responsible coordination.

I urge my colleagues to vote against the amendment.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Yes, FEMA and the Coast Guard.

Yes.

Is it actually less efficient to shut off this kind of interagency discussion and to say that the representative from FEMA or the Coast Guard simply can't participate and that they have to reinvent the wheel? I simply don't understand the rationale, when interagency work is going on and when it has the potential to inform Homeland Security's work, why they shouldn't take advantage of that.

Madam Chairman, I move to strike the last word.

Madam Chairman, I support this amendment because it restates the Department's broad discretionary authority to grant relief or deferred action to deserving individuals.

The authority of law enforcement agencies to exercise discretion in deciding what cases to investigate and prosecute under existing civil and criminal law, including immigration law, is fundamental to the American legal system. And since this amendment recognizes this essential executive authority, especially when it comes to relief for humanitarian purposes or when it serves the public's interest, I recommend that my colleagues support it.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Chairman, I have an amendment at the desk.

Madam Chairman, my amendment would waive certain requirements attached to the Fire Grants and the SAFER grants, and this amendment is necessitated by the amendment passed earlier this evening.

Members are aware that H.R. 2107 reduced funding for firefighter hiring grants, also known as SAFER grants, by $255 million, or 63 percent below 2011. Fortunately, the House resoundingly overturned that ill-advised move earlier today and adopted an amendment by Mr. LaTourette and Mr. Pascrell to restore the funding to the President's requested level.

But my colleagues should also be aware that funding is only part of the problem with this bill when it comes to the SAFER program. The underlying bill also neglects to maintain provisions enacted in fiscal years 2009 through 2011 that allowed fire departments to use these grants to hire laid-off firefighters and to prevent others from being laid off in the first place.

The law traditionally permits SAFER grants only to be used to hire new staff. Now, that provision makes sense when our economy is booming and local governments are in a position to hire new workers. But when the recovery is still fragile and local budgets are actually contracting and workers are being laid off, FEMA needs the flexibility to use these grants to keep firefighters from being cut in the first place. Secretary Napolitano and Administrator Fugate both testified to this need earlier this year during our appropriations hearings. So I am proposing a waiver amendment which would save thousands of firefighter jobs.

Right now the real challenge to community safety is not the reluctance of local governments to hire new fire personnel. It's the potential and actual layoffs of public safety personnel, which means fewer first responders, longer response times, and more lives being put at risk.

This amendment also contains a provision that waives certain budgetary requirements local fire departments have to fill in order to receive a grant. These include not allowing a fire department's overall budget to drop below a certain level, not reducing staff over a number of years even if budgets continue to suffer, and providing local matching funds. Again, these provisions are fine when local coffers are healthy, but we all know how strapped our cities and counties are right now. So in the current economic environment, very few municipalities would be able to meet these requirements, jobs would go unfilled, and firefighter and public safety would be placed at greater risk.

Finally, to address concerns that these waivers have gone on well beyond what was originally anticipated, the fire organizations tell me that 2012 will be likely the last year that they will need these waivers.

When colleagues are weighing this amendment, Madam Chairman, I encourage them to consider the intent of the SAFER program, ensuring we have a safe level of staffing of our Nation's preeminent first responders, the firefighters.

We have already overwhelmingly supported funding for the firefighter jobs by adding funding back to the SAFER program. So if Members really support these jobs, they need to take this additional step. We should vote to allow these funds to be used in the most flexible way possible, the best

way possible to keep firefighters on staff.

So I urge support of this amendment.

I yield back the balance of my time.

I want to join Chairman Aderholt in urging rejection of this nongermane amendment. Members of course would not want to vote against contravening the law in anything that we do, but we have to acknowledge that this amendment is not germane to this bill.

And the rhetoric that has attended the introduction of this amendment contains, just to put it mildly, insinuations and charges that this Member finds unacceptable.

This is not the place, however, Madam Chairman, to engage in a full debate of our Libyan operations or our foreign policy in general. So I will restrict myself to simply saying that I do think this amendment is inappropriate for this bill.

I'll be happy to yield.

I rise in opposition to the amendment and move to strike the last word.

