Providing for consideration of the bill (H.R. 5230) making supplemental appropriations for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2014, and for other purposes; providing for consideration of the bill (H.R. 5272) to prohibit certain actions with respect to deferred action for aliens not lawfully present in the United States, and for other purposes; and providing for consideration of motions to suspend the rules.

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate my colleague for yielding, and I yield myself such time as I may consume.

You would think after 4 years that the majority would know how to run the House, but this week makes us wonder. All we have accomplished this week is to sue the President and deregulate pesticides into the environment. And in a real embarrassment, canceling a vote because Tea Party Members refused to support a border bill that was tailormade for them. Actually, I understand it was in their interest to pass it yesterday.

Now, my colleague, of whom I am inordinately fond, said that the time to act is now. But the time really to act was yesterday when the Senate was in town, because there is no way now what we are doing today could ever become legislation because the Senate would have to pass something, and then it would go to the President who said already he would veto it. So we stay an extra day here to make a point.

Instead of going home to our constituents, we are under siege in a choke hold by some Members of the House. This much is true: it costs the taxpayers $24 million a week to run the House of Representatives, and I am afraid the American people aren't getting their money's worth.

President Truman, it is worth noting, campaigned for President using a quote ``do-nothing Congress,'' which had passed nearly 1,000 bills. And under Mr. Speaker, this Congress has passed just around 120. Mr. Truman was mad because they had not done a health care bill. Fortunately, we got that done 4 years ago.

But this recalcitrant Congress is why President Obama had to act on his own. Nothing is working here, but he was responsible for keeping the country moving. I think we need to describe for the Record and for the public exactly what has been done today.

This morning, the majority adopted a martial law rule until September 5, which is most unusual. Martial law usually lasts 1, 2, maybe 3 days at the outside. But we have 5 weeks, which means the Speaker can call us back at any time. We would hope that he would not do that without telling us what we are going to do. But today, we do not even know what is in this bill. We don't understand this legislation because the 40 pages of it we have not had time to look at. So here we are. We do think it is pretty toxic.

But not only was the bill drafted by Republicans only, in a basement room, there are absolutely no Democrat fingerprints or ideas or amendments or thoughts or suggestions or hopes or anything else in this bill. There have been no hearings, no markups, no amendments, nothing of which we are entitled to as Members of the House and sent here by 750,000 Americans.

This bill, we know, does give $35 million to reimburse the National Guard for activities related to ``border security and the current influx of illegal immigrants.'' Now it turns out that only Texas has spent any money on that, and one wonders if that piqued Senator Cruz's interest in this bill and what we are doing over here because it looks like that is where the money will be going.

The bill tragically cuts all funding for the DREAM Act, the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program. We were told there were something like 700,000 children who were involved in that, who came forward on a promise by this government that they would have an opportunity to go to school and they would not be deported. Now the country has their names, their addresses, and they would be easy to deport because this bill puts an end to the DREAM Act.

I related today in the Rules Committee a story about four undocumented young men in high school in the United States that decided to enter into a contest to build an underwater robot, the trouble that they had simply getting the equipment to do it and the teachers who helped them do it. And they really felt that they had been outmatched and outgunned when they were going to compete as high school students against engineering students at MIT, a premier engineering school in the United States. What happened, those four young men won. They beat MIT. Now, they were part of the DREAM Act. We hope they will not be deported because, more than anything I can think of, the United States needs that kind of thinkers and innovators in what they had to do.

So the Cato Institute agrees. They wrote on July 29, 3 days ago, that DACA, the DREAM Act, was not a primary cause of the surge, and I insert this report from CATO, entitled, ``DACA Did Not Cause the Surge in Unaccompanied Children,'' into the Record. I will also submit some statistical findings from Professor Tim Wong, from the University of California, San Diego, into the Record, entitled, ``DACA Did Not Cause the Influx of Unaccompanied Minors'' into the Record.

[From the CATO Institute, July 29, 2014]

DACA Did Not Cause the Surge in Unaccompanied Children

(By Alex Nowrasteh)

In June, 2012 the Obama Administration announced that it

had authored a memo deferring the deportation of unauthorized

immigrant childhood arrivals in the United States, a program

known as deferred action for childhood arrivals (DACA). The

memo directed then Secretary of the Department of Homeland

Security to practice prosecutorial discretion toward a small

number of unauthorized immigrants who fulfilled a specific

set of characteristics. In essence, some unauthorized

immigrants who had come to the United States as children were

able to legally stay and work--at least temporarily.

