Brooks: Help American workers by removing as many illegals as possible from labor pool

Rep. Mo Brooks speaks at a press conference with U.S. Senators Ted Cruz, Jeff Sessions, and Mike Lee and U.S. Representatives Marsha Blackburn, John Carter, Louie Gohmert, Pete Olsen, Lamar Smith, Roger Williams, and Ted Yoho (Photo: Submitted)

WASHINGTON — Flanked by senators Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) and Ted Cruz (R-Tx.) and a host of other conservative lawmakers, Alabama congressman Mo Brooks urged the U.S. Senate to take up House-passed legislation that he believes would solve the border crisis and prevent President Obama from expanding amnesty.

On Aug. 1 the House passed a bill to address the child migrant crisis and to strengthen border laws, ensuring unaccompanied children are quickly and safely sent home. That same night the House also passed a second bill ending the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrival (DACA) program. DACA granted administrative “legal” status and work authorization to many illegal immigrants, leading central Americans to flock across the border illegally in hopes of being granted amnesty through executive action.

The Senate version of that bill, introduced by Sen. Cruz, has not been brought to a vote in spite of the relentless efforts of Republicans in both houses of congress.

“[T]he reason the United States Senate needs to vote on this legislation, is to represent American citizens who are struggling in this anemic economy under Barack Obama,” Brooks said during Tuesday’s press conference. “You can help American citizens by removing from the labor pool as many as possible of those illegal aliens who are holding American jobs, and preventing even more from crossing the border and coming into America today.”

Brooks cited data from the Pew Hispanic Center stating there are roughly 8 million jobs in America today held by illegal aliens. But the numbers that stuck out to Brooks the most were from the Center for Immigration Studies, which recently published research detailing how many of the jobs created in the United States since the year 2000 were filled by American citizens.

“There was a report that came out recently that was startling, so startling that I asked my staff to make sure that the data in it was accurate,” Brooks said. “We checked with the Bureau of Labor Statistics, we checked with the Census Bureau, we checked with Homeland Security (to make sure it was accurate). Here is the data from the Center for Immigration Studies: there were 5.6 million jobs created from the first quarter of 2000 to the first quarter of 2014. Over that 14 year period of time, in the age bracket 16 to 65, a pretty large age bracket, 5.6 million jobs (were) created by the American economy. You know how many of those jobs went to American born citizens? Minus 127,000… Over that 14 year period because of the lost jobs, coupled with population growth, you now have 17 million more American citizens who are unemployed today than in the year 2000.”

“For many, the American dream is something that they will never be able to reach so long as we continue to have a huge surge of illegal aliens across our southern border,” Brooks concluded.

Numerous recent reports indicate that President Obama has postponed taking executive action on immigration until after the November elections in an effort not to further damage Democrats’ ability to maintain their majority in the Senate.

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