“I can’t support a bill that strips the immigration reform and border security provisions that I supported in the original House bill on intelligence reform,” Gingrey said. These provisions were specifically recommended by the 9-11 Commission on page 390 of its report.

“There are many important and needed improvements in this bill for our intelligence community, but there’s a giant hole left in our security apparatus if we don’t act to fix the immigration problems immediately – not next year, as promised by leadership, but immediately. We have a chance to do it right now and that’s what we should do.

“I do support the compromise worked out on the chain-of-command issues for which we on the House Armed Services Committee fought. I think the negotiations have rendered a final product that preserves our military’s ability to get real-time intelligence to our soldiers in the battlefields, and that will save lives. This part is an improvement over the original Senate bill and I wanted to vote for the vast majority of the changes that are included in this final reform bill. But since this is an all or none vote and I can’t support the legislation in its entirety, I had to vote against the bill.”