Did DACA Cause the UAC Surge?

Some politicians contend that DACA is primarily responsible

for the surge in unaccompanied child (UAC) migrants across

the border in recent years. A recent House Appropriations

Committee one-pager stated that, ``The dire situation on our

Southern border has been exacerbated by the President's

current immigration policies.'' Proponents of this theory

argue that DACA sent a message to Central Americans that if

they came as children then the U.S. government would legalize

them, thus giving a large incentive for them to come in the

first place. Few facts of the unaccompanied children (UAC)

surge are consistent with the theory that DACA caused the

surge.

First, the surge in UAC began long before the June 15, 2012

announcement of DACA. It is true that DACA had been discussed

in late May 2012 but the surge was underway by that time.

From October 2011 through March 2012, there was a 93 percent

increase in UAC apprehensions over the same period in Fiscal

Year 2011. Texas Governor Rick Perry warned President Obama

about the rapid increase in UAC at the border in early May

2012--more than a full month before DACA was announced. In

early June 2012, Mexico was detaining twice as many Central

American children as in 2011. The surge in unaccompanied

children (UAC) began before DACA was announced.

Second, the children coming now are not legally able to

apply for DACA. A recipient of DACA has to have resided in

the United States continuously from June 15, 2007 to June 15,

2012, a requirement that excludes the unaccompanied children

coming now.

Third, if DACA was such an incentive for UAC to come from

Central America, why are so few Nicaraguan children coming?

They would benefit in the same way as unaccompanied children

from El Salvdaor, Honduras, and Guatemala. The lack of

Nicaraguans points to other causes of the surge.

The timing, legal exclusion of the UAC from DACA, and lack

of Nicaraguans indicate that DACA was not a primary cause of

the surge. Of the 404 UAC interviewed by the United Nations

High Commissioner for Refugees since 2011, only 9 mentioned

that U.S. laws influenced their decision to come to the

United States. Other American laws could have influenced the

unaccompanied children to come but DACA is not the main

culprit.

Details on DACA

The DACA beneficiaries, at the time of the memo, would have

to fulfill all of these requirements to have their

deportations deferred: under the age of 31; arrived to the

United States before reaching their 16th birthday; entered

the United States without inspection or overstayed a visa

prior to June 15, 2012; continuously resided in the United

States from June 15, 2007 to the time of the memo; physically

present in the United States on June 15, 2012, as well as at

the time of requesting deferred action from United States

Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS); been in school

at the time of application, or have already graduated or

obtained a certificate of completion from high school, or

have obtained a general education development (GED)

certificate, or are an honorably discharged veteran of the

U.S. Coast Guard or the U.S. Armed Forces; not been convicted

of a felony, significant misdemeanor, or three or more other

misdemeanors, and do not otherwise pose a threat to national

security or public safety.

Beneficiaries of DACA were also allowed to apply for

employment authorization according to the Code of Federal

Regulations. There is a debate amongst legal scholars over

whether the administration's grant of deferred action was

legal. Those who argue that DACA was illegal contend that the

President overstepped his constitutional authority to defer

the deportation of some unauthorized immigrants. Those who

argue that DACA was legal point to the general power of the

Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security to defer

enforcement action. They argue that the Supreme Court has

ruled that decisions to initiate or terminate enforcement

proceedings fall within the authority of the Executive--an

enforcement power used since the early 1970s. Here is more of

their argument. This disagreement has not been settled.

By the end of September, 2013, 580,000 requests for DACA

were accepted by the U.S. government and 514,800, or 89

percent, were approved. Seventy-six percent of the requests

came from Mexicans. Twenty-nine percent of the requests were

filed from California, 16 percent from Texas, and 6 percent

from Illinois.

Read the Full Article: DACA Did Not Cause the Surge in

Unaccompanied Children

What is really happening here is the most extreme, anti-immigrant voices in the Republican Party using the crisis as a political cover to repeal a commonsense policy like the DREAM Act, and the Speaker has caved once again to those voices. Representative Steve King described the underlying legislation as something that he could have ordered off the menu.

