McConnell on Title 42 and President Biden’s Border Failures
‘[T]his week, some of our Democratic colleagues are feigning great angst and indignation over Title 42’s demise. They claim to be outraged that President Biden doesn’t have a better plan. But every Senator had a chance just last year to vote to keep funding Title 42 measures… And every single Democrat voted in lock-step against it… The country reaps what Democrats sowed.’
WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) delivered the following remarks today on the Senate floor regarding security at the southern border:
“The Biden Administration’s reckless policies have created chaos on our southern border. And further mistakes from the Democrats are taking things from very bad to even worse.
“For more than two years now, President Biden and Secretary Mayorkas have proven they are either incapable, unwilling, or uninterested in defending and maintaining our borders.
“Illegal crossings at our southern border have exploded under this Administration. 2.38 million in fiscal year 2022 alone. And that’s just the subset of people whom the authorities actually found and stopped. It doesn’t count the ones who got away.
“The vast majority of these crossers are single adults. Not families, not children; but grown-ups, unaccompanied.
“Customs and Border Protection stopped 67 known terrorist suspects at southern border ports of entry last year. But they found 98 attempting to cross the border elsewhere – more than 6 times as many as the previous year.
“And as of March, authorities had already seized nearly three times as much fentanyl this fiscal year as they had by that time last year.
“All these terrible numbers have come with a stopgap pandemic policy called Title 42 in place. Every month of the Biden presidency, anywhere from 20% to 75% of the illegal crossers have been turned right around and expelled, rather than apprehended and processed the typical way.
“But the Biden Administration has failed so badly that even with this stopgap in place, our border facilities have still been overwhelmed and overrun.
“Now, as the Democrats finally give up the COVID state of emergency, Title 42 is finally going away.
“That wouldn’t pose a crisis for an Administration that was willing to get tough on its own and enforce existing immigration law.
“But Democrats don’t seem willing to do that.
“Just the opposite. President Biden’s team have designed a bizarre Rube Goldberg system that amounts to a special concierge service to help even more illegal immigrants come here even more easily.
“It’s a whole parallel system with processing centers in foreign countries — not to make people come in our front door, but to help even more people surge in through the back door.
“I understand there’s even an official U.S. government smartphone app to help illegal immigrants along the journey. Your taxpayer dollars hard at work.
“Our colleague the senior Senator for Missouri has correctly summarized the Democrats’ plan as ‘Ticketmaster for illegal immigrants.’
“And remember, things are already at an unacceptable level before this new craziness.
“According to one public report, the authorities are already considering, ‘street releases of migrants [into] communities across [the] border if NGO shelters and CBP facilities do not have the capacity to hold them… releases of migrants at bus stops, gas stations, supermarkets, etc., in communities across the border.’
“Now, this week, some of our Democratic colleagues are feigning great angst and indignation over Title 42’s demise. They claim to be outraged that President Biden doesn’t have a better plan.
“But every Senator had a chance just last year to vote to keep funding Title 42 measures. Senate Republicans gave our Democratic colleagues that opportunity. And every single Democrat voted in lock-step against it.
“Every Senate Democrat voted in unison to let Title 42 lapse, with no better solution in place.
“The country reaps what Democrats sowed.”
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Related Issues: House Democrats, Homeland Security, Immigration, Crime, Senate Democrats
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