Madam Chairman, I rise in opposition to this amendment which will preclude the Department of Homeland Security or any entity that receives funding from the Department of Homeland Security, such as State and local governments, from insisting on fair labor standards for construction contracts, also known has the Davis- Bacon Act standards.

Davis-Bacon is a pretty simple concept and a fair one. It requires that

workers on federally funded construction projects be paid no less than the wages paid in the community for similar work. According to the Economic Policy Institute, the differences in labor costs that this makes are insignificant. Average labor costs, including benefits and payroll taxes, are roughly one-quarter of construction costs. Thus, if there's an increase in overall contract costs due to higher wages, it likely would be modest to the point in many cases of being virtually undetectable.

And in fact, Davis-Bacon, in ensuring that fair wages attract skilled workers, this might actually mean that the work is completed at a higher quality and in less time.

This amendment flouts the basic concept of wage fairness. At the exact time we're trying to get people back to work across the country, is this House going to vote to drive down the wages of workers who do business with the government on the theory that it might cost a little less money on construction projects?

Are we going to strong-arm the States and say they can't uphold the labor standards they've adopted in their own right?

I strongly recommend a ``no'' vote. The House has spoken repeatedly on this issue this year. We've taken two votes on this, during H.R. 1 and during the FAA reauthorization, and both times amendments to strike Davis-Bacon standards failed. We don't need to revisit this again here tonight.

I yield to the gentleman from Washington.

I thank the ranking member. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to this amendment.

The bill before us today was born out of the need for reform. It consolidates various grant programs and provides discretion to the Secretary. These reforms include funding reductions, requirements for measurement and requirements for spending languishing dollars.

The consolidation of this bill forces the Secretary to examine the intelligence and risk and puts scarce dollars where they are needed most, whether it is port, rail, surveillance or whether it is high-risk urban areas or to States, as opposed to reverse engineering projects to fill the amount designated for one of the many programs or granting funds to lower-risk areas.

Additionally, as noted by the gentleman, the bill limits Urban Area Security Initiative grants to the top 10 highest cities. Again, this puts scarce dollars to where they are most needed.

That means cities like New York are funded at the significantly higher levels than other cities because they are the highest threat to urban areas. I don't think anyone here can argue that.

This does not mean lower-risk areas will lose all funding. It would just mean the funds will come from other programs such as State homeland grants that are risk and formula based.

I strongly urge my colleagues to support fiscal discipline by aligning funding with areas of highest risk and vote ``no'' on this amendment.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word.

Mr. Chairman, as we approach the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, we are reminded that a key recommendation of the 9/11 Commission is still not completely addressed, that is, the security of the most commonly used form of identification in the United States, the driver's license.

All but one of the 9/11 hijackers carried some form of government- issued ID, mostly State driver's licenses, many of which were obtained in fraudulent manners. During the planning stages of the attacks, these documents were used to rent vehicles, evade law enforcement officials, enroll in flight school and board airplanes.

In 2005, Congress passed, and the President signed, the REAL ID Act to address the security gap and require States to meet certain security standards for the issuance of driver's licenses and identification cards. Despite that action 6 years ago, REAL ID has yet to be fully implemented.

My distinguished colleague, the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, Mr. Smith, has some views to offer on this important topic.

I yield to the gentleman from Texas.

Mr. Chairman, I strongly support the REAL ID implementation.

REAL ID is the law. The Department has an obligation to support the States in moving forward toward full compliance with enhanced driver's license security. Congress has appropriated a steady stream of funding for REAL ID since 2006--$295 million, to be exact.

Additionally, driver's license security is an allowable expense under the State Homeland Security Grant Program. So the actions taken in this bill should in no way be taken as a sign of diminishing support for REAL ID implementation.

Mr. Chairman----

I object.

Will the gentleman yield?

If you would give us just a minute, we are trying to see if we can work something out on this.

Mr. Chairman, we are trying to work out an agreement with the gentlelady from New York.

If you will give us a minute to work this out, we will try to find something that can be accommodating to both parties.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve a point of order against the gentlelady's amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I make a point of order against the amendment.

The amendment proposes to amend portions of the bill not yet read. Section 17, Chapter 2 of the House Practice book states, in

part: It is not in order to strike or otherwise amend portions of a bill not yet read for amendment.

I ask for a ruling from the Chair.