Furthermore, the rules are of course closed, setting the record anew for the most closed rules in any Congress. This bill does stop short of catapulting those children into Mexico and then leaving them to walk to their home countries, but it certainly doesn't do very much since the discussion in the House of Representatives for several years now has been what to do about immigration. It really is a sorry path that we have reached the condition we are in right now, a one-House bill, a Senate that is gone, and a President who won't sign it.

If we learned anything this week, we learned from Speaker Boehner's comments on his blog that the President should do more, not less, contrary to the reason why they sued him, and we do hope that the President will do that and bring a more humane solution to this, as almost all religions in the United States have asked us to do.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Lofgren), the ranking member of the Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration and Border Security and an expert on immigration.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Jeffries), my friend, and a member of the Committee on the Judiciary.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Vermont (Mr. Welch).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentlewoman from Washington (Ms. DelBene), a member of the Committee on the Judiciary.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Lewis).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Doggett).

Mr. Speaker, I yield the gentleman an additional 30 seconds.

Mr. Speaker, that is true. We have no further speakers, and I am prepared to close.

Mr. Speaker, in the more than a year since the Senate passed bipartisan immigration reform, the House leadership has refused to allow a vote on this essential legislation, even though we know it has the votes to pass.

Indeed, over the last 13 months, the majority has not taken one step--not one--to fix our broken immigration system. If we defeat the previous question, I will offer an amendment to the rule to bring up H.R. 15, our immigration reform bill, already passed by the Senate.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of the amendment in the Record, along with extraneous material, immediately prior to the vote on the previous question.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote ``no,'' defeat the previous question, and vote ``no'' on the underlying bills.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 710 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. Slaughter), my friend, the ranking member from the Rules Committee, pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only.

General Leave

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks.

The rule provides for expedited consideration of H.R. 5230 and H.R. 5272.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today because we are facing an unprecedented crisis on America's southern border. Nearly 60,000 unaccompanied alien children have entered the United States illegally this fiscal year, most of whom have come through the Texas-Mexico border, and today, our country faces a threat to our sovereignty and to our rule of law.

The time to act is now. It would be irresponsible for this body to go home for a month without doing our part to help work and solve this problem. I am glad that Members of the House recognize their duty to finish the job. I believe the House has put specific, concrete proposals to act in the best interest of the United States.

Let's take a look at what this crisis on our border is doing. First, the President's catch-and-release program is a big part of the problem. Under this program, nearly 90 percent of unaccompanied alien children have been placed with their families in the United States, many of whom are here illegally themselves.

Second, there is the President's DACA program. DACA is a major reason for the influx of illegal immigrants to the United States. The Director on U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services recently testified to the Judiciary Committee that 700,000 undocumented immigrants have taken advantage of DACA.

Third, there is the 2008 trafficking law, which has allowed so many to effectively skip out on the judicial process and live in our country illegally. Catch and release under the President's proposal is wrong and bad for our country, and only encourages many, many more to continue the trek here.

Combined, these policies, plus signals from the administration, encouraged more illegal immigration and have led to the border crisis that we face today. To stop this crisis, our border must be secured and the tide of illegal immigration should be stemmed. I believe that this rule provides for legislation to accomplish that goal.

H.R. 5230 would provide $659 million for border security, the enforcement of existing laws, illegal immigration prevention, and humanitarian assistance. Additionally, $70 million would be provided for National Guard border efforts. This proposal is paid for, which means that it does not result in any new or additional Federal spending this fiscal year.

However, the House will not simply throw money at the problem. This package also makes specific, concrete policy changes to address the underlying problems that are fueling this crisis. Specifically, it prevents the administration from spending taxpayer dollars to adjudicate any new applications under DACA or any other similar policy. The package also amends the 2008 trafficking law so that all unaccompanied alien children are treated the same as, under the law today, Mexicans and Canadians, and this is for the purpose of removals.

It also provides additional temporary judges to help guarantee that these children get their day in court within 14 days from their initial screening. It also strengthens laws against criminals and those with serious drug-related convictions and those who have them from applying for asylum. It allows for customs and border protection activities on Federal land. Similarly, it authorizes the deployment of the National Guard to our southern border.

Finally, it prohibits the housing of unauthorized immigrants on military bases if housing them would displace members of the Armed Forces or any Active Duty or it interferes with military activity.

