Protecting Our Communities From Failure to Secure the Border Act of 2023

Floor Speech

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Mrs. RAMIREZ. Mr. Chair, we just got back from a week with family. Many of us sat around the table, and we thanked God for the family, for the children, and for the ability to have a roof over their head. Some of you remembered that your family came 100, 200 years ago. In my case they came 40 years ago from Guatemala, and now we are back here with the same rhetoric that we continue to play over and over and over. Republicans are using human beings as bargaining chips to try to realize their extreme and their very harmful policies.

Despite their efforts to cut funding for land protection, cut social safety net services, and bankrupt our Federal infrastructure, they also want us to believe that providing emergency refuge and services to asylum seekers is what is causing all our economic problems.

Now, let me talk about that for a second. Immigrants are not the problem. They are an asset. They are actually a solution to improve our economy.

If you go to the neighborhood ALDI like I do, Mr. Chair, I see three people working there, and when I talk to the cashiers, they say to me: Congresswoman, get those work permits. We need workers.

There are 11.5 million people ready to help fill the almost 9 million open jobs right now. Those open jobs are disrupting the supply chain, and they are increasing inflation. These immigrants are ready to support the 245 million Americans, many of them living in our own communities, living in counties with shrinking populations. They are ready to invest in housing markets, and they are ready to grow our local economies.

Mr. Chair, if you actually ask our people: What keeps you up at night?

It is not being able to pay rent.

What keeps people up at night is that they have to work two jobs just to raise two children.

What keeps people up at night is that they can't afford milk and they can't afford other things.

It is not an undocumented person.

So let's talk about the economy because that is exactly what people want us to be able to address.

Immigrants are ready to increase our national GDP by up to $1.7 trillion over the next decade.

We should be working to address the root cause of this issue by ensuring their successful resettlement and integration instead of shaming them and then going back home and thanking God for family, community, and country.

I ask my colleagues to reject this bill. Let's get to the real work of delivering work permits for all and establishing pathways to citizenship today and improving our economy.

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