The following article written by turncoat Kyl is posted on his Senate website homepage http://kyl.senate.gov/record.cfm?id=275254

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
May 29, 2007


CONTACT:
Andrew Wilder or Ryan Patmintra (202) 224-4521

Complaining from the Sidelines is not a Solution
By U.S. Senator Jon Kyl


In last year’s election, voters said one thing loud and clear: DO SOMETHING ABOUT ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION! Of course, there were a lot of different opinions about what should be done, but more inactivity was clearly not an option.

Separate bills approved by the U.S. House and Senate last year were considered unpalatable by the vast majority of Americans. One version did not adequately address our broken immigration system, and the other was too permissive in its automatic path to citizenship for illegal immigrants. So, nothing changed. Meanwhile, every day, thousands of illegal immigrants continue to pour across our border (roughly 10 percent are serious criminals), workplace enforcement is a joke, and crime and violence are escalating.

Now the Democrats control Congress, and it’s clear a Democrat-only bill would be more liberal than the bill passed by the Senate last year, over my objection. I was presented with a choice: sit on the sidelines and complain about a bad bill; or work hard to ensure that any bill that passed the Senate is one influenced as much as possible by my conservative principles.

For weeks, senators and administration officials worked to forge a bill that secures our border, creates workable and effective interior and workplace enforcement, realistically deals with the people illegally here, and designs a truly temporary worker program that responds to the nation’s fluctuating labor needs.

In these meetings, Republicans insisted on achieving certain milestones in interior and border security (like hiring 18,000 border patrol agents and constructing 370 miles of fencing) before allowing any visas for illegal immigrants – marking a departure from last year’s approach, which resisted any attempts to provide “triggersâ€