These steps come after a series of conversations with members of the majority. We have an obligation to get this bill done. As a Texan, I have pushed and pushed and pushed for us to make sure that we had a bill that could be supported by our Members. It is Texas and those living on the border that are seeing tremendous conditions that are placing our States and local people at a disadvantage.

Thus, I want to thank the Members for continuing to work together on a bill to get 218 votes. I applaud those who spent the time, including today, dedicating themselves to putting the package together. I thank the staff. And as always, I expect and want this body to support this good piece of legislation.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume to just say one of the things I learned this week was that the gentlewoman from North Carolina (Ms. Foxx) presented not only her thoughts and ideas at our conference when we met about how we can make our borders stronger, but she was present the entire time at the Rules Committee, had a chance to forthrightly participate. We had hours and hours of discussion about not only the legislation and what we were doing, but we actually shared ideas among Members on a bipartisan basis today, and I felt like it was a pretty good exchange.

I am delighted, at this time, to yield 15 minutes to the gentlewoman from North Carolina (Ms. Foxx).

Mr. Speaker, at this time, I yield 10 minutes to the gentleman from Ennis, Texas (Mr. Barton), the dean of the Texas delegation.

Mr. Speaker, at this time, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Tyler, Texas, Judge Gohmert, a former State district judge, now Member of Congress.

Mr. Speaker, I yield the gentleman 15 seconds for a clarification of his remarks, if he would take me up on that time.

I would like to advise the gentleman that I do not believe it is a correct statement to say combat-ready troops. The National Guard that is in Texas is not all combat ready. If I could get the gentleman to correct that, I yield him 15 seconds.

Reclaiming my time, Mr. Speaker, I would like to let the Record note that there is no specification for these men and women of the National Guard to be combat ready. In fact, I do not believe that that would be a true statement.

That is not a part of what we have specified in this plan, nor do I believe that it would be a requirement. So I have asked the gentleman, and he chose to answer the way he did, but I would like to state on the Record that there are no requirements, there is no precondition for that. In fact, I do not believe that that is a correct statement.

Mr. Speaker, at this time, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Jolly), one of our newest Members.

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

Mr. Speaker, I would notify the gentlewoman from New York that I have no further speakers, and I have been advised that perhaps she has no further speakers.

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

I also appreciate the gentlewoman, her team, and all of our staffs who have worked overtime, including our Appropriations staff and our staff from Energy and Commerce who helped us with this, as well as the Judiciary staff.

Mr. Speaker, in closing, I have a fundamental disagreement with the President on the question of the border, and that is why we are here today.

You have heard Republican speakers talking about how we believe that the rule of law is important. We believe that America is a great and awesome country and that we are very compassionate, but we take in millions of people each year through a legal process. America is a land of immigrants, but the rule of law is important also. We have problems with our borders. We have had problems with our borders for years, but in particular, after 9/11, the threats that are against this country have placed enormous pressure not only on our law enforcement but on air, land, sea, rail. We feel that the Federal Government should do a better job of not encouraging people to come to this country, bypassing the laws and laying down enforcement and making it easier for our country to be invaded.

That is what is happening right now.

Some 70,000 people have come to our border, and Republicans are standing up and are talking about this in a proper way. We believe that the people who have come here should be allowed to go back home. We should help them, and we should facilitate that. We believe that the rule of law--the processes that we have got to follow to do that--must be followed.

Yesterday, there was an amendment before the Rules Committee asking for almost $180 million to help pay for these children who, as the guests of the Democratic Party and the President, will stay in this country. We are going

to have to end up paying about--$180 million was the request, for 60 days for our local school districts.

There are enormous questions that abound about what will happen, who will pay, how this is supposed to happen when, in fact, America at this time has 25 million people unemployed and underemployed. It is a tremendous deficit that we face. Our social systems and networks are burdened already, and we have many people whom, ourselves, we cannot help--but what do we do? We take on more people.

Mr. Speaker, I think it is time that we listen to the American people and that we listen to what we are trying to do here, and that is to face up to what we were sent here to do, which is to make tough choices and tough decisions. I believe what we are doing is correct. I urge my colleagues to vote ``yes'' on the resolution and ``yes'' on the underlying legislation.

