Biden Administration Failures Creating Border Crisis

Floor Speech

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Mr. GROTHMAN. Madam Speaker, just prior to coming to Washington this week, I spent a couple of days down at the Mexican border to see for myself exactly what was going on down there.

I visited the El Paso sector. I would like to thank the Border Patrol, ICE, the ranchers, and local law enforcement for being so helpful and informative to the nine Congressmen who were in the El Paso sector over the weekend.

Our goal was to see over the last few months how things have changed, and in the last 5 months, things have changed dramatically at the border.

For one thing, illegal apprehensions are way up. In March, we had 172,000 illegal apprehensions, and that doesn't include, of course, the people who snuck across without being apprehended. This time last year, in March, there were 34,000 illegal apprehensions. What could cause an increase from 34,000 to 172,000?

It was painful not only to hear about the numbers but to see row after row of young children on mats just waiting for something to happen.

Now, what has happened? What happened at the border to get a fivefold increase in 1 year, as well as seeing all these children in almost inhumane conditions waiting to be taken away to somebody who they hope will take care of them?

First of all, this administration got rid of the migrant protection protocol. Donald Trump, I am sure in very difficult negotiations, had Mexico agree to hold people south of the border pending hearings for asylum. That was a huge benefit.

Secondly, we had agreements with Central American countries so that when people came here from other Central American countries or South America, they would be held south of the Mexican border.

Third, we changed things to the old-fashioned catch and release, where we touched people, but then when we are dealing with families, we let them in the United States pending a hearing on immigration. We changed title 42 to allow more people to come into this country, whether or not they have COVID.

Finally, we have a President who, during the campaign, made many different statements indicating that illegal immigration was not going to be a problem during his administration, whether he was promising free medical care, supporting sanctuary cities, ending the public charge rule. And President Trump had said: Immigrants coming here, we don't want you here if you are going to wind up on welfare.

It is no wonder they were wearing Biden T-shirts. We make stimulus payments to people who are here illegally.

Given all these changes, is it a surprise that so many people want to come here? In addition to the fact that the changes in the laws themselves cause people to get to the Mexican border to come here, it is advertising to the world that the United States does not care about immigration laws.

Now, we have to do something. We have dug ourselves a deeper hole in our relations with both El Salvador and Mexico. It is important to treat our Latin American cousins with respect. But in February, the President of El Salvador, President Bukele, was not given an audience when he showed up in this country in February. Is that the type of way we should treat our Central American allies when we want people held south of the border?

The Mexican President feels that President Biden has made himself out to be the migrant President. Mexico does not like this free-for-all at our southern border in which we are strengthening the control of the drug cartels.

But, again, our relationship is going south there. The migrant protection protocol, in which we are holding prospective applicants for asylum south of the border, has ended.

Another thing that I think is causing this problem is the actions of the President and Vice President. Three weeks ago now, our Vice President was appointed to be in charge for the administration on what goes on at the southern border. She hasn't been there yet. This has to raise red flags all over the world.

Do the Vice President and the President get along? Right now, it is not hard to find articles by talking heads. Did the Vice President want this position? Has she accepted the position with any enthusiasm? Why, for 3 weeks, in what to me is probably the second biggest crisis, maybe the biggest, at least the second biggest crisis the United States has undergone in the last 6 years, why do we have a person in charge of the crisis who has not gone down to the border? Does she consider this a serious problem or not?

I would love it if she gave a speech, a wholehearted speech, saying that she does believe we have a problem on the border, and she is going to do something.

I am going to divert a little bit from my discussion on what is going on at the border. I want the Biden administration to also give a little thought to how this looks to other countries around the world. I don't like the United States to have enemies--and I don't consider these countries necessarily enemies--but there are times when, clearly, we are being challenged by Russia, China, Iran, and other countries around the world.

How does the United States look to other countries when we can't even secure our southern border, when it looks like we are not even trying to secure our southern border? I want the Biden administration to think that the complete inaction at the southern border, allowing tens of thousands of people to cross every month, sends a message around the world that this administration is not yet fully engaged.

The Vice President has said she wants to deal with root causes. If root causes mean people making less money than in the United States, I mean, we are going to have open borders forever.

We have something great here in the United States, and if we feel that some people would rather live here, or they are not materially as well off as in the United States, I will tell you, if we are not going to secure the border until that is solved, we are not going to solve this problem until we have over a billion new people in this country.

We noticed other things on the border. We noticed the stopping of building the wall. It is not until you are down there that you see all the planks that are supposed to be put together on the wall just sitting there in the sun. Somebody presumably paid for these things. I don't know why, since we had all the pieces for a wall down there, that we didn't at least try to build it for another month or 6 weeks so that the material down there could at least have been used.

I want to point out, by the way, with regard to the wall, because some people think it cost money, compared to the alternative, not only people coming in this country using the services we provide, but we were told at the southern border that when you have the old-fashioned barbed wire, you maybe should have two or three Border Patrol agents per mile. But when you have the wall, you need one agent for every 2 miles. There is a tremendous savings in the number of people you need in Border Patrol at the border if you had the wall.

The idea of stopping it mid-construction, where you have all these metal beams spread out just lying in the southern sun, is very frustrating.

Another thing to point out is that we met with ranchers down there. How difficult it must be for ranchers to see members of drug cartels walking across their land. Wouldn't that just scare you to death? A horrible thing.

We look at the human toll of people sneaking into this country because they are escorted into the country by the drug cartels. A lot of people don't realize this. Another reason so many people are pushed across the border, and another organization that will educate people around the world that you ought to come to the United States, is the Mexican drug cartels.

