Motion to Discharge
Floor Speech
BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT
Mrs. BLACKBURN. Madam President, last week, the Biden administration announced their truly incomprehensible decision to suspend the use of title 42 authority along the southern border. Now, this is just the last in a long line of decisions that this White House has made that defy both reason and a mountain of evidence suggesting they are about to make a deadly mistake.
Even with those title 42 protections in place, this February was the worst February for illegal immigration and border crossings in almost 20 years. The past year was the worst year for illegal border crossings since at least 1960, and according to public reports, the Department of Homeland Security predicts that it is only going to get worse. We will soon see the crossings increase.
They are preparing for up to 18,000 attempted border crossings per day. That is right--18,000 attempted crossings per day. Now, I want to put this in perspective for you. About 90 percent of the 345 towns in my State of Tennessee have a population smaller than 18,000 people-- smaller than the number of people DHS expects are going to try to enter the country illegally every single day. This is chaos. This is border chaos. Think about this: That is like a small Tennessee town every single day of the week, of the month, of the year.
So we have to ask ourselves, how long can we sustain this? And when we look at this border that is in chaos and 18,000 a day--a small town a day coming into the country, trying to claim asylum, illegally entering the country. And we have evidence that this is going to escalate sooner rather than later. And this is the moment that the Biden administration chooses to strip away one of the most important and effective border control tools that we have at our disposal--take it away just as we know that people are coming to the border in record numbers.
And how do we know this? We know that the cartels are now working in countries all across the globe. They are doing this because they are saying: Hey, now you are really going to get in. Pay up. Make the cartels richer because you know this, President Biden--he is all for doing away with the border. He is all for opening that border up and saying: Come on. Come on.
I think that we have to keep in mind a few things. Now, when you keep that in mind--those 18,000 people a day--think about the new set of statistics that we have coming from Border Patrol this month. So far this year, CBP officers in Memphis have seized more than 2,500 pounds of drugs. You know, I had a sheriff tell me: We used to look at drugs in grams and ounces. Now it is all in pounds because of the quantities coming across this border because of Joe Biden's policies.
During the last 2 weeks of March, officials in El Paso seized more than 100 pounds of drugs and arrested 37 fugitives. Those fugitives weren't petty criminals. Among them were a murderer, a pedophile, a fraudster, a counterfeiter, and multiple drug dealers. Yes, that was 2 weeks, and that is what they had right there in El Paso. These are the ones they could identify. And, in addition to the drugs, 37 fugitives from justice were trying to enter our country and escape justice in their country. It is an open door. This is dangerous--very dangerous.
On March 29, in a separate drug bust, Border Patrol seized more than $400,000 worth of meth, fentanyl, and heroin. That is right. That was 1 day, one drug bust. And over the course of a 24-hour period ending on March 30, Border Patrol stopped five migrant smuggling events and arrested 140 people.
Now, I thought it was interesting that CBP chose to use the term ``migrant smuggling'' for that one, but I think we should call it what it is: It is human trafficking--5 human trafficking events, 1 day, 140 people.
You know, I just have to say, what in the world does this administration think is going on at that border? Why will the President not go down there? Why will he not empower people to do their job? Why will he not build a wall, put surveillance, apprehend people, turn them back? But to knowingly let them come into this country, to know that cartels are working around the globe, that they are going to get rich on this--it is kind of like the Biden bonus for the cartels. The doors are open; bring them.
This is unbelievable--absolutely unbelievable. These drug dealers and human traffickers spend their days running back and forth across that border under the watchful eye of the cartels. The cartels are in control on the Mexico side of this border. You do not come across unless you have paid the cartel.
And those cartels are going to use those 18,000 people, the equivalent of a Tennessee town--90-percent of our towns are 18,000 people or less--coming across, being used by the cartels as human shields. What kind of compassion is this? What kind of protection for the American people is this? It is disgusting.
We know that these cartels are going to be able to push these people into the interior, and then those people are going to lose themselves in this wave of humanity, because that is what they have been doing for the past 15 months.
Meanwhile, here in Washington, Democrats have spent 15 months attacking border security as a racist barrier to their open borders agenda. Their spin isn't rooted in reality, but neither is their current ambition to throw open the border in the name of optics. I want to be clear here. If the Democrats indeed abandon title 42, they might bump up their approval numbers with the liberal base, but they are also inviting a humanitarian catastrophe on a massive scale.
Yes, indeed, as I was out in East Tennessee, up on the Upper Cumberland Plateau, this Friday, what I heard from every single law enforcement officer, every county mayor was that, now, because of the human trafficking, the gangs, drug trafficking, sex trafficking, every single town is a border town. Every State is a border State, because all these people coming across the border are coming to your community with their drugs, with their gangs. And if we empower the cartels and open the floodgates to drug dealers and human traffickers, we are not just putting our own communities at risk, we are endangering the thousands of women and children that these criminals are hiding behind because they are trafficking them. So much for their optics.
I think it is clear by now that the Biden administration is almost entirely controlled by the activists who helped him gain power. When people back home ask me to describe what it is like working in the Senate these days, I tell them it feels like a food fight between liberal special interest groups. The Democrats are just throwing spaghetti against the wall, waiting to see what sticks.
Now, they have made a real mess, but they can't seem to gain traction on anything. So why is that? Well, because the reality of the situation in New York and California and Illinois tells the people all they need to know about what is in store for the country if the Democrats get what they want.
They are working with a truly miserable track record. Take a look at it: 7.9 percent inflation. The prices are going up, whether it is at the gas pump or the grocery store. Zero commitment to border security-- we are seeing that played out in realtime. Embassies in Afghanistan and Ukraine are left to rot. That is right. He pulled people out. He pulled people out and left a lot of our people behind--and a nominee for the Supreme Court who is proudly untethered to the Constitution.
Joe Biden really has earned that 55 percent disapproval rating; hasn't he?
Unlike our friends in the mainstream media who think this is all a joke, the American people are taking this very seriously. For them, common sense isn't political. It is practical, and it is necessary. They don't need an activist or a journalist or a comedian to tell them what they believe. They know everything that Joe Biden and his administration and the Democrat control of the House and Senate-- everything they have touched has turned to dust, is on a downward slide--everything. Just look at this. Look at what they have done in a very short period of time.
They also know, when it comes to our Supreme Court Justice nominee-- people in Tennessee know what a woman is. They don't need a biologist to tell them. They know that reckless government spending is making their life more expensive every day and, in some cases, unaffordable. And they know full well because many of them have worked, been a part of our military, volunteered to serve. They are people who have come home, and they are working in law enforcement. They know and will tell you that peace comes through strength, not through surrender, and they are not going to tolerate a government that claims ignorance of all this, that wants to do happy talk and say: Everything is going to be just fine. Don't believe your eyes. Don't believe your eyes. Don't believe that price at the gas pump. Oh, the grocery store shelves, they are full--even though the produce aisles may be mostly empty.
They know that the woke mob is knocking at their door, and they know the consequences and what it means to them.
BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT
Source