I accept the gentlelady's amendment. However, I must clarify that the base bill includes $2.65 billion and includes an additional $1 billion in supplemental funds, and that is a total of $1.8 billion above the request. So I would like to point that out to the gentlelady, but we will accept her amendment.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I appreciate the gentleman from California's views, and we accept this amendment.

However, I would like to state for the record that the $132 million of appropriated funds provided in this bill would not fund immigrant integration grants. They are provided for verification programs, both E-Verify and SAVE, and these are critical programs to the fund.

I want to thank the gentlewoman from Wyoming for working with us on this issue, and I appreciate the concerns that she has raised and also that the gentleman from Utah has raised.

The committee has attempted to address both the requests of the Department of Homeland Security and the interests of Members on both sides of the aisle in drafting section 547. It was narrowly tailored to address only the most necessary environmental mitigation activities directly related to border security construction, operations, and maintenance.

It included strict controls on the transfer of funds from the Department of Homeland Security to the Department of the Interior, only where the Secretary of Homeland Security certifies that the transfer is absolutely necessary for border security and that the Department of Homeland Security does not have the authority to carry out the necessary activities.

Further, the Secretary of the Interior must provide a detailed spend plan with advance notification, allowing the committee to reject the plan.

The committee's interest was border security. Unfortunately, we were not able to balance the various viewpoints and the concerns to find the compromise in this process. For that reason, I support the Lummis amendment.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Chair, I respectfully reserve a point of order on this amendment.

Madam Chairman, I insist upon my point of order.

I make a point of order against the amendment because it proposes to change existing law and constitutes legislation in an appropriation bill and therefore violates clause 2 of rule XXI. The rule states, in pertinent part, an amendment to a general appropriation bill shall not be in order if changing existing law gives affirmative action in effect.

I ask for a ruling from the Chair.

Madam Chair, I reserve a point of order.

Parliamentary inquiry, Madam Chair.

We would like to clarify which amendment is currently being considered.

I ask unanimous consent that the Clerk read the amendment.

Madam Chair, I insist on my point of order.

I make a point of order against the amendment because it proposes to change existing law and constitutes legislation in an appropriation bill and, therefore, violates clause 2 of rule XXI. The rule states in pertinent part: an amendment to a general appropriation bill shall not be in order if changing existing law imposes additional duties.

I ask for a ruling from the Chair.

Madam Chair, I appreciate the concerns of the gentleman from Texas. This amendment supports existing law, and we accept this amendment.

Madam Chair, I reserve a point of order on the gentleman's amendment.

I make a point of order against the amendment because

it proposes to change existing law and constitutes legislation in an appropriation bill and therefore violates clause 2 of rule XXI.

The rule states in pertinent part: An amendment to a general appropriation bill shall not be in order if it changes the application of existing law. The amendment changes the application of existing law.

I ask for a ruling from the Chair.

Madam Chairman, we accept the gentleman from Texas's amendment.

Madam Chair, I rise to strike the last word.

Madam Chair, I rise in strong opposition to this amendment.

SAFER was originally authorized for the purpose of increasing the number of new firefighters in local communities--a hand up, not a handout. SAFER was not intended to rehire or retain firefighters, and certainly was not intended to serve as an operating subsidy for what is unquestionably a municipal responsibility.

The Federal Fire Prevention and Control Act contains very specific requirements that local communities have to meet in order to obtain funds; however, those requirements have been waived for the last 3 years. When initially proposed by the Democrats in 2009, Mr. Price, who was chairman of this subcommittee, acknowledged that these waivers were just a short-term, temporary effort that would expire at the end of FY10. Yet, here we are today debating the continuation in FY12 of a subsidy that our country cannot afford.

Under these costly waivers, there are no controls, there are no salary limits, and there are no local commitments. These proposed waivers totally undermine the original purpose and intent of the SAFER program by forcing the taxpayers to subsidize the everyday operating expenses of the local first responders.

Given our Nation's dire fiscal situation today, we must take a stand that it is not the Federal Government's job to bail out every municipal budget or serve as a fire marshal for every city and town across this country. Therefore, Madam Chair, I would strongly urge my colleagues to support fiscal discipline and to vote ``no'' on this amendment.

Madam Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Chair, I move to strike the last word.

