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Floor Speech
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Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, as the world knows, it goes without saying that one of President Biden's biggest failures was security at our southern border. In fact, the situation is so dire that now Democrats, after the November 5 election, are actually finally seeing the light that they need to do something to recapture the support of the American people, and that was reflected in the first piece of legislation we passed that President Trump will sign into law tomorrow: the Laken Riley Act.
Twelve of our Democratic colleagues in the Senate and 46 in the House supported that bill, which I have to think, before the November 5 election, they would have uniformly voted against. But they realized that they were so out of sync with the American people and our national security interests, I would love to say they got religion or saw the light. Maybe they just counted the votes.
I am heartened, though, that they have seemed to buck the liberal status quo when it comes to the border and actually helped us pass a law that will strengthen our security and make our communities safer. But let's make no mistake about where this crisis came from that took the life of Laken Riley and so many others. This is one that the Biden administration invited and exacerbated from day one after President Biden took office.
On the campaign trail in 2020, President Biden made this pledge. He said:
I would in fact make sure that we immediately surge to the border all those people who are seeking asylum.
Now, that was a big welcome mat or invitation for anybody and everybody across the planet to show up at the border and to claim asylum. And because of the backlog in asylum claims and the fact that they would be released into the interior of the country, basically that was a free ticket into the United States outside of what should be our regular, orderly, lawful immigration system.
But President Biden didn't stop there. When he assumed office, he ended all of the policies of the previous administration--very successful policies like President Trump's ``Remain in Mexico'' policy. He halted the construction of the border wall and, instead, spent Federal dollars to store unused wall materials. And then, right before the election or right after the election, we found out they were actually selling these border wall materials for essentially salvage or for pennies on the dollar. And knowing that, with President Trump resuming office again, we would have to repurchase those items, it just seemed like a kick in the teeth for the American taxpayer and contemptuous, frankly, of law and order.
So we also know that, sort of to add insult to injury, the Biden administration created the so-called CBP One app. This is an app for your phone. CBP stands for ``Customs and Border Protection.'' So, basically, what happens is people outside of the country who wanted to come here and claim asylum, knowing they would be released into the interior of the country and have to wait for years--maybe as long as a decade--before they would appear before an immigration judge, they could literally make an appointment to show up at a port of entry using the CBP One app.
So here you have the Federal Government, the U.S. Government, facilitating the movement of people into the country that were transported here by criminal organizations that got rich thanks to the Biden administration. And it was not uncommon to see people coming from far-flung parts of the planet.
Now, I live in Texas. We have a 1,200-mile border with Mexico. We are accustomed, over the years, to people from Mexico or Central or even South America coming to the border, but not people from Latvia, from China, from the Middle East. But under the Biden administration, they knew that they were going to be able to come to the United States, and they could actually even schedule an appointment thanks to the misguided policies of the Biden administration.
Even as this crisis continued to grow, President Biden ended the use of the very effective title 42 authority, which was used during COVID to limit the movement of adult males into the country because of the COVID situation.
While this is a national crisis that President Biden created, it is one that has been felt most acutely by the people of Texas, the 31 million people I represent. In the midst of the Biden administration's abject failure to keep the American people safe and to control the movement of people and drugs, including some of the most dangerous criminals you can imagine, it was up to the State of Texas and our leadership, like Governor Abbott, to step up and defend our people and our borders the best we could.
Now, understand, border security is not normally a State function because this is an international border, which means it is a Federal responsibility. But what are we supposed to do when the President of the United States and the Federal Government fail to do their job? Well, the State stepped up, which means not only our leadership, our National Guard, but also Texas taxpayers. In other words, we had to pay the tab to provide for border security such as we could, instead of the Federal Government picking up the tab, as it should have.
So Governor Abbott initiated Operation Lone Star, which resulted in more than half a million illegal immigrants being apprehended by Texas law enforcement. More than 50,000 criminals were arrested, and more than 240 miles of border barriers were built by the State--not at Federal expense, a Federal responsibility, but at State expense, by State taxpayers.
This law enforcement operation also intercepted a half a billion doses of fentanyl. Fentanyl, as we now know, is spread throughout the United States--is hidden in counterfeit pills that look like an innocuous pharmaceutical, only to find out that it will kill you in small doses. It took roughly 70,000 lives last year alone, and it is a leading cause of death for young people between the age of 18 and 45. That is what comes over the border in addition to the millions of people.
I applaud the efforts of the Governor and our State legislature to step up and to secure the border and to protect my fellow Texans, even when the Federal Government--the President of the United States and Vice President--turned a blind eye.
