H.R. 4437
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The Border Protection, Anti-terrorism, and Illegal Immigration Control Act of 2005 () was a bill in the
109th United States Congress The 109th United States Congress was a meeting of the legislative branch of the United States federal government, composed of the United States Senate and the United States House of Representatives, from January 3, 2005, to January 3, 2007, du ...
. It was passed by the
United States House of Representatives The United States House of Representatives is a chamber of the Bicameralism, bicameral United States Congress; it is the lower house, with the U.S. Senate being the upper house. Together, the House and Senate have the authority under Artic ...
on December 16, 2005, by a vote of 239 to 182 (with 92% of Republicans supporting, 82% of Democrats opposing), but did not pass the
Senate A senate is a deliberative assembly, often the upper house or chamber of a bicameral legislature. The name comes from the ancient Roman Senate (Latin: ''Senatus''), so-called as an assembly of the senior (Latin: ''senex'' meaning "the el ...
. It was also known as the "Sensenbrenner Bill," for its sponsor in the House of Representatives,
Wisconsin Wisconsin ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest of the United States. It borders Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake Michigan to the east, Michig ...
Republican
Jim Sensenbrenner Frank James Sensenbrenner Jr. (; born June 14, 1943) is an American politician who represented in the United States House of Representatives from 1979 to 2021 (numbered as the 9th district until 2003). He is a member of the Republican Party. ...
. The bill was the catalyst for the 2006 U.S. immigration reform protests and was the first piece of legislation passed by a house of
Congress A congress is a formal meeting of the representatives of different countries, constituent states, organizations, trade unions, political parties, or other groups. The term originated in Late Middle English to denote an encounter (meeting of ...
in the United States illegal immigration debate. Development and the effect of the bill was featured in
The Senate Speaks
, Story 11 in How Democracy Works Now: Twelve Stories a documentary series from filmmaking team Shari Robertson and Michael Camerini.


Provisions

The bill, passed by the House of Representatives, contains the following provisions among others

* Requires up to 700 miles (1120 km) of double-layered fence along the Mexico–United States border, Mexico–US border at points with the highest number of illegal border crossings. (House Amendment 648, authored by Duncan Hunter (R-CA52) * Requires the federal government to take custody of illegal aliens detained by local authorities. This would end the practice of "catch and release", where federal officials sometimes instruct local law enforcement to release detained illegal aliens because resources to prosecute them are not available. It also reimburses local agencies in the 29 counties along the border for costs related to detaining illegal aliens. (Section 607) * Mandates employers to verify workers' legal status through electronic means, phased in over several years. Also requires reports to be sent to Congress one and two years after implementation to ensure that it is being used. (Title VII) * Requires the
Department of Homeland Security The United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is the U.S. federal executive department responsible for public security, roughly comparable to the interior, home, or public security ministries in other countries. Its missions invol ...
(DHS) to report to Congress on the number of Other Than Mexicans (OTMs) apprehended and deported and the number of those from states that sponsor terrorism. (Section 409) * Formalizes congressional condemnation of rapes by smugglers along the border and urges Mexico to take immediate action to prevent them. (House Amendment 647, authored by
Ginny Brown-Waite Virginia Brown-Waite (born Virginia Frances Kniffen; October 5, 1943) is an American politician who served as U.S. Representative for from 2003 until 2011. She is a member of the Republican Party and a founder of Maggie's List. The district s ...
) * Requires all illegal aliens, before being deported, to pay a fine of $3,000 if they agree to leave voluntarily but do not adhere to the terms of their agreement. The grace period for voluntary departure is shortened to 60 days. * Requires DHS to conduct a study on the potential for border fencing on the Canada–US border. * Sets the minimum sentence for fraudulent documents at 10 years, fines, or both, with tougher sentencing in cases of aiding drug trafficking and terrorism. * Establishes a Fraudulent Documents Center within DHS. * Increases penalties for aggravated felonies and various frauds, including marriage fraud and document fraud. * Establishes an 18-month deadline for DHS to control the border, with a progress report due one year after enactment of the legislation. * Requires criminal record, terrorist watch list clearance, and fraudulent document checks for any illegal immigrant before being granted legal immigration status. * Reimburses states for aiding in immigration enforcement. * Causes housing of a removed alien to become a felony and sets the minimum prison sentence to three years. * Allows deportation of any illegal alien convicted of
driving under the influence Driving under the influence (DUI) is the crime of driving, operating, or being in control of a vehicle while one is impaired from doing so safely by the effect of either alcohol (drug), alcohol (see drunk driving) or some other drug, whether re ...
(DUI). * Adds
human trafficking Human trafficking is the act of recruiting, transporting, transferring, harboring, or receiving individuals through force, fraud, or coercion for the purpose of exploitation. This exploitation may include forced labor, sexual slavery, or oth ...
and human smuggling to the
money-laundering Money laundering is the process of illegally concealing the origin of money obtained from illicit activities (often known as dirty money) such as drug trafficking, sex work, terrorism, corruption, and embezzlement, and converting the funds into ...
statute. * Increases penalties for employing illegal workers to $7,500 for first time offenses, $15,000 for second offenses, and $40,000 for all subsequent offenses. * Prohibits accepting immigrants from any country which delays or refuses to accept its citizens who are deported from the United States (Section 404)


