A Quote by Tina Smith

We need to create a fair immigration process that ensures the wellbeing of all families and prevents the wrong people from coming to this country, that includes reforming ICE and immigration enforcement.
Before ICE, we had Immigration and Naturalization Services, but it wasn't until about 1999 that we chose to criminalize immigration at all. And then, once ICE was established, we really kind of militarized that enforcement to a degree that was previously unseen in the United States.
There is no quick fix for illegal immigration. But only when we achieve better control of our borders and better respect for our immigration laws can we give meaning to the discussion we need to have over reforming the numbers, categories, and procedures for legal immigration into the United States.
We need to be discussing issues specifically to help the American people. And that would not include illegal aliens. These are people - I'm for immigration - legal immigration. I've been an immigration attorney. But people who have come to our country and violated laws, we should not be providing full health care services.
We've even lost the definition of immigration. "Immigration" today, if you listen to the left, equals anybody who wants to come into the country should be allowed. That's not what immigration is. That's illegal immigration, and we ought to all oppose it.
Immigration is a federal issue. The failing of Washington to implement an immigration system that works for our families and our businesses - it's Washington's failure. For us locally in Colorado, it's really important that all people here feel comfortable with their local law enforcement.
These are people - I'm for immigration - legal immigration. I've been an immigration attorney. But people who have come to our country and violated laws, we should not be providing full health care services.
What we need to do is to have a sensible approach to immigration. It needs to be open. It needs to be non-dogmatic and non-bigoted. We need to be firm but reasonable in the way we deal with the problem of illegal immigration. And we need to try to get as many of our immigrants who want to do so to become citizens as quickly as possible so that the American people will all see that this is a part of the process of American history, which is a good one for our country.
We are all in favor of immigration that determines who gets in, the quantity of people who get in, whether they assimilate or not. Nobody's opposed to that. But immigration has been defined now as people flooding the country who are noncitizens. And that's called "immigration," according to the culture of the left.
I think the key to getting rid of illegal immigration, no matter where its coming from, is that you need to have a good legal apparatus for immigration.
I completely understand why people are concerned about immigration. There's no silver bullet, no one thing you can do to suddenly deal with all the problems and concerns with immigration, and that includes leaving the E.U.
For one, we very much need in any immigration bill - we need protection for people who are in this country and who have not become citizens, for example, that they are protected and legitimized and given permanent residency here. And we want to see some things of that kind added to the immigration bill.
We need a permanent solution to TPS recipients and develop a path to citizenship. And, more fundamentally, we need to ensure that our immigration policies treat those coming to this country with the dignity and compassion that should be afforded to all human beings and immediately stop tearing families apart.
We are going to enforce the law of America and strengthen immigration and customs enforcement with more resources and personnel to be able to do that, and then Donald Trump has made it clear. Once we have done all of those things, then we are going to reform the immigration system that we have in this country.
But my view is that you need a system at the border. You need some fencing but you need technology. You need boots on the ground. And then you need to have interior enforcement of our nation's immigration laws inside the country. And that means dealing with the employers who still consistently hire illegal labor.
Like other discriminatory legislation in our country's history, immigration laws define and differentiate legal status on the basis of arbitrary attributes. Immigration laws create unequal rights. People who break immigration laws don't cause harm or even potential harm (unlike, for example, drunk driving, which creates the potential for harm even if no accident occurs). Rather, people who break immigration laws do things that are perfectly legal for others, but denied to them--like crossing a border or, even more commonly, simply exist.
The inhumane treatment of families turned an immigration issue into an immigration crisis.
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