I will yield to the gentleman and ask if he can confirm that this amendment still requires applicants to biometrically enroll in person.

Madam Chair, I thank the gentleman. And based on the requirement that the applicants biometrically enroll, we will accept the amendment.

Madam Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Chair, I rise in opposition to the amendment. This amendment is not germane to the Department of Homeland Security appropriations bill. This amendment is better addressed within the National Defense Authorization Act or the Defense appropriations bill.

I yield back the balance of time.

Mr. Chair, I insist on my point of order.

I make a point of order against the amendment because it proposes to change existing law and constitutes legislation in an appropriations bill, and therefore violates clause 2 of rule XXI. The rule states in pertinent part, ``An amendment to a general appropriation bill shall not be in order if changing existing law requires a new determination.''

I ask for a ruling from the Chair.

I move to strike the last word.

Madam Chair, Federal public lands have become the chosen path for drug smugglers and illegals entering our United States of America. The Government Accountability Office has confirmed that certain environmental laws, such as the Wilderness Act and Endangered Species Act, limit the Border Patrol's access and expose great areas of the border to significant environmental damage due to the illegal traffic coming into the United States.

In certain areas, Border Patrol agents are limited to patrolling on foot or on horseback even if the drug runners have ATVs, 4x4 trucks, or even Humvees.

A recent GAO report revealed that the Department of the Interior is taking months to approve simple permits that are necessary for the Border Patrol to do its job to protect the border. The GAO report also revealed that some permits are never granted at all.

When permits are given to the Border Patrol for such things as placing monitor equipment, the Department of the Interior negotiates mitigation packages with the Border Patrol. But these mitigation packages are forcing the Border Patrol to fork over money for environmental activities. The obvious is being missed by the Department of the Interior that the illegal activity itself destroys the environment they are trying to preserve.

I recommend adoption of the Lummis amendment.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.

Madam Chair, it has recently come to light that, according to the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, the Department of Homeland Security granted deferred action to over 12,000 illegal aliens in FY 2010. ``Deferred action'' is a technical term which means that a person is subject to deportation but that our Federal Government, the administration, decides not to deport them at all, calling it ``deferred action.''

This number is a dramatic increase from previous years. It's much higher than the less than 900 number that was recently quoted by Secretary Napolitano in testimony during a Senate Judiciary hearing. These numbers also seem to drastically contradict statements made by the administration that deferred action would not be used to provide a backdoor amnesty to illegal immigrants.

In short, deferred action is an exercise of prosecutorial discretion, and that discretion is not to pursue removal from the United States of a particular individual for a specific period of time. It is only intended to be used on very special occasions; but now over 12,000 people a year are given this deferred action.

Our broken immigration system in this country continues to allow hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants in each year. Increasingly, deferred action is being used as an easy way for the Federal Government to avoid enforcing the law for people who are arrested and caught in the United States illegally. Quite simply, it is illegal to be in this country without permission, and it is the responsibility of the Federal Government to enforce the immigration laws of this country at all times, not to pick and choose when to enforce certain laws, especially immigration laws.

This amendment states that no money from this bill can be used to grant deferred action or parole to an illegal in the United States for any other reason than a case-by-case basis for one of two reasons: one, urgent humanitarian reasons or, two, significant public benefit.

Bottom line, this amendment prevents the administration from going around Congress and the will of the American people by granting administrative amnesty called ``deferred action.''

I yield back the balance of my time.

Parliamentary Inquiry

Madam Chair, I wish to be heard.

Madam Chair, this is the amendment that I mentioned to the majority that I was going to introduce at this time, and it is in order because it is No. 9, which was stated to me by the Clerk as No. 9. So it is in order.

Madam Chair, I have an amendment at the desk. The

title of the amendment is Sanctuary Cities amendment. I have it as No. 10.

I would like the amendment read.

Madam Chair, over the past years, the number of aliens who unlawfully reside in the United States has grown significantly, from an estimated 3 million in 1986, to about 11 million in 2005; and some put those estimates today in 2010 at 20 million.

It is estimated that 400,000 illegal immigrants entered our country last year. Even modest estimates put the cost of illegal immigration to just the Federal Government at over $29 billion each year. That is roughly the annual budget for the entire Department of Justice, and we cannot afford to have this continue.

