Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I become very frustrated when it is evident that nobody wants to do what is the will of the Senate. It is a historic responsibility when you bring a piece of legislation to the Senate, which is to allow Senators, Democrat and Republican, to work their will with offering amendments that are, hopefully, germane and responsible to be debated and voted on.
Why would I want any amendments? I have all I want in the bill. The Judiciary Committee included agricultural jobs, a guest worker revised program, and a program that will deal with illegal undocumented workers already in country that relate to agriculture in the bill.
Would I want anymore amendments? In fact, the Senator from Georgia has already offered an amendment against me. One of my colleagues on this side of the aisle has openly said he wants to kill the AgJOBS provision in this bill, and he has a multiple of amendments he wants to offer. I am willing to let him offer them. I am willing to debate him. I think I can defeat him. I hope I have the prevailing argument.
But what is at hand here is a very important piece of work done by the Judiciary Committee, S. 2454. I am not going to suggest it is perfect in every way. The amendment process does refine and direct the will of the total Senate instead of the will of a single committee.
I suspect the chairman of the Judiciary Committee would be hard pressed to say this bill is flawless, it is perfect, it is without reproach. That is not what my phone calls are saying. That is not what the public is saying. In fact, the public in many instances disagrees with the provisions I have put in the bill.
What is important is exactly what the other Senator, Senator Isakson, said. This is one of our major domestic issues. It is an issue of national security. It is an issue of border control. It is an issue of recognizing the diverse economies of our country and the need for an employment base that is legal, documented, and controlled. It is a matter of immigration.
To suggest we are going to play games with who is on first and who is on second about who makes an amendment, who offers an amendment--why is the other side so nervous and frightened that somehow this bill might be changed a little bit? Better or worse, I don't know.
I think all who have spent time on this issue and know the issue are certainly willing to debate it or we wouldn't be with the issue. We would simply be running politically away from it as this Congress has done for a good number of years.
But the American people, in frustration, in anger, in fear, are now saying deal with it, control your border, our border, our Nation's border. Define and prescribe, background check, inspect those who cross it, at the same time, recognize that a certain type of employee is critically necessary in American agriculture to do the tough, hard, backbreaking work in the fields of America or to change the beds in our resorts or to work in certain forms of manufacturing or in oil patch.
Now, that is at that level of work, and that is an entry-level job, and it is critical to our economy that we have them. Americans, on the large part, have chosen not to do that kind of work anymore. But I recognize the need to recognize American citizens who do, and in my AgJOBS reform of the H-2A program, we create a national labor pool and recognize, first, if someone who is an American citizen is seeking that kind of employment, we make sure they are eligible and eligible first. It is Americans first in this instance, as it should be.
At the same time, there must be a clear recognition that there are now millions in this country, yes, here illegally, but all of them working, and working hard, and paying taxes, and not getting the benefit of those. Why?
Naturally, they are not citizens. We understand that. They probably ought to go home when they are through working, and 90 percent of them want to go home. But the irony is, as we continue to control our border, we create an impenetrable line, as we should, and those who have moved back and forth across that border historically no longer can do that.
Well, it is an interesting thing. It is an interesting issue. The House tried to deal with it in one way--I do not think appropriately, I do not think responsibly. I am not suggesting it is not responsible to control the border. We are doing that in this bill. But I believe we are doing it in a much more sensitive and humane way.
The border has to be secured or what we do here will not work. You cannot try to control and identify and direct employment traffic, if you will, in this country if you cannot control the flow of the traffic. That is part of what we are all about in trying to deal with this issue.
There are those who would say: Round them up and throw them out--round up 8 million, round up five times the size of the population of the State of Idaho and somehow identify them and treat them as legally as you have to under the law and get them out? We cannot do that, will not do that. It is impractical to do that. That is what this bill has struggled to accomplish.
But let's stop and suggest that if this is the issue we all believe it is, why are we fearful of amendments? Why has the other side sleepwalked us for the last 2 days? We ought to have voted on 3, 5, 8, 10 amendments by now. What are we fearful of?
I have my provision in the bill, but let Senator Chambliss amend it. Let him try. Let us debate it. Let us see the differences between what he believes and what I believe. We both agree on so many things as it relates to the agricultural employment base, but we disagree on some things. There is nothing wrong with that kind of healthy debate. I do not fear it. I will not fear it.
And I must say to my colleague from Illinois, when you tried to make the straw person the Senator from Arizona, there is an expression south of the Mason-Dixon line that is simply said: That dog don't hunt. Find a new straw person. This one does not work.
I yield the floor.