Supporting United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement

Floor Speech

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Mr. CUELLAR. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H. Res. 990.

The issue is not the law enforcement agencies or the personnel, but, rather, it is the administration's policies regarding enforcement.

ICE has become a lightning rod for the anger, quite honestly, about President Trump's hardline immigration policies. Our number one goal is to defend our homeland. ICE officers and special agents perform a vital role each day to keep our country safe. I want to make sure that we clear up some confusion about what ICE does, what their functions are.

ICE is split into two primary functions: one is the enforcement and removal operations, which is the one that enforces the Nation's immigration laws; the other, which is very, very important, is it investigates all types of cross-border criminal activities, which include financial crimes; money laundering; bulk cash smuggling; commercial fraud; intellectual property theft; cyber crimes; child pornography; human rights violations; human smuggling and trafficking; information, document, and benefit fraud; narcotics and weapons smuggling and trafficking; transnational gang activities; export enforcements; and international art and antiquity theft.

Again, as has been mentioned, the good work that ICE has done in FY 2017: 4,818 transnational gang members were arrested, over 11,000 narcotics criminal arrests were made, and 904 sexually exploited children were identified and rescued. I know that for a fact because my brother has worked with ICE, the sheriff down there, Martin Cuellar, and they have saved some of the kids there.

Again, the issue is not law enforcement agencies or personnel. It is not the men and women who are working there very hard every day, but it is, rather, the policies of the administration regarding this.

Again, I would ask Members to please look at this legislation and support it.

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