[Congressional Record Volume 167, Number 72 (Tuesday, April 27, 2021)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2213-S2215]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                            Border Security

  Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, tomorrow evening, across the Capitol, 
President Biden will deliver his first State of the Union Address. As 
we continue to make headway in our fight against COVID-19, I expect the 
President to reflect on the tremendous progress we have made and 
encourage Americans to get vaccinated. So far so good.
  But I also believe he will try to frame the nearly $2 trillion 
partisan bill that was rammed through Congress earlier this year as the 
driving force behind that progress, even though less than 10 percent of 
the bill was related to COVID-19.
  I expect the President will call on Congress to pass his so-called 
infrastructure bill, which is similar to the COVID-19 relief bill in 
that it is a partisan bill having very little to do with the title of 
the bill itself. Only about 5 percent, in fact, goes toward roads and 
bridges, something we would all define as infrastructure.
  I am hopeful that the President will finally announce a plan to 
address the crisis at our southern border because, so far, the 
administration has been largely silent. The crisis at the southern 
border is real; it is big; and it is growing. We are breaking all the 
wrong kinds of records, including the numbers of unaccompanied 
children, total monthly border crossings, and the capacity levels at 
our care facilities.
  In March, we saw the highest number of border crossings on record, 
more than 172,000 individuals. That was a dramatic increase from the 
already eye-popping 100,000 in February--February, 100,000; March, 
172,000; and, trust me, it is going to get nothing but worse.
  Nearly 19,000 of these individuals were unaccompanied children, the 
highest numbers we have ever seen in a single month. Sometimes people 
will say: That child came to America all by himself or herself. I want 
to disabuse my colleagues of any notion that a child--small child--
would make that trip to the United States ``by themselves.'' These 
children are being turned over to criminal organizations that are paid 
by the head to transport them from their country of origin into the 
United States and, unfortunately, these human smugglers, known in my 
part of the country as ``coyotes,'' care nothing for the welfare of 
those children. It is only the money that they could produce by 
transporting them to the United States that they care about.
  It is true we know that a spike in migration is not an entirely new 
phenomena and, sadly, neither is the dramatic increase in the number of 
children, but the current surge is unlike any we have experienced in at 
least the last 20 years, according to Director Mayorkas.
  These eye-popping numbers are compounded by a deadly pandemic. We 
have never seen that before. The pandemic, of course, has made once 
routine tasks like transporting and caring for migrants incredibly 
dangerous to the men and women who are performing those duties.
  In an effort to downplay the seriousness of the border crisis or to 
defer attention from it altogether, the administration has spent 
literally no time talking about it, especially when compared to the 
time and energy that it has dedicated to things like climate change.
  In fact, the Biden administration has spent the first several weeks 
of the surge denying that there is anything wrong at the border. Then 
they came up with some creative euphemisms to describe what has 
happened. They called it a challenge. They called it a situation. They 
called it a mess. Well, as long as you didn't call it a crisis, they 
didn't seem too bothered by it.
  A month ago, the President tapped the Vice President to lead efforts 
to address this crisis, which I thought was a positive sign, until I 
realized Vice President Harris acted as though the President had handed 
her a hand grenade and had pulled the pin because she couldn't get away 
from it fast enough, saying the next day that, well, her job is purely 
diplomatic in nature. She hasn't made a single trip to the border and, 
apparently, does not plan to do so at all.

  The President has given lip service to encouraging migrants not to 
come, but those statements mean absolutely nothing when all of the 
other signals being sent by this administration are: There is a green 
light and a welcome mat out for migrants to come to the United States.
  The situation is such that we are reaching a breaking point, and the 
Vice President and President could recognize that if they took the time 
to look and to learn from the very same people I have learned from, the 
experts who do these terribly difficult jobs along the border.
  As you can imagine, I have spent a lot of time listening to those 
folks because I represent them. They are my constituents. I visited 
border communities and heard from the Border Patrol officers, mayors, 
county judges, and NGOs, nongovernmental organizations, that are doing 
the best they can dealing with overwhelming numbers.
  I had the opportunity to actually talk to some of the migrants 
themselves about their journeys to our border and what brought them 
here. In the Rio Grande Valley, I spoke with three young mothers 
holding their crying infants less than a mile from the river they 
crossed into the United States. They had just undergone preliminary 
health screenings and were waiting for a bus to take them to a 
processing center.
  And, please, our colleagues should understand these migrants are not 
trying to get away from the Border Patrol. They are literally walking 
up to the Border Patrol and turning themselves in because they realize 
that is the next step to their being placed into the interior of the 
United States and completing their journey.
  Of course, as you can imagine, each of these mothers was hopeful. 
They made it to the United States and knew that as a family unit with 
young children they would be cared for by our government and then 
released into the interior of the United States. One of the mothers 
paid $3,600, she said, to get here. Another paid $6,000. This is big 
business for the smugglers and the criminal organizations that charge 
thousands of dollars to bring migrants to the U.S. border.
  I think it is important to note that this is not just a Mexico-
Central American phenomena. A couple of months

