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When a law enforcement officer apprehends an illegal immigrant, it makes no sense to simply release that individual who has been breaking our laws with no threat of sanction or penalty.

Under current law, there is no additional penalty for someone who enters the United States illegally and then commits either a crime of violence or a drug trafficking offense. They simply come under the same penalty as we have in current law.

El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras have all agreed to send additional consular officers from Guatemala, from Honduras, from El Salvador, send them to the U.S. border so that we can more quickly and humanely identify unaccompanied children and process their individual removal.

The American people depend on these federal employees to process, investigate, and adjudicate applications for immigration rights and benefits in a timely and thorough manner.

Eligible citizens from any State in the Union can serve in the Border Protection Corps of that State.

In the absence of a limitation on local enforcement powers, the states are bound by the Supremacy Clause of the United States Constitution to enforce violations of the federal immigration laws.

Laws are getting passed in states like Alabama that basically would punish American citizens who are 'harboring' people. Since the federal government hasn't been able to muster or to get comprehensive immigration reform passed, states are taking it upon themselves to police and enforce laws.

We are taking the steps necessary to be ready to send whatever assistance is requested of us, and we are preparing to receive citizens who seek refuge in our state.

To suggest that immigration is the exclusive domain of the federal government, disallowing partnerships with local law enforcement, defies the will of Congress, not to mention reality. Numerous local jurisdictions have laws on the books dealing with immigration in a variety of ways.