Some jurisdictions have assisted Federal authorities in apprehending and detaining unauthorized aliens pursuant to agreements called the 287(g) agreements, with Federal immigration authorities enabling respective State or local law enforcement agencies to carry out various immigration enforcement functions, and I commend these jurisdictions.

However, there are some jurisdictions that continue to mandate that their employees not communicate with ICE when they come across someone that is in the country illegally. These jurisdictions are known as sanctuary cities and are located throughout the United States. This practice is against the law, and it is in violation of current law which is 8 U.S.C. 1373.

However, despite the law, many cities and localities still place these restrictions on law enforcement officers and other employees. 8 U.S.C. 1373 states: notwithstanding any other provision of Federal, State, or local law, a Federal, State, or local government entity or official may not prohibit or in any way restrict any government entity or official from sending to or receiving from the Immigration and Naturalization Service, now called ICE, information regarding the citizenship or immigration status, lawful or unlawful, of any individual.

Once again, Madam Chair, this is current U.S. Federal law. This amendment is simple. It says that no funds from this act can be used to contradict current U.S. law, which I just read.

This amendment should pass unanimously because it already is against the law for cities and other jurisdictions to prevent law enforcement officers and other employees from sharing information with ICE. All this amendment is doing is saying that no money from this act can go to support an already illegal activity. It is a commonsense amendment. I urge support of the amendment.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Chairman, I have an amendment at the desk.

Madam Chairman, what is taking place is under the guise of granting deferred action. Deferred action is a procedure, an administrative procedure by the administration that is used when a person is detained who is illegally in the United States and the action to deport that individual is deferred to some unknown date. The person is released, and what occurs is that person is never deported and never has a hearing.

This procedure started years ago with a few hundred people a year. But last year, in 2010, over 12,000 people had their immigration deportation hearings deferred to an unknown date, and what occurred was they were released and their action against them will never be taken. Some call this a form of amnesty, administrative amnesty. You can call it whatever you want, but those people stay in the United States.

What this amendment does is prohibit the administration from using, under the guise of deferred action, this procedure to not have hearings on individuals, which allows them to end up staying in the United States. And no funds can be used to implement the verdict action except in two cases: One is under humanitarian reasons, and the second would be some significant public benefit to the United States. Otherwise, no deferred action, no get-out-of-jail-free card for people on a discriminatory basis done by the administration or any of its agencies.

I urge adoption of this amendment.

I yield back the balance of my time.

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

I rise for clarification. With great respect for my colleagues, and understanding the importance of Homeland Security dollars, I am very concerned that there seems to be a misunderstanding. I would like to read again the quote from the 9/11 Commission. ``Federal Homeland Security assistance should not remain a program for general revenue sharing. It should supplement State and local resources based on the risks of vulnerability that merit additional support. Congress should not use this money as a pork barrel.''

I would also like to remind my good friends that under the Homeland Security grant program, there are many other sources of funding for these communities. California, for example, is getting $153,953,988. Connecticut is getting over $12 million. Nevada is getting over $10 million, et cetera, et cetera. So there seems to be some misunderstanding that the UASI program should cover all the Homeland Security funding for these States.

We believe strongly that there are reasons for funding, certainly by formula--and that's the way this bill is written--almost every city, over 50 cities in the United States. But the UASI funding is specifically targeted to those areas such as New York that are pointed to by the terrorists. I don't want to mention bin Laden, but others, they clearly are the most at risk. And if you're number one, there clearly should be a rationale for getting the funding. So those 10 cities will be getting the funding because they're most at risk. But the other Homeland Security funding will be divided by formula to all the other Representatives of States that are here today. So I respect your needs. I think it's very important. And there is money in this bill that would cover the needs which you so articulately discussed today.

I have an amendment at the desk.

I ask unanimous consent to return to the previous paragraph.

I move to strike the last word, then.

Mr. Chairman, my amendment would address two critical shortfalls in the fiscal year 2012 Homeland Security appropriations bill: inadequate funding for communities devastated by recent disasters, and for first responder and antiterror programs.

We have a responsibility to help rebuild homes and businesses following disasters throughout the South and Midwest where communities are reeling and families are mourning and rebuilding.

