CNN Lou Dobbs Tonight - Transcript
CNN Lou Dobbs Tonight - Transcript
Tuesday, October 18, 2005
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DOBBS: Understandably so. Adaora Udoji in Taunton, Massachusetts. Thank you very much.
Tonight hundreds of residents are returning to their homes in Burbank, California, after torrential rains and mudslides. Mudslides slammed into Burbank neighborhoods, turning streets into filthy, raging rivers yesterday. More than three feet of mud is still being cleared from some roadways. This gushing water, filled with sediment, in the streets of Burbank. And rain is still falling in the Los Angeles area tonight. Flood watches remain in effect. More than 10,000 people lost power in yesterday's Southern California storms.
Turning now to our nation's latest hurricane threat. It is Hurricane Wilma. Wilma strengthened into the 12th hurricane of this season earlier today. Wilma is a slow-moving Category 1 storm right now. It has sustained winds of 80 miles an hour. But Hurricane Wilma is expected to pick up speed and intensity later in the week.
Forecasters are expecting Wilma to make landfall Saturday. The most probable target tonight? South Florida. But Wilma could hit shift course and hit further west along the storm-ravaged Gulf Coast. It is far too early to tell. And it could hit as a dangerous Category 3 storm or higher, according to the National Hurricane Center.
More now on our top story tonight: The Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on our nation's border crisis. My next guests are members of the committee, who have introduced their own plan for immigration reform, a plan that, if implemented, has the best chance of asserting border security and stopping the massive invasion of illegal aliens.
Senator Jon Kyl of Arizona and Senator John Cornyn of Texas join us now from Capitol Hill.
Gentlemen, after today's hearing, what is your reaction to Secretary Chertoff's remarks?
SEN. JON KYL (R), ARIZONA: Well, I'll start with that. Secretary Chertoff focused on the Department of Homeland Security appropriation bill, which President Bush signed this afternoon, and noted that it is a huge step forward in enabling us to get control of the border and also provide better security within the country. It's an appropriation bill that will now fund most of the activities that we've been lobbying for for a long time, in a very robust way.
And what it goes to demonstrate is that you don't have to wait for immigration reform legislation to pass to begin really going after the enforcement issue, which is what this appropriation bill will do.
DOBBS: Senator Cornyn, we had heard officials before, certainly not from this administration, talk about border security. These were certainly the strongest statements I've heard from anyone in this administration about border security. This was also a day in which the president, talking about that very same legislation on homeland security, saying that we have border security. Were you taken aback just a bit by the president's words?
SEN. JOHN CORNYN (R), TEXAS: Well, I actually did not hear specifically what the president said, but what we heard today from Secretary Chertoff and Secretary Chao is an unequivocal commitment to obtaining operational security of our border. And I'll tell you, Lou, the best news I heard today is that Secretary Chertoff said the catch- and-release policy of the United States government was intolerable, and it was going to be ended as soon as absolutely possible.
DOBBS: Is it coincidental, gentlemen, that the secretary's remarks come, and Senator Bill Frist, the Senate majority leader's remarks of last week come as most congressmen and senators are returning from their districts, their home states, and have heard constituents say they're sick and tired of the issue of illegal immigration and the continued permission that the federal government is giving to absolutely ignore U.S. laws?
KYL: Well, from my perspective, Lou, I've just spent the last week out in Arizona announcing my candidacy for reelection, and I say there are three issues in Arizona. It's immigration, immigration and immigration, and everybody is upset about it, and they do want the laws enforced first. They think some kind of a guest worker program is important, but they want to see a commitment to enforce the laws, which would include ensuring that a guest worker program is properly enforced.
DOBBS: A guest worker program that is not an amnesty program, as clear a statement from an administration official that there will be no amnesty today. Senator Cornyn, your thoughts?
CORNYN: Well, Secretary Chao got a little pushback from members of the committee about that, wondering why we couldn't have a path to citizenship under this temporary worker program. I was glad to see her emphasize the principle of work and return, not work and stay, which characterizes the proposals Senator Kyl and I have made, which is not designed to be an alternative path to citizenship, but merely to ameliorate the other concerns, the economic concerns, the workforce concerns without creating amnesty.
DOBBS: Gentlemen, is it your -- is it your view that the administration is prepared to support your legislation in the Senate, which requires first border security, and then dealing with the issue of immigration reform?
KYL: Let me answer that two ways. First of all, by signing the legislation today, that really puts us on a path toward enforcement, the administration is acknowledging, and the president said as much this afternoon, that it starts with enforcement. And then, probably it's going to be next spring before we actually get immigration reform legislation passed, and that's when a temporary worker program would then go into effect.
The proposal that Secretary Chao talked about today is pretty close to what Senator Cornyn and I have introduced. Not exactly -- not exactly like it, but in terms of the key proposals, no amnesty and work in return, it's pretty close.
DOBBS: Senator Kyl, Senator Cornyn, we thank you both for being here.
CORNYN: Thanks, Lou.
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