“Pro-immigration groups are already urging action on the immigration issue, hoping the new Congress will provide a favorable forum for their concerns.  What they want the federal government to do, on the other hand, looks very different from the bills we passed in the last year.

 

Last year, Congress approved vastly expanded funding to increase the number of U.S. Border Patrol agents and close gaping holes in U.S. border security.  I voted with a great majority of my colleagues in the U.S. House of Representatives to create tougher penalties for tunnel-builders who smuggle illegal aliens and contraband into the U.S. under our border.  The president signed legislation to add new technologies to monitor and strengthen our southern border.  At the same time, Congress wrote legislative language to crack down on drug traffickers.

 

Supporters of immigration reform in the 110th Congress want to “lay out a path to earned legalization for undocumented immigrants already living here,” in the words of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.  Other activists oppose spending to close gaps in the border fence between the U.S. and Mexico.  They are vocal and hopeful that America’s laws will change to accommodate those who came here, and live here, illegally.

 

Yet the debate over national security is far from settled.  The nation remains vulnerable along our borders, and though we worry about the severe threat posed by terrorists, in reality, we also face daily threats from drug smugglers and illegal aliens.  These constant burdens on our judicial system and services have the potential to erode the American way of life from the inside out. 

 

It is far too soon to stop talking about border enforcement in favor of debates about widening the legal immigration process.  It is not the process which is faulty in this debate – it is our borders which are still broken.

 

We must never in the immigration debate forget that coming to America by ignoring the proper paperwork and legal process is completely against our law. Just because someone thinks he has a perfectly good reason for speeding does not mean he won’t get a ticket.  By changing U.S. policy to accommodate the millions of illegals already in this country and the many more on their way, we are conceding the authority of our law. 

 

In his State of the Union Address, President Bush addressed the subject.  He told the nation: “We need to resolve the status of the illegal immigrants who are already in our country without animosity and without amnesty.”

 

My question is what does the president mean by ‘without amnesty’?

 

While all the terms of the immigration debate must clearly be defined, ‘amnesty’ is by far the most important.  By coming to America illegally and skirting the due process of law we have in place to create an orderly immigration process, illegal aliens have already shown a disregard for the law that we cannot abide.  Simply forgiving this transgression, even if a fine is imposed, sends a dangerous signal of encouragement to people all over the world who would like to live here but spurn the legal process. 

 

Citizenship in America should never be for sale, nor should it defy the principles of fairness on which our country was founded.”