Tom Carper

Unless there is real serious buy-in from the political elite in the country, very little of this will have any success.

We need to see these migrants as people, not simply as numbers.

Many observers warned that as long as the Northern Triangle countries remained mired in violence and poverty, migration would continue.

I wonder if that is sort of a comprehensive approach. It sounds to me like it is intended to be.

Sunshine is the best disinfectant.

That is just morally wrong.

We were shocked by the flood of migrants arriving across our borders from Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador.

I believe we have a moral obligation to try and help to undo that damage.

This is an important challenge for the region and for our country as well. I think it is a moral challenge.

I think that is terrific, sir. There are three key aspects to that strategy. They include security, governance, and prosperity.

I think the root cause of a lot of what we talked about here today is our insatiable appetite for illegal drugs.

The need was for some more shallow-bottom boats.

Two things, each of you.

Today we take note of an important but often overlooked aspect of our homeland security: our Nation's maritime borders.

The only thing that is realistic that we can accomplish, at least in the next 18 months, is a--and let us not use 'piecemeal' because that may have the wrong connotation.

I understand that we have begun to allow a limited group of children from Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador to apply in their home countries to come to the United States as refugees.

It is confusing, and a long and tortured road.

Is there something we need to do here at our end on the legislative side to make sure that something like this does not happen again?

I think on the Northern Triangle side, our big contribution we can make from my office is continue to fund detachments down there to help in their law enforcement work.

I want to make sure we are getting our money's worth, and if there is some component that is missing, that we need to be mindful of, please let us know.

We literally stayed there as humanitarians on Christmas morning. I thought it was pretty extraordinary.

You have to find out what works and do more of that.

If we are to realize the kind of border integrity along our border with Mexico, we need to work with these three Central American countries--Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador.

If we do immigration reform, do it smart, we can actually make some progress on this front.

We do not do comprehensive very well, because it is complicated.