Amid Border Crisis that Includes COVID Surge, Democrats Want Amnesty in Tax-and-Spend Spree
‘…the Administration is already practicing a policy that amounts to functional amnesty in many cases. What Democrats want now is to make that explicit and permanent. They’d effectively like our southern border to be even more open — even during an ongoing public health emergency that has federal, state, and local officials contemplating new batches of rules for American citizens.’
WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) delivered the following remarks today on the Senate floor regarding the border crisis:
“As I’ve said before, Democrats’ spree is reckless on multiple levels. We’re all familiar with the staggering $3.5 trillion bottom line. We all know it would only amp up the painful inflation that’s already hammering middle-class families, in large part because of the last partisan deluge of spending Democrats rammed through a few months back.
“But just as alarming is the parade of left-wing ideas that comprise this mess.
“Turning temporary pandemic welfare payments with no work requirements into a permanent dole… Shoving through big chunks of the Green New Deal… Government price-fixing that would leave us with fewer new medicines and new cures…
“And then there’s an effort to further inflame the Biden Administration’s border crisis with a far-left amnesty.
“We’ve now seen the highest unaccompanied child arrivals on record. The biggest month for migrant encounters in 21 years. And this month, total CBP apprehensions for the calendar year are expected to top a million for the first time in 15 years… with five months still to go.
“So one might think my friends across the aisle would try to avoid repeating the missteps that created this crisis.
“That they would be careful to avoid doubling down on the perverse incentives generating so much suffering at our southern border.
“But apparently, Washington Democrats intend to do the opposite. Their reckless taxing-and-spending spree would include an even bigger green light for this crisis. At the worst possible time.
“Under the Biden Administration’s unenforceable catch-and-release policy, just 13% of the 50,000 individuals who’ve been released into the United States since March have actually reported to assigned ICE check-ins.
“So in a sense, either intentionally or through incompetence, the Administration is already practicing a policy that amounts to functional amnesty in many cases. What Democrats want now is to make that explicit and permanent.
“They’d effectively like our southern border to be even more open — even during an ongoing public health emergency that has federal, state, and local officials contemplating new batches of rules for American citizens.
“The message to Americans appears to be: Put your guard back up, even if you’re vaccinated. But to a jaw-dropping degree, the message to people arriving at our southern border seems to be: Come on in, even if you’re COVID-positive!
“CBP data are reportedly showing a huge uptick in positive COVID tests in the Rio Grande Valley sector. That’s just one sector and that’s just among whatever fraction of the individuals are even being tested. And among individuals in ICE custody, apparently one in three are declining to receive a vaccine.
“Yet it seems the Biden Administration doesn’t consider a COVID diagnosis any reason to make an exception to its catch-and-release policy. Alarming reports of COVID-positive detainees being turned out into Texas communities even have border-state Democrats sounding the alarm.
“I hope President Biden is listening. Maybe members of his own party will have better luck conveying what the American people have known for months:
“The situation at our southern border is a crisis. It deserves real attention and real solutions. Not a reckless taxing and spending spree with amnesty policies that would make things worse.”
Related Issues: Senate Democrats, Taxes, Green New Deal, COVID-19, Immigration
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