Prohibiting aid to illegal immigrants

It would be a crime to assist an illegal immigrant to "remain in the United States... knowing or in reckless disregard of the fact that such person is an alien who lacks lawful authority to reside in or remain in the United States". Furthermore, the prison term applicable to a removed alien, would also be applicable to anyone who knowingly aids or assists" that alien "to reenter the United States". Previous laws already prohibited "aiding and abetting" illegal immigrants. This bill, however, is specifically intended to increase enforcement against human smugglers.


Amendments

* Eliminates the
Diversity Immigrant Visa The Diversity Immigrant Visa program, also known as the green card lottery, is a United States government lottery program for receiving an immigrant visa followed by a permanent resident card. The Immigration Act of 1990 established the curre ...
(also known as ''Green Card Lottery'') program. (House Amendment 650, authored by
Bob Goodlatte Robert William Goodlatte (; born September 22, 1952) is an American politician, attorney, and lobbyist who served in the United States House of Representatives representing from 1993 to 2019. A Republican Party (United States), Republican, he was ...
) * Prohibits grants to federal, state, or local government agencies that enact or maintain a sanctuary city policy. (House Amendment 659, authored by Thomas Tancredo) (withdrawn 12/16/2005 by unanimous consent) * Incorporates satellite communications among immigration enforcement officials. (House Amendment 638, authored by John Carter) * Requires all
United States Border Patrol The United States Border Patrol (USBP) is a Federal law enforcement in the United States, federal law enforcement agency under the U.S. Customs and Border Protection, United States Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and is responsible for secu ...
uniforms to be made in the U.S. to avoid forgeries. (House Amendment 641, authored by Rick Renzi) * Institutes a timeline for deployment of
US-VISIT United States Visitor and Immigrant Status Indicator Technology (commonly referred to as US-VISIT) is a U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) management system. The system involves the collection and analysis of biometric data (such as fingerpr ...
to all land-based checkpoints. (House Amendment 642, authored by Michael N. Castle) * Amendment 656 failed. The bill's original (Republican) language changed the existing penalty for first illegal entry from a misdemeanor to a felony. This amendment from Rep. Sensenbrenner would have changed the bill's felony language back to misdemeanor, leaving this aspect of the existing law intact. The amendment was defeated by a vote of 164 to 257. Republicans voted 156 to 65 for the amendment, to change felony back to misdemeanor. Democrats voted 191 to 8 against the amendment, to leave the bill's language as a felony. During the spring of 2006, at the peak of the protest marches, Democrats used this felony aspect to rally protesters against the bill as a whole. This strategy is often referred to as a "poison pill".