As a result of Operation Lone Star, Texas was able to reduce illegal immigration into the State by 87 percent. But, as I said, these efforts came at a very real cost. The State of Texas spent nearly $4.8 billion on walls and barriers, local grants to counties and cities, processing criminal arrests, and moving migrants out of small Texas towns.
Deploying the National Guard for building border barriers, guarding and constructing those barriers, and apprehending migrants who were illegally present in the United States cost another $3.6 billion. Then Texas had personnel costs for our State troopers, Department of Public Safety troopers, who were responsible for repelling additional illegal migrants, arresting those who otherwise broke the law, transnational gang members, cartel members, human smugglers, and human traffickers. The Federal Government didn't do it; so Texas did. That came to an additional $2.25 billion in taxpayer expenditure--money that should have been provided by the Federal Government for a Federal responsibility, borne by the taxpayers of my State.
The Texas Department of Criminal Justice spent an additional $311.2 million on anti-gang violence. The number of dangerous gangs emanating from Central America or Venezuela are well-known and, indeed, these are some of the most dangerous people that have made their way into the United States as a result of the policies of the Biden administration. So Texas had no choice but to deal with anti-gang violence.
And then there is a cost associated with the prosecution of these border crimes at Operation Lone Star's criminal processing centers.
And then the game wardens--this was an ``all hands on deck.'' Even the game wardens in Texas played a role. They patrolled the Rio Grande River to prevent illegal entries.
Criminal processing centers required health and safety services. And the list goes on and on and on.
This was an all-of-government effort in the State of Texas. Even the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission put millions of dollars toward interdicting human trafficking at the border.
All told, as a result of the Biden-Harris administration's abject dereliction of its responsibility at an international border, to enforce the law cost the State of Texas about $11.1 billion.
Now, Texas, unlike many of the States in the rest of the country, doesn't have an income tax. We fund our government through sales tax and through property tax, and we don't have an income tax. This was a painful expenditure by the Texas legislature and by our leadership. And that figure doesn't even take into account what local counties and cities and other nonprofits were forced to further shoulder when it came to the financial burden.
Before President Biden came to office, Texas spent $800 million every 2 years on border security, roughly $400 million a year. That means that taxpayers are on the hook for nearly 14 times what they typically spent on border security due to the failure of the Biden administration.
It wasn't just negligence. It was intentional. It was willful.
Keeping our Nation's border secure is the responsibility of the Federal Government. It is not and it should not be the responsibility of the individual States. That is part of our constitutional framework.
This is a crisis that the Biden administration literally invited by rolling out the welcome mat and refusing to enforce laws that were on the books.
What is worse? In the midst of this disaster, the Federal Government reimbursed others--nonprofits, nongovernmental associations--to help facilitate illegal immigration, through FEMA's Emergency Food and Shelter Program to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars.
So Texas has been stuck with the check for the Biden-Harris failed policies, and that is wrong. Governor Abbott has asked Congress to reimburse Texas for its costs that should have been incurred by the Federal Government in the first instance. I support this request. And along with our State delegation, we are going to fight to get Texas taxpayers the money they are rightfully owed.
The Texas congressional delegation is 40 individuals strong--38 in the House and 2 here in the Senate--and we believe it is only right and just for the Federal Government and the Congress to reimburse the State for expenditures it should have never had to make if the Biden-Harris administration had simply done its job, which is to provide for a secure border.
Surely, if the Federal Government can reimburse nongovernmental organizations for rolling out the welcome mat for illegal migrants, it could also cover Texas's expenses for keeping U.S. citizens safe.
And the work that was done along the border did not accrue to the benefit solely of people in Texas. I mentioned the fentanyl crisis. Fentanyl now, unfortunately, has spread to 50 States. But the work that was done at the border, keeping some of the fentanyl out of the country and arresting criminals at the border, that benefited people in all 50 States--again, another reason why this is a Federal responsibility.
It is only a matter of basic fairness that the Federal Government should step up and help address a crisis that was a problem of its own making. Texas taxpayers should not have to foot the bill alone as a result of President Biden's mishandling of border policy.
So I urge all of our colleagues here in the Senate, as well as our colleagues in the House, to work with me and the Texas delegation--all 40 of us--on fulfilling this request by Governor Abbott to reimburse Texas for its expenses that it never should have had to spend and make, if President Biden and the Federal Government had simply done their job.
The Federal Government created this crisis, and it is up to the Federal Government to pay the tab.
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