Statement

U.S. Sen. David Vitter today released the following statement in response to President Obama's speech on his plans for addressing our illegal immigration problem:

"I'm really disappointed to hear that President Obama is continuing to promote amnesty as a solution to our illegal immigration problem. Amnesty advocates try to hide behind all kinds of clever language, but at a basic level they want to simply ignore and not enforce many of the strong immigration laws we already have on the books.

"What the American people want to see is enforcement of our current immigration laws. They support deploying National Guard troops to secure the border with Mexico, and they support initiatives like the E-Verify program, which has been successful at identifying illegal aliens in the workplace. We have many of the right tools and laws in place already, but we must actually enforce them without granting mass amnesty to illegals. This is what Arizona is trying to do, yet that state is being demonized for stepping into the void left by an unwilling federal government.

"As chairman of the Senate Border Security Caucus, I will continue to use every means available to promote a true counterproposal to the president's false choice between mass amnesty and mass deportations -- attrition through enforcement," said Vitter.