this long overdue bipartisanship legislation allowed defendants previously convicted or sentenced for a federal offense involving crack cocaine to sentence petition for sentence reduction. in 1996 congress passed the anti-drug abuse act which created mandatory penalties for drug offenses and introduced a 100-1 sentencing disparity between crack cocaine and powder cocaine offenses. this meant a person who distributed five grams of crack cocaine receive the same five-year mandatory minimum sentence as a person who distributes 500 grams of powder cocaine. a person who distributed 50 grams of crack cocaine received a received the same 10-year mandatory sentence as a person who distributed 5,000 grams of powder cocaine. it soon became evident that this sentencing disparity created a significant racial disparity. four years after congress passed the anti-drug abuse act, the average federal sentence for black defendants was 49% higher than the average sentence for white defendan
[captioning made possible by the national captioning institute, inc., in cooperation with the united states house of representatives. any use of the closed-captioned coverage of the house proceedings for political or commercial purposes is expressly prohibited by the u.s. house of representatives.] the speaker: the house will be in order. prayer will be offered by chaplain kibben. chaplain kibben: would you pray with me. return to us, o god. dwell in the midst of us. in this place, in our cities, neighborhoods, and nation that we would again acknowledge you. may you see reason to call us faithful and may we reflect your glory to all who would see. in you may both youth and those of age find reason to be joyful. may all marvel at your handiwork, your steadfast love, your saving mercy. cause our hands to be strong to do the work you have set before us so your piece in the pealdz of your hearts and bring forth the fruit in the garden you have called us to teand. give us increas
it is the product of one of the longest and most difficult legislative undertakings in the last three conferences. it is an excellent example of virtually successful bipartisan effort. and the allies of immigration reform on both sides of the capital and on both sides of the aisle work together to accomplish these critical controls for illegal immigration. in 1981, this administration asked the congress to pass the comprehensive legislative package including lawyer sanctions, measures to increase enforcement of immigration laws, and legalization. the act provides these three essential components. discouraged the problem of illegal immigration should not therefore be seen as a problem between the united states and its neighbors. our objective is to establish a reasonable, fair, orderly, secure system of immigration into this country and not to discriminate in any way against particular nations are people. i would like to recognize iq of public servants whose efforts have mad
indulgence. it had nothing to do with discrimination. it had to do with a new policy. and it is true that i did rule and put a self-executing rule in that did answer the question desire of the committee to handle this issue, and i did it accordingly. i thank the gentleman. mr. hoyer: i thank the gentleman. mr. speaker, it appears that no one is going to be able to tell me what the schedule is for the week to come. i will tell you that s unfortunate. i hope there is a schedule for the week to come. because there s a lot to be done. we haven t done we haven t finalized zika. we passed a bill here which we think was inadequate. we haven t dealt with flint. we need to pass puerto rico restructuring. i think they ve made some progress on that. i congratulate the speaker. and the leader for facilitating that progress. we don t have a voting rights bill scheduled. we need to do that. there are a number of other serious pieces of legislation this house needs to consider. we re goin
be gained on that, and they are ready they say they are ready to abide by the new rules about the environment, trade agreements, intellectual property, and as far as the u.s. economy is concerned, the administration would say to your question, well, the only way to move forward and get better paying jobs and to pay down the debt is to grow the u.s. economy and to do that through trade, and bernie sanders and some other people say no, either the trade agreements have to be renegotiated or negotiated in a more beneficial way for the u.s. were we should perhaps protect parts of our economy to have some sectors that we simply protect the terrorists. host: let me conclude with this point, i we had a good pivot point with regards to the u.s. and vietnam? i we had a better point in five years or 10 years ago? guest: absolutely. relations have improved pneumatically. it is not just economic driven. it is largely driven by this what china is of doing in the south china sea and wheth