Secure the Border Act of 2023

Floor Speech

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Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, rain can be a blessing or a curse depending on whether we get too much or too little. Like water, America can sustain our prosperity and our strength by the flow of people who want to come here, if they can come here legally. What Republicans rave about as a crisis, if properly addressed, represents a great opportunity for our country.

By overcoming Republican opposition last year, we have achieved the lowest unemployment in America in 50 years. If every single American who is reported as unemployed today were to take a job, we would still have millions of unfilled jobs in this country.

Our economy is crying out ``help wanted'' to which Republicans respond, ``keep out,'' and ``let's build a wall to wall us off from the rest of the world.''

We have a serious worker shortage. Our economic growth today is being slowed because so many businesses cannot find the workers they need to fulfill the needs of their customers.

Yet, just across our border are a host of people who are looking for a job. We need construction workers. We need workers to care for the old, the ill, and the young, and restaurant and other service jobs. Some of them are very highly skilled, and some of them are hardly skilled.

If some immigrants could work in this country and come here legally and go home when they need to, then they wouldn't be risking their lives in deserts, dying in dangerous rivers, and sitting on the streets of our border communities.

Certainly, we cannot take everyone who wants to come here. We need rules for orderly immigration and for fairness. They are the rules that Republicans have blocked in this Congress for years. So long as they see any immigrant hysteria as more valuable to them politically than finding a solution, then we are not going to get there. Today's vote represents just their latest refusal to accept reality and another refusal to enact a comprehensive and reasonable system for legal entry for workers.

There is, of course, a humanitarian aspect. Our Dreamers, who were brought here as little children and many of whom are now adults, are facing years of uncertainty. A nurse, a Travis County prosecutor, a teacher, and many students whom I have met personally, still don't know how long they can tell their employer they can work. There is so much they have to contribute. Multiple studies show they will only strengthen our economy.

There are other families in Texas border towns today who have risked everything to escape oppression and corrupt and authoritarian governments like Venezuela. Many of them have legitimate claims for political asylum, but the Republicans have abandoned the promise of our Statue of Liberty.

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Mr. DOGGETT. America's strength has always been found in our diversity. Let's overcome the fearmongering and the anti-immigrant hysteria and do the serious, hard work of passing genuine comprehensive immigration reform. Let's turn immigration into a true win for the American people.

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