Why do they do that? They do that because they are charging 3,000 bucks a head for every Mexican person who comes across the border. They are charging $5,000 a head for every Central American. They are charging $8,000 to $10,000 a head for every Brazilian.

As long as the drug cartels are making money at the border, is it any surprise that we have such a surge here, as they attract people or encourage people to come to the United States?

I want to make another point about these poor children at the border. What goes on right now is that the children come to the border. If they are unaccompanied, we hold them, looking for somewhere to put them in the United States. It is very heart-rending to see all these kids without anybody there.

But right now, under the current protocols, if you have a child who has parents in Honduras, but you give them a piece of paper saying that he has an aunt and uncle in New York, rather than send that child back to his parents, they send them to the aunt and uncle in New York, who are here illegally.

Does that make any sense? That is what is going on.

One thing that really irritates the Border Patrol down there is they know that if American parents were to send a 5-year-old child, let's say, and drop him off at the Milwaukee airport and hope he shows up in the airport in Miami the next day, Child Protective Services would be there saying: What is wrong with the parents?

Here at the southern border, we are co-conspirators on these dangerous trips for the children, some of which wind up dying, and many of them wind up being sexually assaulted, which is just a horrible thing.

Another thing that we found out at the border is that the amount of hardcore illegal drugs is rocketing up. I know some people may say that is an old story. The week before I went to the border, I happened to visit with the DEA in Milwaukee. Last year alone, in Milwaukee County, 540 people died of illegal drug overdoses. When I talked to the people at the DEA in Milwaukee, they felt it was entirely possible that all 540 people were poisoned to death with drugs either brought across the southern border or ingredients for drugs brought across the southern border.

Madam Speaker, look at the skyrocketing number of people who are dying of hardcore drugs.

Why is that?

We should have anticipated it.

The powerful Mexican drug cartels are going to make money. There was a time, maybe 10 years ago, when marijuana coming across the southern border was common. But now as more American States legalize marijuana-- Washington, Colorado, and what have you--there is so much marijuana being produced in the United States that there is no money to be made by importing marijuana from Mexico.

I heard an anecdote of marijuana being brought here from Mexico, and it was being carted around the Southern United States, looking for somebody to take it. Nobody would take it because you can have higher quality marijuana growing legally here in the United States.

So what are the Mexican drug cartels going to do?

They are going to import in this country more heroin, more meth, and especially more fentanyl. That is what we are seeing at the border.

So rather than being a time to cut back and saying that we don't care as much about the border, now is the time with the increasing number of fentanyl deaths--540 in Milwaukee County alone last year from fentanyl and the other drugs, which is a shocking number--now is the time to dial up enforcement at the border. But instead, it seems, we are going the opposite way.

I don't know what is going on that you want to let more fentanyl in the country, Madam Speaker. I know there are some people who say that it is a victimless crime or what have you, but you tell that to the families of the 540 people who died last year in Milwaukee County. That is another result of this lax, devil-may-care attitude, as far as what is going on down there.

So the question is: What to do?

Maybe Mexico will not go back to the old agreement, but I think the President should beg Mexico to go back to the migrant protection protocol where one more time we are allowed to hold people on the Mexican side of the border pending hearings as to whether they are eligible for asylum.

Secondly, we have to hire more Border Patrol.

I want to go back and explain something. I talked about the 170,000 people in March who are touched by the Border Patrol. That doesn't include people whom they don't catch. The more the Border Patrol has to deal with the children on the southern border, the less time they have to guard the border. So there is clearly a significant increase in people crossing the border because they know the Border Patrol is no longer there. They are dealing with paperwork for the children that they have to process, and that has to be the priority.

If you are going to go down this path, President Biden, and not care about the southern border or not reinstate the migrant protection protocol with Mexico, at least hire more Border Patrol agents so we can process the people you are letting in this country; and don't leave these huge swaths of the southern border wide open.

Because of that, people I have talked to guess--this is a guess--that whereas, last year, maybe 10,000 people a month were crossing the southern border without the Border Patrol touching them, now it is more like 30,000 people a month. What a disaster.

We should amend the Flores agreement, which is what is requiring us to take so many of these children and ship them around the United States. We should be able to send them back to their native country.

We should try to undo the damage we have done with the way we have treated the El Salvadorean President and see if he can, one more time, assist us in preventing people from all around the world coming up from south of Mexico.

Since the metal beams used to put together a wall are just sitting there in the hot sun, we should at least, at a minimum--it would be great to build a whole wall--use up the raw materials for the wall that are sitting down there. Actually, it is more than a wall; it is a whole wall system. Just don't have those metal beams just sitting there in the desert forever.

Above all, President Biden and Vice President Harris, show you care. Show you care. Let the world know that the United States does not have an open border for anybody to come across the border, be they criminal, especially people coming across with that fentanyl. Show that you care. Hold a press conference.

It would be nice if Vice President Harris would show that she accepted her new job with some enthusiasm. Again, the talking heads I read right now imply that maybe she didn't even want the job.

So, please, President Biden, show you care before we have 200,000 people a month coming in the country. Show you care a little about the fentanyl crisis, as we are approaching 90,000 people a year dying in this country of illegal drugs, most of which come across the southern border. Show you care about those little children sitting in row after row of mattresses on our southern border. Show you care about the drug cartels and the way they are corrupting the Mexican Government and beginning to corrupt the United States. Say you want to stop the system in which they are able to make so much money sneaking people in this country. Show you care about the poor ranchers on the southern border, who have been there for generations and now have to be scared to death to go out late at night and can't let their children ride their horses on their land for fear of what will happen to them.

If you won't do it, we have to call upon the public and other Members of Congress to let the Biden administration know that the current situation is completely untenable. You have to step up to the plate and do something.

Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

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