Executive Session

Floor Speech

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Mrs. BLACKBURN. Mr. President, thank you for the recognition and opportunity to speak with my colleagues about an issue that I think is so incredibly important.

We just heard the Senator from Vermont discuss the issue at the southern border. I made a return trip--one of many I have made to the southern border over the past decade--this past Friday. I have to tell you, I thought this situation was just a terrible situation a decade ago. As I have continued to visit and work on issues that deal with illegal immigration, illegal aliens, working on immigration reform over the past decade, many times with great frustration because we cannot achieve bipartisan agreement, I saw a situation on the southern border this trip that was far worse than I ever could have imagined.

In the middle of all of this are some very brave Border Patrol agents, ICE agents, DHS agents, Coast Guard that are there providing healthcare--they are carrying out their job every single day. I am grateful to them for their service. I am so impressed by their resolve to protect this Nation--to protect it.

There is a lesson we could learn from these Border Patrol agents. As they go out, underfunded, disrespected, not knowing what they are going to encounter, there is a lesson that every single American could learn. These men and women are dedicated. They show up. They do their job. They value--they value--citizenship in this country. They value this Nation's sovereignty. And one of the things they know is that citizenship--citizenship--is something the American people should hold very dear. It should not come to somebody illegally approaching our country. It should not come to somebody who is coming here to do us harm.

I will tell you this: To enter one of those reception centers or retention centers in the El Paso sector--which is there in Southwest Texas and right on the New Mexico-Mexico border--is to enter an area where you can just feel the chaos and the uncertainty. It permeates the air.

People know this is difficult. The American people should know this is very difficult. It is a terrible situation that our men and women of the Border Patrol are dealing with--to see young mothers alone with their babies, waiting for answers from a Federal agency about where they are going to go or what is going to happen to them because somebody in Central America lied to them--a cartel lied to them, misrepresented to them what they were going to see.

I heard from a Border Patrol agent that there are adults who are saying: Well, this is not what we were promised. This isn't what we were expecting. Maybe we should just go back home. They were lied to.

This is why we need to get busy with changing the asylum laws, the magnet that is pulling people here. Change this. It is why I applaud the efforts of the President for making certain that we are dealing with Mexico--having them secure their southern border, having them call out the National Guard to make certain these cartels are not able to operate in Mexico.

Our Border Patrol--as I said, I am just so grateful we have them, and without Americans knowing, they are blessing our lives every single day because they show up and do the job that is in front of them without proper resources because there has not been bipartisan agreement here.

Then, every day they go home, and they have encountered people who have measles, mumps, H1N1 flu, TB, scabies, lice. That is what they are exposed to every single day as they do their job. Healthcare is not their job. Securing the southern border is their job, and everybody who is against giving the Border Patrol what they need to secure that border needs to begin to think twice about that and have compassion for these men and women who are on the frontline.

The appalling conditions absolutely shock the conscience, but they didn't surprise me. This is what is happening because people think they can get by with coming here illegally. Last month, 144,000 migrants crossed the border--last month. In Tennessee, that is just under the size of Clarksville, TN. Think about a whole city coming in.

In the first 8 months of this fiscal year, 411,000 unaccompanied children and families made that same journey.

This past weekend, when I was out with the Border Patrol, 12 people in 3 groups were apprehended right in front of me. That was in the timespan of 30 minutes. There were four from Honduras, and eight were from Cuba. That is just a handful of the approximately 1,000 illegal aliens per day who are apprehended in the El Paso sector.

Ninety percent of those people come as family units, clogging a system designed to process adults traveling alone. The sheer number of people our agents are struggling to process and control is staggering.

Right now, the facilities at the El Paso border station house are taking in 1,247 illegal aliens. That facility is built to accommodate 123. At just one station in the El Paso sector, $26,000 a day is spent on food, just food--food. Where are they getting this money? It has not been appropriated. They are taking it out of their operations budgets. This is why they need us to surge resources to the southern border-- resources for more agents, resources for more technology, resources for a border wall to stop illegal entry into this country.

If it were just a question of numbers, the situation may seem more manageable. But as I mentioned, disease, drugs, and a frightening disregard for the law have transformed these border stations into refugee zones.

Right now, agents at camps are working overtime every single day, trying to keep up. Loopholes in regulations controlling the release of unaccompanied minors to purported custodians are endangering the 11,507 children who crossed the southern border in May of 2019.

I want to be certain everybody understands this: 11,507 is the number of children who crossed that southern border in the month of May.

To make things worse, we are seeing child predators and traffickers cross the border in increasing numbers. Girls as young as 10 years of age are being given pregnancy tests--10-year-olds--because traffickers or adults who are not family members are the ones who are bringing them in. This is an area where my colleagues across the aisle need to work with us and put a stop to this. We don't know if these children are going to smuggling rings, or sex rings and being sent to a pimp, or to labor gangs and being sent to a boss. We don't know because many of the people who are the so-called custodians who are accepting these children, who are their sponsors, guess what, they are in the country illegally.

On June 7, border agents seized enough fentanyl to kill nearly 2 million Americans. I was there in that port when they seized 5 kilos, but the drug lords and the cartels are undeterred. They are so bold in this; do you know what they are doing now? They are posting Facebook ads soliciting mules to run their deadly product across the border. We have to do better. This is something that should no longer be up for debate.

I sponsored the Accountability for Care of Unaccompanied Alien Children Act to codify information-sharing agreements between the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Health and Human Services. This would help protect minors from the ravages of exploitation and human trafficking, but that protection isn't possible if there are not going to be agents able and available to check on who is attempting to claim these children.

I know some of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle are not for these agencies sharing this information, but let me tell you something. If this is going to help keep children safe, if it is going to keep them out of these sex trafficking and human trafficking gangs, we need to know who is a criminal alien, who is in this country illegally, and these children do not need to be sent to them.

We know the White House in May sent an emergency request for $4.5 billion in funds to increase shelter capacity at the processing centers, to feed and care for the detained migrants, to hire agents and staff, and to bolster law enforcement's ability to shelter and protect unaccompanied minors. Our border agents need this money to protect our border and to protect our Nation's sovereignty.

Yesterday, before the Senate Judiciary Committee, acting DHS Secretary Kevin McAleenan expressed serious concerns for Border Patrol agents who are forced to play the part of a translator, caregiver, counselor, and nurse.

Let me ask a question. What do my colleagues think would happen if the Border Patrol decided they had had it? They had had it. They were tired of it, and they were not going to show up for work, to work overtime, to work hard hours, to do a job they are not trained to do. They are trained to protect the border; they are not trained to be a caregiver and a nurse. What would happen if they reached the breaking point, and they didn't show up--because, let me tell you something, this border has reached a breaking point.

It is time for us to realize, yes, there is a crisis. It is a humanitarian crisis; it is a national security crisis, and it is time that our Border Patrol be shown the respect--the respect they deserve by funding the needs that they have to protect each and every one of us and to help keep this Nation safe and secure.

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