Political Quotes

“Let me offer just a few thoughts. I am delighted to associate myself with a very important point that the chairman of the committee made, and I will use the terminology ``authorization equals affirmation.'' It is important for us in this Congress to affirm an agency that is handling some of the most precious responsibilities, alongside of the intelligence community, alongside of the United States military, Defense. It is Homeland Security. That is why this is a first start toward making sure that we are, in fact, looking to affirm or reauthorize the importance of this particular agency. What I would say is that, when we were crafting this bill along with my chairwoman as she introduced this legislation, we were somewhat before this rising surge, and we began to think about what we needed to do to get in front of it. I am very glad that I laid the framework in my language in the bill dealing with having DHS find out what are the causes, how do we address the issue of unaccompanied children that are coming. We might have used the term ``surge.'' It was a surge, but it wasn't at that point. I believe that facts are crucial, and I think it is important that this bill will encourage some of the things that have already been done. The President has met with the three Presidents of Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador to determine and assess what the reasons are, how extreme the violence is. The stories are horrific.…”