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

Mr. Speaker, some Members have asked whether this bill terminates deferred action for DREAMers with DACA. This question was put to Chairman Goodlatte at the Rules Committee today, and he answered, as I saw on TV, that the text speaks for itself. He is right. The text does speak for itself. And on lines 5 through 7 on page 1, the text clearly terminates DACA by prohibiting DREAMers from applying to renew their deferred action, which they must do after a 2-year time period.

It also prevents future deferred action to ensure that we continue to deport the parents of the DREAMers and parents of U.S. citizen children, sending those children, by the way, into foster care, or prevent DREAMers who have not yet filed for deferred action from doing so.

So basically, this bill will have the effect of removing DACA from the DREAMers and making them deportable.

Now, there has been a lot of discussion about the role that DACA has had, and I will put into the Record a report from the Cato Institute, titled, ``DACA Did Not Cause the Surge in Unaccompanied Children.'' If you do statistic analysis, you can see that it is impossible that DACA has been the cause of these children coming from the three war-torn countries, as the report reports.

[From the Cato Institute, July 29, 2014]

DACA Did Not Cause the Surge in Unaccompanied Children

(By Alex Nowrasteh)

In June, 2012 the Obama Administration announced that it

had authored a memo deferring the deportation of unauthorized

immigrant childhood arrivals in the United States, a program

known as deferred action for childhood arrivals (DACA). The

memo directed then Secretary of the Department of Homeland

Security to practice prosecutorial discretion toward a small

number of unauthorized immigrants who fulfilled a specific

set of characteristics. In essence, some unauthorized

immigrants who had come to the United States as children were

able to legally stay and work--at least temporarily.

Did DACA Cause the UAC Surge?

Some politicians contend that DACA is primarily responsible

for the surge in unaccompanied child (UAC) migrants across

the border in recent years. A recent House Appropriations

Committee one-pager stated that, ``The dire situation on our

Southern border has been exacerbated by the President's

current immigration policies.'' Proponents of this theory

argue that DACA sent a message to Central Americans that if

they came as children then the U.S. government would legalize

them, thus giving a large incentive for them to come in the

first place. Few facts of the unaccompanied children (UAC)

surge are consistent with the theory that DACA caused the

surge.

First, the surge in UAC began long before the June 15, 2012

announcement of DACA. It is true that DACA had been discussed

in late May 2012 but the surge was underway by that time.

From October 2011 through March 2012, there was a 93 percent

increase in UAC apprehensions over the same period in Fiscal

Year 2011. Texas Governor Rick Perry warned President Obama

about the rapid increase in UAC at the border in early May

2012--more than a full month before DACA was announced. In

early June 2012, Mexico was detaining twice as many Central

American children as in 2011. The surge in unaccompanied

children (UAC) began before DACA was announced.

Second, the children coming now are not legally able to

apply for DACA. A recipient of DACA has to have resided in

the United States continuously from June 15, 2007 to June 15,

2012, a requirement that excludes the unaccompanied children

coming now.

Third, if DACA was such an incentive for UAC to come from

Central America, why are so few Nicaraguan children coming?

They would benefit in the same way as unaccompanied children

from El Salvdaor, Honduras, and Guatemala. The lack of

Nicaraguans points to other causes of the surge.

The timing, legal exclusion of the UAC from DACA, and lack

of Nicaraguans indicate that DACA was not a primary cause of

the surge. Of the 404 UAC interviewed by the United Nations

High Commissioner for Refugees since 2011, only 9 mentioned

that U.S. laws influenced their decision to come to the

United States. Other American laws could have influenced the

unaccompanied children to come but DACA is not the main

culprit.

Details on DACA

The DACA beneficiaries, at the time of the memo, would have

to fulfill all of these requirements to have their

deportations deferred: under the age of 31; arrived to the

United States before reaching their 16th birthday; entered

the United States without

inspection or overstayed a visa prior to June 15, 2012;

continuously resided in the United States from June 15, 2007

to the time of the memo; physically present in the United

States on June 15, 2012, as well as at the time of requesting

deferred action from United States Citizenship and

Immigration Services (USCIS); been in school at the time of

application, or have already graduated or obtained a

certificate of completion from high school, or have obtained

a general education development (GED) certificate, or are an

honorably discharged veteran of the U.S. Coast Guard or the

U.S. Armed Forces; not been convicted of a felony,

significant misdemeanor, or three or more other misdemeanors,

and do not otherwise pose a threat to national security or

public safety.

