House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy of California, House Majority Whip Steve Scalise of Louisiana, Republican Conference Chairwoman Elise Stefanik of New York, and a handful of committee ranking members on Thursday introduced the Border Security for America Act.
It is Republicans’ solution to the situation at the southern border, where, in one example illustrating the scope of the problem, a premier migrant organization in South Texas has become so overwhelmed that it is turning away migrants who have been released from federal custody.
“The Biden Administration’s failure to secure our southern border puts every American’s security at risk,” Stefanik, the third-highest Republican in the House, said in a statement.
“Biden’s open border policies have been a complete disaster, causing the worst border crisis we’ve seen in over 20 years,” she added. “As the number of encounters continue to rise, drugs and weapons are flooding across our southern border, and Democrats have turned their backs on our border patrol agents and law enforcement.”
Republicans want to hold Democrats’ feet to the fire on the border, where nearly half of Border Patrol agents in hard-hit regions have been pulled from the field to care for people in custody.
The plan is comprehensive and would force the federal government to restart border wall contracts that were abandoned by Biden, fund advanced technology that would aid federal law enforcement at the border, and boost the number of homeland security employees working at the international boundary. The three items are measures that Border Patrol leaders frequently tout as necessary to do their jobs.
“We’ve been down to the southern border several times to see this crisis firsthand and hear directly from those on the frontlines,” New York Rep. John Katko, the top Republican on the House Homeland Security Committee, said in a statement. “This legislation tackles key shortcomings and weaknesses we’ve seen for ourselves that are fueling the border crisis.”
This article was originally published by Washington Examiner. Read the original article.
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