00:00I reserve the balance of my time.
00:01The gentleman reserves, and the gentleman from Maryland is recognized.
00:06Thank you, Madam Speaker.
00:07I want to underscore something that the gentleman from California said.
00:13The whole weight of this bill is on people who are not the hardened criminals.
00:19Obviously, we're going to be prosecuting rapists for rape and murderers for murder and so on.
00:25He talked about people who are hardworking immigrants, the kind even President Trump described when for a moment he said there wouldn't be immigration raids on farms because the agricultural sector is in crisis and people are saying we need the workers.
00:43Well, I wanted to echo what President Trump said briefly there before he was corrected by Mr. Miller.
00:51I was just up in upstate New York in Adirondacks in the 21st Congressional District, represented by Ms. Stefanik.
01:02And I met a bunch of dairy farmers there, told me it was impossible for them to find workers to work the farms.
01:11And with the additional crackdown on migrant labor, it's pretty much impossible for them to get the workers they need.
01:20So what's the economic result of that?
01:22Well, they take the citizen labors they've got and they do mandatory overtime.
01:29So they're working, you know, an additional 15, 20, 30 hours a week.
01:34Then they've got to pay them time and a half under the Federal Labor Standards Act.
01:39So the prices go up now because they're not able to find enough workers to satisfy the demand.
01:45Their choice at that point is either to pay the farmers less money, which they can't do because the farmers are already at the breaking point, or they've got to increase prices.
01:57And that's what they end up doing.
01:58And they've said to the groceries, this is because Congress refuses to work on bipartisan immigration reform.
02:05That's why we're seeing inflation in dairy, in produce, and across the agricultural sector.
02:14So the gentleman is telling us if we're serious about dealing with this, we need to do what we started to do at the end of 2024.
02:22We need to have bipartisan commitment to immigration reform.
02:27And we need to sit down and work this out the way that prior generations of Americans have done.
02:33This is a country that's been built on immigration.
02:36So I'm afraid that the gentleman's legislation here, which is basically just jacking up a whole series of criminal penalties,
02:45doesn't get us out of the economic problems and the immigration policy problems that we're in.
02:52And so it's a distraction.
02:54It will be ineffectual.
02:57And so it's not going to work to deal with the real crisis that we're facing.
03:01I'll reserve.
03:03The gentleman reserves and the gentleman from North Carolina is recognized.
03:07Just briefly, Madam Speaker, before I recognize my friend from Utah,
03:10I will say that the colleague from my friend from Maryland mentioned robbery and rape and murder.
03:17This bill's goal is to apprehend dangerous criminals before they rob, rape, or murder Americans.
03:24And secondly, and most importantly, referencing a farm worker.
03:28If they're here illegally and they do not commit a felony, this bill does not touch them.
03:35The only standard that this bill has, do not come back into the country a second time illegally and do not get convicted of a felony.
03:43How low do you think of the farm workers that they cannot meet that standard?
03:47With that, I will yield two minutes to my colleague from Utah.
03:52The gentleman is recognized.
03:53The gentleman is recognized.
03:53The gentleman is recognized.
03:53The gentleman is recognized.
03:53The gentleman is recognized.
03:53The gentleman is recognized.
03:54The gentleman is recognized.
03:54The gentleman is recognized.
03:54The gentleman is recognized.
03:54The gentleman is recognized.
03:55The gentleman is recognized.
03:55The gentleman is recognized.
03:56The gentleman is recognized.
03:56The gentleman is recognized.
03:56The gentleman is recognized.
03:57The gentleman is recognized.
03:58The gentleman is recognized.
03:59The gentleman is recognized.
04:00The gentleman is recognized.
04:01The gentleman is recognized.
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04:03The gentleman is recognized.
04:04The gentleman is recognized.
04:05The gentleman is recognized.
04:06The gentleman is recognized.
04:07The gentleman is recognized.
04:08The gentleman is recognized.
04:09The gentleman is recognized.
04:10The gentleman is recognized.
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