Political Quotes

“``Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passions, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence.'' John Adams made that statement almost 250 years ago. I recall his words when House Speaker Pelosi, in arguing against more funding for security at the southern border, claimed that President Trump was ``manufacturing a crisis.'' The facts on the border establish that a crisis exists. According to the Department of Homeland Security data, 161,000 family units arrived in fiscal year 2018, an increase of 50 percent, and 60,000 unaccompanied children arrived in the same time period, an increase of 25 percent. Asylum claims have surged an astounding 2,000 percent in the past 5 years, although most of these claims will be found invalid later, after judicial review. These surging numbers are overwhelming our resources on the border and creating a humanitarian, security, and legal crisis. The Mexican side of the border is often controlled by Mexican criminal cartels or gangs. They charge a fee to assist border crossings. To get here, many illegal immigrants put themselves in the hands of these vicious smuggling gangs, which are looking for profit and are uninterested in basic human dignity. On the dangerous journey to the border, 7 out of 10 migrants suffer from violence, and 31 percent of women and 17 percent of men are sexually assaulted.…”