Chairman Aderholt, whose Alabama district was devastated by tornadoes, took the first step in committee by increasing disaster relief funding, and I supported his efforts. My amendment builds upon his work to provide an additional $1.5 billion in disaster relief to help FEMA respond to needs that far exceed funding levels in this bill.

Just as we have a responsibility, however, to help communities rebuild from natural disasters, we must help them prepare for and prevent manmade ones.

Funding for FEMA's first responder grants as well as the proposed block grant structure provide inadequate levels to protect and prepare the top terror targets in the Nation or to keep our communities safe from fire hazards.

The State Homeland Security Urban Area Security Initiative, Transit Security, Port Security, and additional grant programs will be forced to compete against each other for only two-thirds of the $1 billion provided for first responder grants, which is a cut of roughly $1.5 billion to the program.

Further, by dramatically reducing funding for firefighter grants, the Republican majority would shift a tremendous burden to local communities to either slash services or increase taxes to ensure adequate fire coverage.

My amendment would increase funding for disaster relief by an additional $1.5 billion, while also bringing first responder and fire grant programs back to their fiscal year 2011 levels.

Now, some of my colleagues across the aisle object to funding recovery efforts without offsets. Those from areas affected by recent disasters, including Republican Senator Roy Blunt, understand that the overwhelming recovery need must be prioritized. And all of us know the repercussions of allowing our first responders to go unprepared or untrained in this dangerous world.

Earlier this year, even before the death of Osama bin Laden increased our state of alert, Secretary Napolitano testified that we were at our most heightened state of terrorist threat since September 11.

If this bill is adopted without my amendment, hundreds of millions of dollars in antiterror funds will be taken from our most targeted regions. Just weeks after intelligence gathered at Osama bin Laden's compound indicates a clear intent to strike the Nation coinciding with the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, such reductions would be unconscionable.

I urge my colleagues to support the amendment.

I yield back the balance of my time.

I appreciate it. You have been very, very helpful. Thank you.

I now ask unanimous consent to consider my amendment out of order.

I would like to make a few additional points because, previously, I did discuss the amendment in greater detail, and I thank the chairman for his consideration. There are a couple of important things. As to the $1 billion to the block grant funding, I think it is important that we look at the breakdown:

$192.6 million for law enforcement training and exercises; $55 million for Operation Stonegarden grants, which is overtime costs; and $85 million for FEMA to administer the grant programs, which is the Department of Homeland Security estimate. This brings the funding total down to $667.1 million before the block grant even begins to be distributed to the State Homeland Security Grant Program, UASI, the Metropolitan Medical Response System, Interoperability, Port Security, Transit Security, and Citizen Corps.

SHSGP is written in such a way that it doesn't have to even be funded; but if it is, there are minimum funding requirements for each State and territory--.35 percent of total funds for FY12. Given that SHSGP provides funding to each State, there is no scenario under which the Secretary does not fund this program. That is mandatory. So the minimum funding level that can be provided for SHSGP and that can comply with the statutory requirement is $125.4 million. This would leave just $551.7 million remaining for UASI, MMRS, Interoperability, Port Security, Transit Security, Citizen Corps.

Now, I discussed previously when I introduced my amendment that there are tremendous needs for responding to the recent disasters all around this country that are really unheard of--the tornadoes, the floods, the loss of life. People have to rebuild their homes, rebuild their lives. It is essential that we appropriate that additional money, and it is also essential that we respond to the threats which are still out there. People will say bin Laden is gone, but there is an entire network that we have to be concerned about. So, Mr. Chairman, I hope that we can respond adequately to both disaster needs and the needs of our UASI areas with regard to terrorist response for the grants.

Let me conclude by thanking you, after sitting here for 6 hours, maybe 8 hours today, for allowing me to offer this amendment after being late for 10 seconds. I appreciate your consideration. I appreciate the support, and I do hope we can pass it and respond to the real needs out there for both disasters and the terrorism threats that are within our communities.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Point of Order

I move to strike the last word.

I rise in support of the Clarke amendment. In fact, I have a similar amendment filed at the desk that I won't need to bring forward because this amendment accomplishes the same thing.

