Economic Policies Crushing to Working Poor

Floor Speech

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Mrs. BICE of Oklahoma. Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Arizona.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to address the ongoing crisis happening at our southern border. Since President Biden took office, he has stopped building the wall, brought back catch and release, and ended the remain in Mexico policy.

As a result, this administration has created the worst humanitarian, national security, and public health crisis ever seen at our Nation's southern border.

In the past 3 months, each month, we have seen more than 170,000 border encounters, a new 21-year high, totaling over half a million illegal border crossings. These numbers are resulting in overcrowded shelters, human trafficking, drug smuggling, and violence.

In addition, the surge of unaccompanied children coming across the border shows no signs of slowing down.

In June, the number of children arriving daily rose to 530. A journey like this is not only unsafe; it could lead to sexual exploitation or forced labor.

Despite the continuing increase of border encounters each month, House Democrats want to defund Customs and Border Protection and Immigration and Customs Enforcement by nearly $1 billion. Our CBP, ICE, and DHS officers have been putting their lives at risk protecting Americans. Calling to defund them during the worst immigration crisis in U.S. modern history is deeply troubling.

Mr. Speaker, the open border rhetoric from the Biden administration has encouraged hundreds of thousands of people to make the dangerous trek to the U.S. We must secure the border. We must protect our border cities. We must support the men and women who honorably protect our border. We must end this heartbreaking crisis.

In addition to the immigration crisis that we are seeing on the southern border, we are now dealing with a COVID crisis that is not being addressed. The number of individuals crossing into this country with COVID has increased exponentially.

These individuals are not being tested. They are not being offered vaccinations. They are being put on buses and shipped across this country.

With the number of cases on the increase, it is imperative that this administration addresses the border crisis issue immediately.

Mr. Speaker, I again thank my colleague from Arizona.

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Mrs. BICE of Oklahoma. I had not heard that, so that is incredibly interesting information.

I think that with the mandates that are being put in place by the administration, asking for vaccinations of Federal employees, vaccinations of our military, how about we test and vaccinate people who are illegally coming into this country if we are going to ship them all over the U.S.?

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Mrs. BICE of Oklahoma. It is an incredible irony.

I will say I appreciate this whistleblower coming forward and providing that information to us because you are right, we are not being given accurate or timely information about what is happening on the border currently.

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Mrs. BICE of Oklahoma. I guess it remains to be seen.

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