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Floor Speech

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Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, it has been clear for a while now that an enduring legacy of the Biden-Harris administration will be the historic immigration crisis at our southern border. And I don't use the word ``historic'' lightly, but it is appropriate, because President Biden and Vice President Harris have presided over 4 years of recordbreaking illegal immigration at our southern border.

That is right: The 4 highest years of illegal immigration ever recorded at our southern border have occurred on President Biden's and Vice President Harris's watch.

I say occurred on their watch, but, of course, this recordbreaking illegal immigration didn't just occur on their watch. The Biden-Harris administration created this crisis. On the day he took office, the President began dismantling President Trump's border security policies, and illegal immigration began surging in response--and kept on surging.

Between official U.S. Customs and Border Protection encounters and known ``got-aways''--individuals the Border Patrol saw but was unable to apprehend--there have been somewhere around 10 million--10 million-- migrant encounters at the southern border during this administration.

Now, to put that number in perspective, that is larger than the population of the vast majority of U.S. States, and that is just the individuals we know about.

There are undoubtedly individuals who have made their way into our country over the past 4 years who have been neither seen nor apprehended.

The past 4 years have displayed the problems with unchecked illegal immigration. Shelters are overwhelmed. Border cities are overwhelmed. Blue cities far from the border are overwhelmed. The Border Patrol is stretched thin.

Agents pulled off field work to process the massive amounts of migrants, and the list goes on.

And, of course, it is essential to remember the situation at the border doesn't just affect the border. As I said, cities far from the border have struggled to deal with an influx of migrants.

Criminals who have made their way illegally into the country have committed crimes far from the southern border. And the effects of cross-border illegal activity are felt all around the country.

My State of South Dakota is about as far from our southern border as you can get, but law enforcement officials consistently tell me, in larger and smaller communities, that the deadly drugs they are dealing with have entered the country across our southern border.

And then there are the national security issues. The June arrest of eight Tajikistan nationals with suspected ties to ISIS who had illegally entered the country, as well as the identification of more than 400 migrants who used an ISIS-affiliated smuggling network to enter the United States, are just two examples of the kind of threats that we face--and the dangers of the chaos that President Biden and Vice President Harris have allowed to rage and have unleashed at our southern border.

Since October 2020, 387 individuals on the Terrorist Watchlist have been apprehended attempting to cross our southern border between ports of entry. Mr. President, 387 individuals on the Terrorist Watchlist. Those are the ones we caught. How many have come in who have been unobserved? How many terrorists or other dangerous individuals have made their way across without being apprehended?

Immigration officials are currently preparing for a possible final surge before President Trump takes office, a clear sign, if one were needed, that migrants regard President Biden as the open border President.

But final surge or no final surge, the days of this border crisis are numbered. Securing our border and removing those who have entered our country illegally are at the top of President Trump's priority list, and the Republican Congress is committed to doing everything it can to help, for the sake of our security and for the sake of our rule of law.

We sometimes forget that aspect--the rule of law. But the area of immigration should not be an exception to the principle that the law has to be respected. Immigrants have played, and will continue to play, a vital role in this country. And that won't change. But immigration has to be legal.

We need to end the notion that illegal pathways are a viable way to take up residence in this country, and we will end that notion under President Trump.

The Biden-Harris administration heralded the start of a border crisis. The Trump-Vance administration will herald the end of it. Two more months. Two more months.

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