I want to talk for a minute about immigration. Most politicians do not want to talk about immigration. They would like the subject to go away. I count among my friends and supporters very good people from almost every country around the globe who have arrived here in the last 20 years or so. A nation without borders is no nation at all.
Politicians are, in the main, quick to condemn illegal immigration.
However, the Justice Department has been very slow to put a program in place, a meaningful program, to stop the literal invasion of our territory. I do not fault the line officers of the border patrol. They are some of the finest public servants that I have met in public life. I believe there has not been a real commitment made by our government to stopping illegal immigration, and I believe this must change. I am very discouraged that the labor movement, in particular, no longer acknowledges the obvious fact that the levels of immigration, legal and illegal, that we have experienced in the last few years, coupled with our trade policy, has been a downward driver on wage rates for working people and that folks in the poorest parts of this Nation have seen their housing costs rise or have lost the opportunity for housing at all, due to the mass of immigration this country is now experiencing.