DOLE ON IMMIGRATION
JUNE 19, 1996
TRANSCRIPT
Bob Dole spoke this afternoon at a computer company in Woodland Hills, California. His focus was on immigration and Proposition 187, the California initiative to limit public services to illegal immigrants.
SEN. BOB DOLE, Republican Presidential Candidate: (Woodland Hills, California) Now I've always had the feeling if the federal government doesn't want the responsibility of taking control of our borders, then maybe they ought to turn it over to the states. But as long as the federal government has it, and I believe we should have it, we ought to be able to control the borders. And we shouldn't stick the states with billions and billions of dollars of extra expenses, particularly in a state as large as California, because each year, an additional 300,000 individuals are in our country illegally, not legally, illegally, and about half of them come to California. And each illegal entry in this country is an affront not just to the laws of the United States but to every immigrant, every immigrant who did the right thing, played by the rules, and came to this country legally. It also represents a drain on public resources, and again with a disproportionate impact on California, stabbing state taxpayers, all of you in this audience, with an annual burden of hundreds of millions of dollars to provide services to illegal immigrants. So it's bad enough that the federal government has failed to properly secure the border. What's worse is the federal government tells the states they've got to pay for it, they must provide free taxpayer-funded benefits to illegal aliens. And last year alone this unfunded mandate cost the taxpayers of California more than $2.6 billion, $2.6 billion. And I don't believe it's fair to impose these burdens on the states, so I have been working with Governor Wilson and other governors, Democrats and Republicans, to try to ease the burdens on the states. We thought particularly when it comes to incarceration, I think 19 or 20 percent of all the people incarcerated in California are illegal aliens. And that costs five hundred and some million dollars a year, about a half a billion dollars. And we thought at least we should reimburse the states for that. I also supported Prop 187.
I thought it was necessary to send a message, a very strong message to those of us in Congress, and to the President of the United States, whoever that may be, that we had a responsibility for our borders. And that's what Prop 187 was all about. And some of the people in administrations were berating 187's, the advocates as demagogues and schizophrenic for supporting an idea that received more than 60 percent of the vote of the people in California. They weren't demagogues. They were simply demanding fairness. And through Proposition 187, the voters of California, the most culturally diverse population in America, resoundingly declared that those who come here illegally should not have a claim on your taxpayer's dollars. That's what the message was. And we feel for the people in Mexico. That's why, even though there was a lot of criticism when I supported the NAFTA agreement, I want the economy to grow in Mexico, and I'm pleased to read this morning they're going to repay another $3.7 billion on the debt that we made an emergency loan. A lot of people said we'd never get the money back. We're going to get the money back. And I supported it. We want the people and the government of Mexico to succeed, but in the interim, should California pick up the tab?
And I would say to President Clinton or anybody else, no. Where is the federal government's responsibility? Why aren't we sending $1.8 million to California if everybody agrees it's a right policy to let all the illegals in and then educate their children without any cost to anybody? The point is that the money at issue belongs to the taxpayers of California and the other states involved. So it's really about fairness. It's about trusting the states. For those who say they oppose unfunded mandates, we all got up and said, oh, we don't like mandates, but here's a big one. And maybe it's time the Congress takes another look. So it seems to me that on the basis of what we've seen here today there are great opportunities, always are great opportunities in America, and we want those opportunities to continue for all the people who come here legally. We are the boiling pot. We do have open arms. We understand our role in the world, and we understand that we're the greatest nation on the face of the earth, and we have certain responsibilities. And I think we've carried those out. But I would say the average age of this audience is probably about--
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: Twenty-seven.
SEN. BOB DOLE: I was going to say 28, but--(laughter among audience)--27, I'll go for 28, maybe 30. But it's your future. You're the ones paying the taxes. You're the ones praising the families. You're the ones that are going to have to make the decisions. And so I would just ask you to keep in mind certainly we understand we have many, many responsibilities. We understand, as I said at the outset, the government of the United States does a lot of good things and we help people all over the world, and sometimes you may disagree with what we do in other parts of the world when it comes to aid. And I said early, we want Mexico to succeed. We want the people to find good jobs. And if somebody's out of work and can't feed their family, they're going to be looking for some other place to go, whether they live in California, Mexico, Kansas, or whatever. But there has to be finally a line drawn and say, okay, if the federal government's policy is not to worry about the borders, then they ought to worry about compensating states like California.