What the amendment says is that all of those cities, the 54 cities that were arbitrarily removed from eligibility, should have that same opportunity to compete for these Homeland Security grants. It doesn't increase funding at all but says: Why are we limiting our threat assessment cities to 10 cities when, in fact, many other cities have exposure to risks?

And if we just look at what we found so far from the raid of Osama bin Laden's compound, they looked through and found some of the things that these terrorist cells may be going after. And, in fact, some of the very terrorist threats were targeting areas that are included in some of these cities that have arbitrarily been removed from eligibility for these Homeland Security grants.

So all we're saying is, in cities like New Orleans, and if you just look at the corridor between New Orleans and Baton Rouge--and both cities, both New Orleans and Baton Rouge were arbitrarily removed from eligibility. Between the Port of New Orleans and all the shipping transport that's done there, as well as all of the oil and gas infrastructure for our country that's located in that region, all of the chemical plants that are located in that region, they are part of that terrorist assessment that were determined in the data that we've retrieved from Osama bin Laden's compound, including the threat to oil tankers and ships, some of the very commerce that moves through the Port of New Orleans, and yet the Port of New Orleans is removed from eligibility.

So this amendment doesn't guarantee that they will get any of these-- any access to these grants, but what it does say is they've got the ability to compete if the terrorist threat is determined to be high enough to where they should be able to get the funding from those grants, because our terrorist threats change from day to day, from year to year. We get more information, just as we've recently gotten a treasure trove of new information on where those threats are. Why should we arbitrarily remove some of the very cities that may rise to the top of that list?

So this gives the flexibility back to the Department of Homeland Security to allow those other cities to compete where there are real terrorist threats. So that's what this amendment does.

I support the amendment, and hopefully we will be able to get this language added back in.

Madam Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.

Madam Chair, the amendment I bring forward right now in this bill is really directed at addressing a bureaucratic red tape inefficiency that is causing over 1 million American workers to make multiple trips to get a document that they are required to have, the Federal Government requires them to have. It's a transportation worker identification credential, and it's an important document to have. But it was created back in 2007, and it has a 5-year limitation and it has to be renewed. And a worker has to go into a registered TWIC office, and they have to go and get their fingerprint taken. They've got to get their picture taken and present credentials to get the card.

The problem with the implementation is that the Department has been requiring these workers to go back multiple times to get the card when, in fact, if you look at how a passport, for example, is issued, you can go in and you can fill out the paperwork and then they send you the passport. It works that way for most forms of identification, but for whatever reason, in this TWIC program, the Department has been requiring multiple trips.

The reason that this is a big issue for all of these workers is there are 1.8 million Americans who are required to have a TWIC card in order to do their jobs. And so under these current rules, they have to go and make multiple trips. And in some cases, this isn't an office right down the street; this is an office over 100 miles away.

I have a letter from the Passenger Vessel Association in support of this amendment, and they point out frequently that the TWIC enrollment center is hundreds of miles away from a mariner's home, necessitating two round trips of many hours in duration. It is not uncommon for the mariner to be forced to stay overnight during each round trip. And, of course, the employee has to pay for these round trips, has to pay for the overnight, has to be away from their job, and for no valid reason. In fact, the Department hasn't even implemented rules to properly utilize these TWIC cards; yet they're still making the employees go and have these multiple trips.

If you imagine a State like Alaska where you might have to spend days to go get the card, and you have to first go spend days to go file for the card, then you have to go spend days to go get the card, this is unnecessary. It's an incredible burden on our workforce, and it's something that we can address by preventing the funds from being used for implementing this policy. It still gives them broad discretion to implement a successful TWIC program, but again, just like passports or other forms of identification, our over 1.8 million American workers shouldn't be forced to jump through all of these bureaucratic red tape hoops that are actually costing them money that they should be able to spend on their families.

I ask for support of the amendment.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Yes. They would still have to go to the center and have to apply. In fact, in the language of the amendment, it refers to an approved transportation worker identification credential. So they would have to actually go and be approved. Because even if they went and let's say they were rejected, then they wouldn't be able to get the card. But if they went to the center and got approved, then they shouldn't have to go back again to get the card.

So it does require that they would have to still go in person, take the photo ID, and implement the biometric data, but it just makes sure that they don't have to go through these continuous bureaucratic hurdles to go and get the card.