STRENGTHENING AMERICA'S SECURITY IN THE MIDDLE EAST ACT OF 2019--Motion to Proceed

Floor Speech

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Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, from El Paso to Brownsville, TX, my State shares a 1,200-mile border with Mexico. If you were daring enough to attempt to walk that entire stretch, you would trek through deserts, cross mountains, through cities, and probably end up getting a little wet in the Rio Grande River. You would meet folks who are proud of the strong bonds our country has with our southern neighbor. Many, of course, have relatives in both countries. You would talk to sheriffs, police officers, Border Patrol agents, all who care deeply about protecting our communities. And undoubtedly, you would end up eating some good Tex-Mex along the way.

In my time in the Senate, I have had the opportunity to meet countless Texans who live and work along the southern border, and I seek their advice and counsel on what Congress ought to do, what the Federal Government ought to do to protect them and their communities. What they tell me is that Texans and the Nation rely on the billions of dollars of legitimate trade that comes across the ports of entry with Mexico. But with the growing volume of goods crossing our borders and the persistent staff shortages for Customs and Border Protection, they want to make sure there are no security gaps that can be exploited by criminals or slow down the legal movement of goods. That is a concern I share, and I continue to advocate for additional improvements in our ports of entry to protect this vital lifeline for our economy, as well as our security.

But just as these communities care deeply about the economic benefits of our shared border, they care deeply, of course, about their own safety and security. They believe that both can peacefully coexist, and so do I.

During my visits, I have witnessed some of the horrific treatment that migrants receive at the hands of the criminals, including those who smuggle them. The truth is, these criminal organizations that move people and drugs and contraband across our border exploit our porous border and care nothing for human life. It is a commodity. It is the way they make money. They care nothing for the people they hurt, so they wring another dollar out of someone else's misery on a daily basis. It is a high-volume business, too, and incredibly lucrative.

I have seen the stash houses with windows lined with tin foil, and inside, a veritable cesspool that makes you want to gag or lose what you had for lunch. This is where the human smugglers cram large groups of illegal immigrants in unimaginable conditions while awaiting their transit to the interior of the United States.

I have seen their logbooks where they record their corrupt transactions, correlating real-life human beings with their value in dollars and cents.

I have talked to Border Patrol agents who have discovered tractor trailers full of people attempting to enter our country, some of whom never complete their journey because they die from exposure or are smothered to death in the crammed quarters.

In Brooks County, TX, where the Falfurrias checkpoint of the Border Patrol is located, about 50 miles north of the border, I have seen unmarked graves of the migrants who were trying to cross vast swaths of South Texas in the August heat in order to bypass the Border Patrol checkpoint but then were left to die by the smugglers. Their graves are marked only with identities like ``skull case'' or ``unknown female.''

Border security is not immoral, as Speaker Pelosi has shamefully claimed, but refusing to act in the face of evil is immoral. It is clear that there is a crisis, as it is clear that it is our responsibility to restore safety and security and order. In my wildest dreams, I never would have imagined we would be debating whether we should secure our borders, as we apparently are now. That is something on which we should all agree. Instead, we should be focused on how to secure our borders and how to do it in a smart, responsible way.

In my experience, learning from the experts, they tell me there is no one-size-fits-all solution. You can imagine that with a 1,200-mile border with just Texas and Mexico, with the variety of topography and geography, one-size-fits-all does not work. What works best in the Rio Grande Valley doesn't necessarily work in an urban environment like El Paso, with Juarez right across the international bridge.

We need to customize solutions that meet the specific need rather than trying to dictate from here in Washington--thousands of miles away--a solution that solves nothing. We need to look at border security as a combination of three things: physical infrastructure-- yes, that includes barriers, walls, fences, vehicle barriers in appropriate locations, but it also includes technology--radar, ground sensors, drones, aerostats. This is a layered approach that provides flexibility for the experts on the ground to determine what is best for each sector, what is best for each part of our immense border, and implement the changes necessary to achieve desired results. As I said, in many areas, the landscape and location mean physical barriers may not be needed and may not be practical. In rural areas, technology-- censor technology or cameras--may be sufficient, but we know we need additional boots on the ground, too, because it is not enough to put a barrier in place or have a radar or ground censor in place if you don't have the Border Patrol to show up and detain people they discover trying to make their way illegally into the United States or bringing drugs into the United States. So some combination of these three elements I think is always going to be needed, no matter where you are talking about.

I am proud of the work we have done in the Senate, generally speaking, and I know when we work together we can do a lot of good, but logic and experience should tell us we shouldn't be the ones deciding how every inch of our southern border is secure. I don't claim to be an expert, although I have gone to school on the topic and spent a lot of time talking to those people who are experts and learning from them. I believe we need to let those experts drive the decision-making process on the right combination of resources needed to achieve operational control of the border. Unfortunately, our Democratic colleagues' refusal to invest in real border security has landed us in a partial government shutdown resulting in 800,000 Federal workers who on Friday will not get a paycheck. That is unnecessary. Unfortunately, they are collateral damage to a political game which we should not be playing. I know many of these 800,000 Federal workers are already anxious about how they will make a car payment or how they will pay their mortgage or their rent or how they will put food on the table. It is completely unnecessary, this shutdown.

I am afraid this debate on border security of course is not really a debate about border security at all; it is a way for congressional Democrats to take a stand against a President they oppose while putting border communities at risk and sending the men and women who protect them to work without pay. This battle has gone on too long, and I can only hope Speaker Pelosi and Minority Leader Schumer show some leadership rather than continue to take the low road. This shouldn't be about winning a partisan fight; it should be about protecting our citizens and stemming the tide of illegal immigration, drugs, and contraband entering our country. If there were ever a time, now is the time for common sense to prevail and end this senseless shutdown.

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