Beneficiaries of DACA were also allowed to apply for

employment authorization according to the Code of Federal

Regulations. There is a debate amongst legal scholars over

whether the administration's grant of deferred action was

legal. Those who argue that DACA was illegal contend that the

President overstepped his constitutional authority to defer

the deportation of some unauthorized immigrants. Those who

argue that DACA was legal point to the general power of the

Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security to defer

enforcement action. They argue that the Supreme Court has

ruled that decisions to initiate or terminate enforcement

proceedings fall within the authority of the Executive--an

enforcement power used since the early 1970s. Here is more of

their argument. This disagreement has not been settled.

By the end of September, 2013, 580,000 requests for DACA

were accepted by the U.S. government and 514,800, or 89

percent, were approved. Seventy-six percent of the requests

came from Mexicans. Twenty-nine percent of the requests were

filed from California, 16 percent from Texas, and 6 percent

from Illinois.

Read the Full Article: DACA Did Not Cause the Surge in

Unaccompanied Children

Now, we know that this bill would eliminate DACA for DREAMers and make them deportable, but few in this body may know that the bill also returns to our bitter 2-year fight about reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act. It took this House 2 years to reauthorize the Violence Against Women Act at the beginning of this Congress, and when we did it, we did it over the strong opposition of the majority of House Republicans.

Today's bill undermines the basic premise of that act, that victims of domestic violence should be empowered to leave their abusers. It does that by denying the ability of battered immigrant spouses who have left their abusers and successfully self-petitioned for a VAWA visa the ability to work for the months it may take for a visa number to become available. This one change will prevent countless battered immigrant spouses from ever leaving their abusers and will drive others right back into the hands of their abusers.

Now, we have heard a lot of discussion about the law, but I think it is important to recall that the ability to make prosecutorial decisions is well-grounded in the law. In fact, in 1999, I recall well the letter sent by then-Chairman Henry Hyde, signed by 28 bipartisan Members of Congress, to the Clinton administration asking for the use of prosecutorial discretion. And most recently, the Supreme Court in the Arizona case recognized the broad authority of the administration to make decisions about whom to prosecute. The Arizona case reaffirmed the legality of the deferred action program.

So all this discussion to the contrary is really nothing more than legal nonsense.

What does this bill do?

It deports the DREAMers. It reinvigorates the Republican war on women by forcing women with VAWA visas back to their abusers. This is bad policy. It is an outrageous bill. It is being done in the worst possible process, and I wish so much that the Republicans had reached out, taken the offer of our leaders to sit down and work together to come up with a solution that really works for our country instead of deporting the DREAMers who are so much the hope and future of our great American Nation.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume, and I rise today to oppose this outrageous bill and the ridiculous process that produced it.

Just yesterday, this House attempted to consider a bill that went too far on policy and not far enough on funding levels, but apparently even that wasn't bad enough for my colleagues on the other side of the aisle.

Mr. Speaker, yesterday's bill vanished into thin air, and in its place, we now have this haphazard mess. This bill is the result of some sort of auction with members of the majority.

The bill also paves the way for another piece of legislation to be approved tonight--a brand-new bill on the so-called DACA--deferred action on undocumented children program--related to young people who were brought here as minors by 2007 and only know the United States of America as their home. This new bill has not been approved by any committee and contains language that would throw thousands of young people into legal limbo.

This new supplemental funding bill would add an additional $35 million to reimburse States for deploying the National Guard to the border, which is pointless. In other words, U.S. taxpayers will pick up the tab for Governor Perry's campaign stunt.

The bill also would change the initial screening process used by Customs and Border Patrol. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops opposes the change, noting:

It would make crippling changes to current U.S.-trafficking

victim protection law that we fear would send these

vulnerable children, and others in the future who have fled

trauma, exploitation, and violence, back into harm's way,

likely resulting in continued degradation, injury, and death

for many of them.

I insert the letter into the Record.

U.S. Conference of

Catholic Bishops,

Committee on Migration,

Washington, DC, August 1, 2014.

Dear Representative: I write to reaffirm the opposition of

the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) to H.R. 5230

and express our opposition to H.R. 5232.

