{"database": "openregs", "table": "congressional_record", "rows": [["CREC-2014-12-16-pt1-PgS6870-3", "2014-12-16", 113, 2, null, null, "CLOTURE MOTION", "SENATE", "SENATE", "SCLOTURE", "S6870", "S6872", "[{\"name\": \"Harry Reid\", \"role\": \"speaking\"}, {\"name\": \"John Cornyn\", \"role\": \"speaking\"}]", null, "160 Cong. Rec. S6870", "Congressional Record, Volume 160 Issue 155 (Tuesday, December 16, 2014)\n\n[Congressional Record Volume 160, Number 155 (Tuesday, December 16, 2014)]\n[Senate]\n[Pages S6870-S6872]\nFrom the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]\n\n                             CLOTURE MOTION\n\n  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, there is 3 hours of\ndebate equally divided in the usual form on the motion to invoke\ncloture on the Saldana nomination.\n  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.\n  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.\n  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.\n  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for\nthe quorum call be rescinded.\n  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.\n  Mr. REID. Mr. President, it would probably be appropriate that I\nsuggest the absence of a quorum but ask unanimous consent that the time\nbe divided equally.\n  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.\n  Mr. REID. This would be during all quorum calls today--because there\nwill be several of them--that the time be divided equally on the\nSaldana matter.\n  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.\n  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.\n  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.\n  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.\n  Mr. CORNYN. I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum\ncall be rescinded.\n  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.\n  Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, more than 3 months ago I was proud to\nintroduce a fellow Texan, Sarah Saldana, to the Homeland Security and\nGovernmental Affairs Committee in connection with her nomination to\nbecome the Nation's top immigration enforcement official, a position\nimportant to our country and particularly to Texas.\n  Ms. Saldana was born in Corpus Christi, TX, and became the first\nLatina U.S. attorney in Texas history and only the second woman to hold\nthat position in the 135-year history of Texas, in the northern\ndistrict, a region that includes the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex, spans\n100 counties, and stretches across 95,000 square miles. I, along with\nformer Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, was proud to support her\nnomination to that important job.\n  In her role as U.S. attorney and previously as a line prosecutor,\nSarah Saldana has fought public corruption. She has fought organized\ncrime, sex traffickers and other dangerous criminals. She has also\nprosecuted numerous high-profile public corruption cases, including the\nvery publicized corruption trial that resulted in the conviction of the\nformer Dallas mayor pro tem, Don Hill, and the ongoing case against\nDallas county commissioner John Wiley Price--both members of her\npolitical party--which put her in some disfavor, as you might imagine,\nin Democratic political circles. But it was something which\ndemonstrated to me that she was a person of courage and conviction and\nshe believed in enforcing the law beyond purely deferring to personal\npolitical interests.\n  Throughout her career she has developed an outstanding reputation,\nand based on her qualifications alone, we would be hard-pressed to find\na person better suited for the job at Immigration and Customs\nEnforcement than Sarah Saldana.\n  Unfortunately, the President changed everything this last November by\nhis Executive action on immigration. To be clear--I have said this\nbefore on the floor, but I will just repeat--I believe the President's\nactions are beyond his constitutional authority and are a reckless\npolitical stunt.\n  Here are the sorts of things the President is claiming to do. The\nDepartment of Homeland Security has issued a series of directives\npursuant to the President's instructions on November 21, doing\neverything from repealing the Secure Communities Program, by which\nlocal law enforcement cooperates with Immigration and Customs\nEnforcement and when a person is arrested who also is in the country\nillegally, they are detained by local law enforcement, even though they\nhave served their time or otherwise are subject to release so that ICE\ncan come pick them up and return them to their country of origin. The\nPresident's Executive action and the Department of Homeland Security\ndirectives pursuant to that eliminate the Secure Communities Program.