Debate

The House version of the bill was opposed by a variety of migrant,
social justice Social justice is justice in relation to the distribution of wealth, opportunities, and privileges within a society where individuals' rights are recognized and protected. In Western and Asian cultures, the concept of social justice has of ...
, humanitarian, and religious organizations, and other groups. Among the criticisms raised by opposition groups are that the proposed legislation might negatively affect over 11 million illegal immigrants and those associated with them, that it includes measures which create substantial barriers to
community policing Community policing is a philosophy and organizational strategy whereby law enforcement cooperates with community groups and citizens in producing safety and security. The theory underlying community policing is that it makes citizens more likely t ...
, and that it represents the most draconian anti-illegal immigration bill in nearly a century. The bill does not specify one particular group over any other; passage of the bill would affect all illegal aliens living within the U.S. The fact that most of the protests to date have come largely from Mexican and
Hispanic The term Hispanic () are people, Spanish culture, cultures, or countries related to Spain, the Spanish language, or broadly. In some contexts, Hispanic and Latino Americans, especially within the United States, "Hispanic" is used as an Ethnici ...
based population centers may stem from the fact that Hispanics are the largest undocumented-immigrant group in the country. On the supportive side of the issue, it is argued that living illegally in the United States is civil infraction, and that this bill merely aims at re-cementing U.S. immigration codes that have long been neglected by changing the seriousness of the infraction from a civil to a criminal one. Supporters of the bill argue that it will increase border security by providing more US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents to the border, thereby helping to curtail any possible entry to the country by terrorists, and that the passage of this bill may help curtail drug trafficking and human trafficking from Mexico to the US by depriving smugglers of sources and contacts on the US side of the border. Detractors say the bill includes measures that will infringe on the
human rights Human rights are universally recognized Morality, moral principles or Social norm, norms that establish standards of human behavior and are often protected by both Municipal law, national and international laws. These rights are considered ...
of
asylum seeker An asylum seeker is a person who leaves their country of residence, enters another country, and makes in that other country a formal application for the right of asylum according to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights Article 14. A per ...
s by stripping important
due process Due process of law is application by the state of all legal rules and principles pertaining to a case so all legal rights that are owed to a person are respected. Due process balances the power of law of the land and protects the individual p ...
protections, criminalizing status over which they may have no control, and dramatically limiting their access to essential services. Opponents of the bill argue that it would also redefine illegal immigrants as felons, and punish anyone guilty of providing them assistance. In addition, it would create several new mandatory minimum penalties for a variety of offenses, including some that would expose humanitarian workers, public-school teachers, church workers, and others whose only object is to provide relief and aid to five-year mandatory minimum prison sentences. Contrary to some reports, the bill would not have involved massive numbers of deportations. It might have increased the ease of deporting of people caught by local law enforcement, but there are no provisions to actively search for illegal immigrants as happened during
Operation Wetback Operation Wetback was an immigration law enforcement initiative created by Joseph May Swing, Joseph Swing, a retired United States Army lieutenant general (United States), lieutenant general and head of the United States Immigration and Naturaliza ...
. Los Angeles Archbishop
Roger Mahony Roger Michael Mahony (born February 27, 1936) is an American Catholic retired prelate who served as Archbishop of Los Angeles from 1985 to 2011. He previously served as an auxiliary bishop of the Diocese of Fresno from 1975 to 1980 and Bis ...
spoke out on provisions in the
immigration Immigration is the international movement of people to a destination country of which they are not usual residents or where they do not possess nationality in order to settle as Permanent residency, permanent residents. Commuting, Commuter ...
bills, he wrote to President Bush that certain proposed measures would effectively outlaw the provision of charitable assistance and religious ministry to individuals not in valid immigration status. On Ash Wednesday, 2006, Cardinal Mahony announced that he would order the clergy and laity of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles to ignore H.R. 4437 if it were to become law. He personally lobbied senators
Barbara Boxer Barbara Sue Boxer (née Levy; born November 11, 1940) is a retired American politician, lobbyist, and former reporter who served in the United States Senate, representing California from 1993 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party (United St ...
and
Dianne Feinstein Dianne Emiel Feinstein (; June 22, 1933 – September 29, 2023) was an American politician who served as a United States senator from California from 1992 until her death in 2023. A member of the Democratic Party, she served as the 38th ...
to have the Senate consider a comprehensive immigration reform bill, rather than the enforcement-only bill that passed the House of Representatives. Mahony also blamed the Congress for the illegal immigration crisis due to their failure to act on the issue in the previous 20 years, opposed H.R. 4437 as punitive and open to abusive interpretation, and supported S. 2611.


Response

Millions of individuals have protested against the legislation because of the perception that it will result in
mass deportation Mass is an intrinsic property of a body. It was traditionally believed to be related to the quantity of matter in a body, until the discovery of the atom and particle physics. It was found that different atoms and different elementary parti ...
. Leaders in the movements involved have called for Congress to pass a bill that allows unauthorized immigrants to receive legal status. The
United States Senate The United States Senate is a chamber of the Bicameralism, bicameral United States Congress; it is the upper house, with the United States House of Representatives, U.S. House of Representatives being the lower house. Together, the Senate and ...
is considering bills (e.g. S. 2611) that will strike some of the provisions from H.R. 4437, such as the sections declaring illegal presence to be a felony (illegal entry is currently a misdemeanor) and criminalizing aid to illegal aliens. In addition, many cities and counties have taken formal positions opposing the bill.
Labor unions A trade union (British English) or labor union (American English), often simply referred to as a union, is an organization of workers whose purpose is to maintain or improve the conditions of their employment, such as attaining better wages ...
have also largely opposed the bill, though there is division among the labor movement as to whether to support a guest worker program, or legalization of those currently present, two provisions currently in some of the Senate bills. The debate has to an extent polarized opinions among U.S. citizens on illegal immigration. Gallu