Our opposition to H.R. 5230 stems from four troubling

aspects of the measure. First, it would make crippling

changes to current U.S. trafficking victim protection law

that we fear would send these vulnerable children, and others

in the future who have fled trauma, exploitation, and

violence, back into harm's way, likely resulting in continued

degradation, injury, and death for many of them. Second, it

would not provide adequate funding for the Department of

Health and Human Services Office of Refugee Resettlement

(ORR) to enable it to care for vulnerable unaccompanied

children in U.S. custody. Third, its level of funding for ORR

is so low that it would severely hamper the agency's ability

to fulfill its responsibility to care for refugees, asylum

seekers, special immigrants, trafficking victims, and torture

victims. And fourth, the measure contains no provisions to

address the root causes that have compelled so many children

to make the arduous journey from their homes in Central

America to the United States and elsewhere in the region.

Our opposition to H.R. 5232 stems from its elimination of

the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. It

is our view that this program has helped protect a vulnerable

group of children who for all extensive purposes are

Americans. It would subject them once again to removal to

countries they do not know. We urge its defeat.

How our nation responds to this humanitarian challenge is a

moral test of our national character. We ask that you oppose

H.R. 5230 and H.R. 5232, which we feel fail to live up to

that test.

Sincerely,

Most Reverend Eusebio Elizondo,

Auxiliary Bishop of Seattle, WA,

Chairman, USCCB Committee on Migration.

Mr. Speaker, this House majority needs to make up its collective mind. Do they want to provide emergency funding to enable our Federal agencies to respond to the humanitarian crisis on the border? Or do they wish to rewrite current law on immigration, political asylum, and due process? We can't do both in an hour of floor consideration.

The House should have already taken up bipartisan comprehensive immigration reform the Senate passed more than 1 year ago, with the support of Democrats and Republicans, the labor and business communities, evangelicals, law enforcement, and many others.

We would have been proud to work together with our Republicans on the other side of the aisle to give thoughtful consideration to this immigration process. The Senate did it. We had an opportunity to do it, and instead, we are rushing through tonight to put a bill on the floor that has changed many times as it has proceeded through the process.

That bill, the comprehensive immigration bill, would have helped prevent the crisis on the border today. If we had passed this 1 year ago, we wouldn't be in the desperate situation we are in now. Now, we are at a point where it requires emergency supplemental funding that we should provide cleanly and quickly without the baggage of extraneous policy that caused so much political division.

This package crossed the line from being a supplemental spending bill and became a controversial revision of immigration policy with limited funding thrown in as an afterthought. That is a shame. That is really sad because we know that the Departments of Homeland Security, Justice, Health and Human Services, and State need this money to do the job.

Mr. Speaker, just last year, this body allowed a small vocal minority to push a government shutdown over controversial policy ideas. This process today causes me to wonder whether many have learned the perils of such recklessness.

I urge my colleagues to oppose this package and start over. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gallego).

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Lofgren), the ranking member of the Immigration Subcommittee of the Judiciary Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer), the distinguished minority whip of the House.

I yield an additional 1 minute to the gentleman.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume to remind the distinguished chair of the Appropriations Committee that the reason the Senate could not bring a bill to the floor was because not one Republican will allow the procedural vote of cloture to bring it to the floor. Therefore, we are having a very important debate, but this bill, as you know, is going nowhere.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Price), the ranking member of the Homeland Security Subcommittee on Appropriations.

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

I am proud to be a Member of the Congress of the United States of America because I have respect for the law. The comprehensive immigration bill has been sitting out there for over a year. If we could work in a bipartisan way, if we could show that we have respect for the law, we would have had a serious debate and really passed a law. This bill is going nowhere. As you know, the Republicans in the Senate wouldn't even bring a bill to the floor.

That is why I am proud to yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Becerra).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Lee), a member of the Labor, Health and Human Services and Foreign Operations Subcommittees of Appropriations.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from New Hampshire (Ms. Shea-Porter).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Pelosi), the minority leader of the House.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Washington, Adam Smith.

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

Mr. Speaker, as we close this debate, I would like to address my remarks to our distinguished chairman with whom I have worked for quite a while, and just once again, I would like to say this bill deserves a ``no'' vote.

I look forward to working with you in a bipartisan way to pass a real comprehensive immigration reform bill, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 710, I call up the bill (H.R. 5272) to prohibit certain actions with respect to deferred action for aliens not lawfully present in the United States, and for other purposes, and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous materials on H.R. 5272.

