Judd Gregg: “I wish to talk about the progress we have made relative to securing our borders because this is one of those situations…”

“I wish to talk about the progress we have made relative to securing our borders because this is one of those situations where the facts on the ground have not yet caught up with the public perception, which is understandable. That happens a lot in all sorts of areas where things are moving in the right direction, which were broken but are being repaired; there is still a perception that things are fundamentally broken. We are moving in the right direction relative to the borders. Since 2005, we have made rather significant strides toward putting in place the infrastructure and the people necessary to secure the borders. I have the good fortune to chair the Subcommittee on Homeland Security. It may well be the only major appropriations bill that gets out of this Congress before we adjourn in October. That bill and the precursors to it, including the appropriations bills which we passed over the last 2 years and the supplementals that have gone with those bills, have allowed us to significantly expand our commitment to homeland security. This has been an aggressive step taken by the Republican Congress and the administration. Back in 2005 we took a look at the problem when I assumed the leadership of this subcommittee, and we basically reoriented this whole funding stream within the Homeland Security Department, relative to the issue of weapons of mass destruction and border security.…”