On the recordJanuary 24, 2019
The most dangerous thing that I do is leave the border to come to Washington, D.C. I am not talking about the politics. I am talking about, it is more violent here. So what should we do? Let's open up the government. Let's sit down, advocate for 21st century solutions, technology, increase personnel. We are losing more Border Patrol. What do we do? What does the administration do? They put a $297 million contract out to show them how to hire Border Patrol. They just put out a $14.8 million payment to hire two--two--two Border Patrol agents for almost $15 million. Increase personnel, increase the infrastructure at our ports of entry, and increase immigration judges. We have been increasing immigration judges for the last 3 years. This is nothing new. We have been doing that. Again, one of the most important things, do we play defense on the 1- yard line, where we spend $18 billion at the U.S. border? Or do we play defense on the 20-yard line, which is working with the southern part of Mexico, where we put $80 million a couple of years ago? And what happened? They started stopping 220,000 individuals a year, a lot of people who are coming in, and putting money in Central America, which we have done before, to do that. So, again, given the facts, I just call upon our friends: open up the government; let's negotiate. We are appropriators. I feel very confident if we open up the government and we sit down, we will find a solution.