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

Mr. Speaker, H.R. 5272 prohibits Federal funding or resources from being used to adjudicate any application for the President's Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, program; and it prohibits the President from issuing employment authorization documents to unlawful immigrants in the United States.

This bill differs from the bill the House was set to consider yesterday in that it prohibits funds from being used for adjudication. The prior version of this bill was a simple prohibition on the President's actions.

According to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Director Leon Rodriguez, the President's Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program has already allowed over 714,000 unlawful immigrants, who claimed to have arrived as minors, to remain in the United States and seek employment. DACA is a major reason for the unprecedented influx of minors and family units along our southern borders.

This deferred action program was announced by the President and the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security on June 15, 2012.

It is a usurpation of the plenary authority over immigration law that article I, section 8, clause 4 of the United States Constitution confers on the legislative branch.

And the President knows that it is a usurpation of congressional authority. In fact, in March of 2011, he stated: ``With respect to the notion that I can just suspend deportations through executive order, that's just not the case, because there are laws on the books that Congress has passed. The executive branch's job is to enforce and implement those laws. There are enough laws on the books by Congress that are very clear in terms of how we have to enforce our immigration system that for me to simply, through executive order, ignore these congressional mandates would not conform with my appropriate role as President.''

Despite this admission, just over a year later, the President implemented the DACA program. And today it stands as a beacon for any unlawful immigrant to simply cross into the United States illegally because word has gotten out that they will be given permission to stay. I heard this again and again from unlawful immigrants in Border Patrol custody when I visited the Rio Grande Valley earlier this month.

So let's be clear: the President's administrative policies abandoning immigration enforcement and his promises about future administrative legalizations continue to encourage unlawful immigrant parents to smuggle their children into the United States. These policies and promises put money directly into the pockets of human smuggling and drug cartels and put children at risk of perilous, illicit journeys to the United States. And they undermine the fundamental constitutional principles that Congress creates the laws and the President is bound to enforce them.

H.R. 5272 sends the vitally important message that minors tempted to come here in the future will no longer be rewarded by a President who chooses to use his pen and cell phone to legislate. They will have absolutely no opportunity to receive DACA benefits.

I thank the gentlewoman from Tennessee (Mrs. Blackburn) for introducing the bill and urge my colleagues to support it.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I will now yield to both the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gohmert) and the gentleman from California (Mr. McCarthy), the majority leader, for purposes of a colloquy. And I will begin by yielding to the gentleman from Texas.

That is correct.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 15 seconds to say that this bill does not deport anyone. This bill simply freezes a program that violates the United States Constitution.

So now, Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Barr).

Mr. Speaker, I yield the gentleman an additional 1 minute.

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

At this time, its my pleasure to yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Scalise), the brand-new majority whip of the United States Congress.

Mr. Speaker, at this time, I am pleased to yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. King), a member of the Judiciary Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield the gentleman an additional 30 seconds.

Mr. Speaker, at this time, I am pleased to yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Idaho (Mr. Labrador), a member of the Judiciary Committee.

Mr. Speaker, at this time, it is my pleasure to yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from Minnesota (Mrs. Bachmann).

Mr. Speaker, I yield the gentlewoman an additional 1 minute.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Poe), a member of the Judiciary Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield an additional 1 minute to the gentleman.

Will the gentleman yield?

I know you said that is just the way it is, and I agree, but I just want to make an added point.

I yield an additional 30 seconds to the gentleman if he will yield to me.

So 50,000 coming across the border, that is 50,000 unaccompanied minors coming to the border, and they are a small percentage of the total number of people. Eighty-five percent of the people coming to the border right now--and all categories are up. Children are up most, but all categories are up, and 85 percent are not unaccompanied minors.

So the gentleman makes a very valid point about the crisis at our border and the cause of that crisis. The President caused it. The President can solve it. The President should act now, and we need to send a strong message that America is not open to people who violate our laws.

Parliamentary Inquiry

Mr. Speaker, I also only have one speaker remaining and am prepared to close.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 15 seconds to say that DACA is more than just abuse of prosecutorial discretion. It also creates benefits that are not provided for under the law.

At this time, it is my pleasure to yield 5 minutes to the gentlewoman from Tennessee (Mrs. Blackburn), the chief sponsor of this legislation.

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