Missing Persons and Unidentified Remains Act of 2019

Floor Speech

Mr. Speaker, while I support this legislation, I strongly believe in ensuring justice for all victims and their families. I want to be absolutely clear that the continued crisis at our border requires more from Congress.

S. 2174 provides resources to law enforcement and related entities tasked with processing the remains of those who tragically died while making the dangerous journey to enter this country illegally.

But Congress should be doing more to secure our borders and to prevent these tragic deaths in the first place. I am concerned about the burdens this bill places on our already strained U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

Under this bill, CBP is charged with documenting information about individuals who died at the border, reporting on the causes of their deaths, and mapping their final locations. I truly fear that these reports may be used by open-border advocates to malign the men and women of the U.S. Border Patrol when those advocates inevitably decide to play politics and start to argue that CBP is not doing enough to mitigate migrant deaths.

In reality, to prevent future deaths at the border, we need to make it absolutely clear that no one should embark on this dangerous journey because illegal entry is simply not an option. We must fix our broken immigration system, which incentivizes people to cross our border illegally. Strong border security and interior enforcement is the best way to stop loss of life.

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Mr. RESCHENTHALER. Mr. Speaker, in closing, while I support this bill, I think Congress must do more to secure our borders.

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