Border Security. During consideration of the Immigration Overhaul (S. 744), Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) offered a motion to table (kill) an amendment offered by Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) that would \”not allow the processing of this new category called registered provisional immigrants until Congress votes that the border is secure.\” Paul\’s amendment featured a requirement that Congress certify every year for five years that the border is secure or at least making specific progress toward border security as defined in detail by the amendment. If Congress would vote in any of these five years that the border is not becoming more secure, then the processing of people as \”registered provisional immigrants\” as provided for in S. 744 would stop until Congress would vote that the border is becoming more secure.
The Senate agreed to Reid\’s motion and killed the Paul amendment on June 19, 2013 by a vote of 61 to 37 (Roll Call 154). We have assigned pluses to the nays because it is the constitutional duty of the United States to \”protect [every state] against Invasion\” (Article IV, Section 4).
