Termination of National Emergency Declared By the President on February 2019
Floor Speech
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Mr. BIGGS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding time to me.
I will just tell you, I spent at least a couple weeks on the border this year alone, multiple times. I have been in every facility that I can find, and I get down there as often as I can. I talk almost daily to folks who live along the border.
I would get a chuckle, if it weren't so doggone serious, when I hear people say: Oh, no, there are no drugs coming across the border. We are getting them on the ocean.
I will tell you one thing: In the Tucson sector, 40 percent of the drugs that come into this country from the south, they come in through the Tucson sector. You know why? There are 75 miles of open border. You have one port of entry. It has a fence, about a mile-and-a-half on each side of it. Then you have single-strand barbed wire for as far as you can see. You have four-strand barbed wire. You know what it is holding it up to? It is coming up to the bollard fencing. It has a slipknot, in case you need to get into the country. You can stand there and look at the five paths that come across. They all come right to the place where the slipknot is.
I will tell you one thing: If you have a problem with an emergency declaration, then you just simply don't know what an emergency is.
Mr. Speaker, 1.1 million people have surrendered or have been apprehended at the border this year.
Another million or so--we don't even know--have come across. We even let 1.2 million people come in legally this year.
And you want to tell me you don't have a border crisis? You have got opioid addiction and overdoses killing people. You have got people coming in unvetted.
You had 1,000 people come in from where? The Congo--the Congo--right through the Rio Grande Valley.
I am telling you something: For you to stand there and say you don't think this is an emergency means you just simply aren't paying attention.
And this President has the authority--because Congress delegated that authority to the President of the United States of America--to deal with emergencies, and this becomes a true crisis, a true emergency.
I will just give you one thing.
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Mr. BIGGS. I was at one place, the most remote border entry we have got in the entire country. It is only open 9 to 4.
We have three customs agents assigned there. We have got one Border Patrol agent who actually lives there in a double-wide mobile home. I won't say what his name is. Let's just say it is Bob.
The night before I got there, 2 a.m., 255 people, cartel-driven-- because there is no place for 30 miles, 40 miles. That is the nearest town. So, 250 people were dropped off, and they all go up and knock on the door of the double-wide.
They are reading from a paper. They say: ``Bob, we declare asylum.''
I talked to an agent. He tells me that he has been exposed, in the last 6 weeks, to hepatitis A, B, and C; measles; mumps; lice; scabies; and he said: ``Don't forget, a skin-eating bacteria that they haven't been able to identify yet.''
That is not a border crisis? You don't want to address that? I am telling you, it needs to be addressed. It needs to be addressed today.
I thank the President for having the courage to do it. You know what? If you want more money, get him more money for the Coast Guard. I will support that.
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