\n  It also purports to prioritize immigration enforcement according to\nthree priorities. The problem is these add even more confusion to what\nis already an indecipherable and confusing mess, and it also puts to\nthe lowest priority people who have been convicted of crimes such as\nchild abuse, stalking, theft, some child pornography offenses,\npossession, distribution of alcohol to minors, hit-and-run, including\nsome hate crimes, property destruction, false imprisonment, some\nabduction offenses and the like. In other words, the President's\npriorities for immigration enforcement really represent a wholesale\n\n[[Page S6871]]\n\nchange in the law--if they were actually authorized. Until they are set\naside by a court or if Congress were to repeal them along with what\nwould require a Presidential signature, they are the standing\nrequirement for any Director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement.\nThe President, purportedly, also used his authority to issue work\npermits for millions of people illegally in the country. While I don't\nbelieve our country would ever engage in mass deportation, the fact\nthat the President has usurped the authority of Congress and purports\nto take on the authority to issue work permits to people illegally in\nthe country to me is mind boggling.\n  This is the situation into which the President has put a good and\ndecent person such as Sarah Saldana. The President has put the next\nDirector of Immigration and Customs Enforcement in an untenable\nposition. When confirmed, she will be the principal enforcer of our\nimmigration laws. Unfortunately, she now claims the President was\noperating within his legal authority to issue this Executive action. I\nsay that because several Senators on the Senate Judiciary Committee\nissued written questions to the nominee about this Executive action,\nand it is clear in her responses that Ms. Saldana has wholeheartedly\nembraced the President's Executive action and claims that it is within\nhis authority.\n  If you think about it, a Presidential nominee has two choices. They\ncan either say, well, I disagree with what the President has done, so I\nwill refuse to serve, or if they are already confirmed, I am going to\nresign my position, or they can embrace the President's policies,\nbecause the President is the one who makes those policies. Clearly, Ms.\nSaldana has embraced the President's policies, which I believe are\nunconstitutional.\n  I believe we should be deeply concerned about the damage the\nPresident's Executive actions will do to our already broken immigration\nsystem because they reinforce the dangerous message that the President\nis already sending to the world that our laws against illegal\nimmigration will not be enforced. This is an invitation for\nlawlessness, and it will make it much more likely that we will\nexperience further humanitarian crises and a surge of illegal\nimmigration such as we saw last spring and which we have seen this year\nwith more than 60,000 unaccompanied children coming from Central\nAmerica through Mexico to our southern border. So the President's\npolicies are a green light, and, unfortunately, Ms. Saldana has\nembraced those policies.\n  I believe that the recent election was a mandate for us to work\ntogether on bipartisan solutions to our country's biggest challenges,\nbut apparently the President didn't get the memo. I was actually at a\nlunch at the White House with other leaders of both parties across the\nCapitol where Speaker Boehner, the incoming majority leader and I, and\nthe current majority leader said to the President: Please don't do\nthis. Don't poison the well. Give us a chance to do our job as the new\nmajority in the House and the Senate to try to pass consensus\nimmigration reform bills and put them on your desk. The President\nignored that. So the President chose to poison the well and to make it\nharder for us to do what we know we all have to do; and that is to fix\nour broken immigration system to the best of our ability.\n\n  The President's reckless Executive actions have done further damage.\nThey are deeply unfair to people who have been waiting patiently in\nline according to the written immigration laws--the people who have\nbeen playing by the rules. To allow millions of people simply to jump\nahead of those people who have been waiting patiently in line and\nplaying by the rules is profoundly unfair. At a time when our economy\nis starting to recover from the financial crisis in 2008 and the\npolicies that have intervened, we know that there is potential harm to\nhard-working middle class families who are already living on stagnant\nwages and a rising cost of living to have millions more people eligible\nfor work permits under the President's purported authority in these\nExecutive actions. We ought to be careful about that, we ought to be\ndeliberative about that, and we ought to make sure we are doing the\nsorts of things that will protect--not harm--hard-working middle class\nfamilies. But the President has ignored all that and just done it his\nway.