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Floor Speech

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Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, I just heard the minority leader come to the floor and speak about his ballooning list of demands--demands that are designed to protect illegal immigrant criminals. That is what this is about. This is the discussion right now on the floor of the U.S. Senate. Democrats have come up with a Christmas list of demands-- demands designed to appeal to their radical base.

This growing list of Democrat demands makes it almost impossible to remove dangerous illegal immigrants from the streets of our Nation. Democrats are resisting even the most reasonable attempts to enforce our immigration laws. They don't want us--law enforcement--to enforce the immigration laws of this Nation. That is what they are for: getting rid of those laws.

The more we learn about the demands coming from the minority leader and that party, the less the normal American citizen likes them, and that is especially if you are concerned about any safety or any security in the community in which you live or the neighborhood or the streets of your community. The Democrats continually want to make it harder to arrest and remove illegal immigrant criminals.

So last week, I spoke about the one Democrat dangerous demand for requiring something called judicial warrants. Now, that may sound like a technical change. It is not. It is a dramatic change, and it would grind immigration enforcement to a halt.

Do you know what it would do? It would lock in place the chaos that Joe Biden and the Democrats hoisted upon this country with their wide- open border policy.

The Democrats' preference is to release illegal immigrants who are criminals right onto our streets. They prefer that over holding them until immigration officials can come to pick them up, if they have been arrested.

So I am going to take a look at one of the specific demands that the Democrats have come up with--and it is a new demand; I haven't seen this one before--because they want to ban immigration enforcement from their so-called sensitive locations. The so-called sensitive locations defined by the Democrats, in the past, have included places of worship, hospitals, and schools. Now, they want to include in that list polling places.

Well, let's think about that. It is an entirely new provision. Polling places have never been included on any list like this before, and Democrats are now including them because they want to turn America into a sanctuary country and polling places into sanctuary locations. That is what the Democrats are demanding.

So let me ask Democrats a simple question: Why do you want to protect illegal immigrant criminals at polling places? What are they doing at polling places?

They shouldn't be at U.S. polling places. Why in the world would they be there if they are not trying to vote? And, by law, they are not allowed to vote.

That tells you how far to the left the Democrats have moved. Illegal immigrants aren't allowed to vote in Federal elections. Sometimes Democrats will say that, but it is not what they want.

Democrats seem fixated on protecting illegal immigrant criminals at polling places. Yet Democrats energetically opposed commonsense policies to protect the integrity of the ballot--the integrity of the ballot. It is a vital right of American citizenship--the sanctity of the ballot.

Democrats opposed photo IDs to vote. You need one to check out a book from the library. You need one to get on a plane. You need one to buy a beer. But the Democrats don't want you to have to produce a photo ID to vote, which is a sacred right of citizenship. That is because Democrats oppose election integrity. They oppose ensuring American elections are dedicated and decided only by American citizens. They don't want that. They believe it disadvantages them to have just citizens vote, and they support banning immigration enforcement at polling places. It is astonishing. That is how far to the left the socialist-driven Democrat Party has moved.

Illegal immigrants shouldn't be at polling places--illegal immigrant criminals--and they shouldn't be roaming our communities. They need to be arrested and removed from the country.

Once again, Democrats are putting illegal immigrants ahead--who are criminals--ahead of the safety and security of the American people.

Taken together, the list of Democrat demands points in one dangerous direction, and that is the direction of abolishing ICE, abolishing our borders, and turning America into a sanctuary nation. Republicans will not accept changes that make our communities less safe.

The deadline the Democrats have demanded to fund the Department of Homeland Security is Friday, 3 days from now. The Department of Homeland Security budget is $90 billion. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is 11 percent of that. Democrats are risking America's safety over 11 percent of the Department of Homeland Security budget.

The rest of the budget goes to other critical functions the American people depend upon and need right now, and that is because it funds FEMA, or the Federal Emergency Management Agency, for disaster relief, as our Nation is trying to still deal with the effects of a recent storm. It funds TSA to help keep Americans safe when they fly. It funds the Coast Guard to stop the flow of drugs and what has been coming across to our shores from foreign countries. It funds the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency to protect our Nation from cyber attacks and more.

So, this week, Senate Democrats have a choice to make:

Option 1, fund the Department of Homeland Security.

Option 2, Democrats can once again side with the radical left and force a shutdown of the vital services to the American people. And why do they want to do that? To protect illegal immigrant criminals.

If Democrats choose option 2, it will force a shutdown to protect illegal immigrants. The consequences to the American people will be painful. The Democrats have been choosing that side again and again-- safety and prosperity for the Republican choice; illegal immigrant criminals, the Democrat choice on the floor of the U.S. Senate.

The Democrats seem to be very willing to delay disaster relief, to disrupt air travel for every American, and to degrade anti-drug operations. And our Nation will be more vulnerable to cyber attacks.

All of these key missions are conducted by the Department of Homeland Security, the one branch of government that has not yet been funded. We have done 11 of the 12 appropriations bills. We have funded 96 percent of the government. And the Democrats said: Nope, we are not going to fund that vital function of the government--because that is the demand of the radical left.

Republicans are ready to vote to keep America safe, and we have been ready for weeks. To the point, weeks ago, the House of Representatives passed a bipartisan appropriations bill to fund the Department of Homeland Security. Senate Democrats had agreed to what was in the bill. Then the Democrats flip-flopped. And they did it why? Because of the cries from the radical left, the people that are calling the tune for that party. Democrats were for it before they were told to be against it.

Democrats need to start protecting the American people and stop protecting illegal immigrant criminals. It is that simple. But, today, Democrats on this floor--we just heard it from the minority leader-- continue to be the party of open borders and illegal immigrants.

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