CN

CBS/New York Time

Los Angeles Times/Bloomber

NBC/Wall Street Journa

and several other polls taken have consistently shown public support for the senate immigration bill allowing certain immigrants to earn legal status over the harsher H.R. 4437. However, The
Center for Immigration Studies The Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) is an American anti-immigration think tank. It favors far lower immigration numbers and produces analyses to further those views. The CIS was founded by historian Otis L. Graham alongside eugenicist a ...
, a pro- immigration reduction organization, conducted a Zogby poll that showed that Americans supported the House approach of enforcement instead of the Senate comprehensive approach

Great American Boycott, "A day without an immigrant", where unauthorized immigrants and those who supported them were encouraged to abstain from buying anything and to skip work or school, was organized, taking place on Monday, May 1, 2006. The intention was to show the American public that their economy is helped by undocumented immigrants. It resulted in at least one million marchers nationwide. Major marches were held in Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, Dallas, while smaller events occurred in most states, most prominently in Pennsylvania, Virginia, and North Carolina. Crowds in Los Angeles were estimated at 600,000 for the two boycott marches. At the second largest protest, in Chicago, an estimated 400,000 attended. Not all the organizations in the immigration rights movement supported the boycott and resulted in varied participation rates. The effect the day had on the economy remains largely unknown. On May 11, 2006, Senate leaders declared that they would try to pass an immigration bill of their own by the end of the month, S. 2611. On May 13, 2006, President
George W. Bush George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician and businessman who was the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Bush family and the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, he i ...
asked
the Pentagon The Pentagon is the headquarters building of the United States Department of Defense, in Arlington County, Virginia, across the Potomac River from Washington, D.C. The building was constructed on an accelerated schedule during World War II. As ...
to deploy the
United States National Guard The National Guard is a U.S. state, state-based military force that becomes part of the United States Armed Forces, U.S. military's reserve components of the United States Armed Forces, reserve components of the United States Army, U.S. Army a ...
to assist border patrol agents. The deployment was to be limited to 6,000 troops.


Film


The Senate Speaks
Story 11 in How Democracy Works Now: Twelve Stories a documentary series from filmmakers Shari Robertson and Michael Camerini, that examines the push for comprehensive immigration reform in the United States from 2001 to 2007. Since its release the film has become an important resource for advocates, policy-makers and educators. ''The Senate Speaks'' centers around the response to the Sensenbrenner bill's passage in the House. The film presents the immigrant movement's public response to the toughest anti-amnesty, enforcement-only immigration bill in history. Focus is placed on party leaders' pressure to respond. The film continues to tell the story of the bi-partisan immigration reform that the Senate passed in 2006 as an alternative approach to H.R. 4437.


Sources and notes


See also

*
Anti-terrorism legislation Anti-terrorism legislation are laws aimed at fighting terrorism. They usually, if not always, follow specific bombings or assassinations. Anti-terrorism legislation usually includes specific amendments allowing the state to bypass its own l ...
* Gran Marcha * How Democracy Works Now: Twelve Stories


External links


CNN/Time magazine article on public opinion regarding issues in H.R. 4437

GranMarcha.org - photos of La Gran Marcha "The Great March" held in Los Angeles to defeat H.R. 4437

Description of Diversity Visa program (green card lottery), opposing H.R. 4437 amendment

Final vote results for roll call 661 (US House of Representatives)

Immigrant Legal Resource Center page in opposition to H.R. 4437

Jurist article on Senate Judiciary Committee amendment of H.R. 4437

Library of Congress page on H.R. 4437

The Moral Choice in Immigration Policy
JURIST A jurist is a person with expert knowledge of law; someone who analyzes and comments on law. This person is usually a specialist legal scholar, mostly (but not always) with a formal education in law (a law degree) and often a Lawyer, legal prac ...

Tracking the U.S. Congress

WashingtonWatch.com page on H.R. 4437

''How Democracy Works Now: Twelve Stories'' - Series page
{{DEFAULTSORT:Border Protection, Anti-Terrorism, And Illegal Immigration Control Act Of 2005 United States proposed federal immigration and nationality legislation Mexico–United States barrier Immigration to the United States Proposed legislation of the 109th United States Congress Illegal immigration to the United States Terrorism laws in the United States