\n  Well, some pundits have suggested perhaps the President's real goal\nwas to provoke Republicans to taking the bait and descending into\nfurther dysfunction. Well, if I heard one message from my constituents\nand people as I campaigned for reelection in Texas, it is that people\nreally want us to work together. They want this place to function. In\nmany instances they don't care so much about what we do, as long as we\ndo something to work together. Of course, they care about what we do,\nand there are areas where we disagree. But there are areas of common\nground where we can work together to solve these problems. We are not\ngoing to take the bait if that is what the President's intention was,\nand we are not going to descend into even more dysfunction. That would\nbe a repudiation of the message and mandate the voters sent to us on\nNovember 4.\n  So we are going to plow ahead. When the new majority takes place on\nJanuary 6, working with our colleagues in the House, working with our\ncolleagues across the aisle, we are going to try to find places where\nwe can pass bipartisan immigration legislation--not in a comprehensive\nfashion but in a step-by-step fashion to try to make some progress to\nimprove our broken immigration system.\n  I am most concerned about the precedent the President's actions would\nset for our system of government. What if future Presidents take upon\nthemselves the claimed authority to issue other Executive actions that\nignore the separation of powers and allocation of responsibilities\ngiven to the different branches of government under our Constitution?\nIt is a dangerous precedent. If the President cannot be trusted to\nenforce the laws passed by the people's elected representatives, then\nself-governance is an illusion. This is very dangerous.\n  The American people should never stand for rule by Executive fiat,\nand they should demand the rule of law be enforced under our\nConstitution. The President's frustration with the Republican House of\nRepresentatives is no justification for doing what he has done. He\nneeds to give us an opportunity to do our job, and he needs to join us\nat the negotiating table to make progress on our broken immigration\nsystem.\n  Although I admire Ms. Saldana, I fear she will be tasked with\ncarrying out the implementation of the President's unconstitutional\nExecutive actions, refusing to enforce our immigration laws.\nUnfortunately, when given the chance to address the constitutionality\nof these actions with the Judiciary Committee, these fears were not\nalleviated. Members of the committee were denied a chance to ask her\nquestions during an open confirmation hearing, something several\nprevious nominees for this position have undergone.\n  As a matter of fact, Senator Grassley, the ranking Republican on the\nJudiciary Committee, and I invited Ms. Saldana to appear at an informal\nquestion-and-answer session, since the chairman of the Judiciary\nCommittee denied us an opportunity to have a formal hearing, so she\ncould perhaps answer our questions and clarify her position--the\nposition she took in the written answers to the questions for the\nrecord, which I referred to earlier.\n  I don't know whether she got bad advice or whether she, herself,\ndecided it would be a futile effort, but she decided not to appear for\nthat informal give-and-take.\n  Maybe it would have helped her clarify her answers to the questions\nsent by the committee, maybe not. Maybe she would have stood by her\nanswers, but we will never know.\n  It is for these reasons I regrettably cannot support her nomination.\nMs. Saldana, as I said, is somebody whom I admire and respect, but if\nshe is determined to help the President implement this deeply flawed\nExecutive action and refuses to enforce the law Congress has written\nand has been signed by previous Presidents, I cannot support her\nnomination.\n  I will not aid and abet a President dead set on unilaterally defying\nour Nation's immigration laws.\n  I yield the floor.\n  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Illinois.\n\n[[Page S6872]]\n\n                          ____________________"]], "columns": ["granule_id", "date", "congress", "session", "volume", "issue", "title", "chamber", "granule_class", "sub_granule_class", "page_start", "page_end", "speakers", "bills", "citation", "full_text"], "primary_keys": ["granule_id"], "primary_key_values": ["CREC-2014-12-16-pt1-PgS6870-3"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 11.553185060620308, "source": "Federal Register API & Regulations.gov API", "source_url": "https://www.federalregister.gov/developers/api/v1", "license": "Public Domain (U.S. Government data)", "license_url": "https://www.regulations.gov/faq"}