[[Page S2214]]

ago, when I was down at the Del Rio sector of the Border Patrol, the 
Border Patrol Chief showed us a slide with the names of 54 different 
countries represented by the people who were detained coming across the 
Del Rio sector just so far this year--54 different countries.
  As I said, many of these ``customers'' are children traveling with no 
parents. We know the journey is not a safe or easy one. In fact, it is 
dangerous, and it is hard, and many children arrive in critical health, 
having endured days, weeks, and months on the road. And the tragic fact 
is, some of these children don't make it. They die en route.
  I have heard horrific stories of physical and sexual abuse that 
occurs at the hands of the criminals, cartels, and human smugglers, and 
others traveling in a large caravan of immigrants. At the Kay Bailey 
Hutchison Convention Center in Dallas, which is now serving as a 
shelter for migrant boys, I talked to one young man who endured a 3-
month-long trek on foot from Central America to the United States. He 
told us he slept in the jungles along the way and that food was scarce. 
As you can imagine, he was happy now to be in a shelter receiving three 
square meals a day with a roof over his head.
  These stories are not unique. Many of us have seen the heartbreaking 
video of a young boy abandoned by smugglers in the Rio Grande Valley, 
dropped from the top of the wall into the interior of the United 
States. And we have read the story about a young girl who drowned 
trying to cross the Rio Grande River. And we have seen where the 
smugglers who care so little for the welfare of the people they are 
smuggling into the United States--and in one instance they threw a 6-
month-old child into the river, knowing the Border Patrol would be 
diverted in order to save the child, which thankfully they did, while 
they skedaddled into the United States.
  I think it is heartbreaking that these children are enduring this 
sort of trauma, and it is infuriating that cartels and criminal 
organizations are getting richer in the process.
  So make no mistake, there is a crisis at the border and the policies 
of the Biden administration helped make it worse. Despite warnings from 
folks on both sides of the aisle, the administration revoked policies 
of the previous administration without any alternative plan in its 
place. Making matters worse, they entirely failed to prepare for the 
obvious consequences. Now the question is, What are they going to do to 
address it?
  I believe the American people deserve to hear from President Biden 
his outline of a plan to address the border crisis and to manage this 
surge of humanity in a fair and humane way. If the President is still 
working on that portion of the speech, I would like to make a friendly 
suggestion.
  There is a grassroots plan out there that was built from bottom up by 
the Senators and Congressmen most familiar with the crisis. It includes 
input from the men and women who dealt with migration surges in the 
past and who are working around-the-clock to manage the consequences of 
uncontrolled movement of migrants across the border now. It is called 
the Bipartisan Border Solutions Act.
  Senator Sinema from Arizona, who also represents a border State, and 
I have introduced this legislation here in the Senate. We are proud to 
work with two Texans, one Republican and one Democrat, Henry Cuellar of 
Laredo and Tony Gonzales, a Republican in the 23rd Congressional 
District. He represents, I believe, the largest single section of the 
U.S.-Mexico border of any Member in Congress. Our bill seeks to address 
the most urgent problems on the border today. There is more we can and 
should do, but at least this would address the most urgent problems.
  First, it would establish four regional processing centers to 
streamline the processing of migrants. Right now, the smugglers know 
that if they flood the zone with children, the Border Patrol are going 
to have to go off the frontline in order to take care of the children, 
leaving it wide open for smuggling narcotics and other migrants--
narcotics which, by the way, contributed to roughly 88,000 drug 
overdoses in America alone in the last 12 months.
  Our bill would provide protections for migrant children who come into 
the country without a parent or any relatives.
  It would help reduce the immigration court backlog and remove a major 
pull factor for migrants who do not have a legitimate asylum claim. But 
it would, more importantly, speed up the process for the most 
vulnerable migrants who do have a valid asylum claim.
  I think these are commonsense reforms that should earn the support of 
Members from both parties in both Chambers in Congress, as well as a 
number of respected outside organizations.
  We would be glad to receive the support of the administration or at 
least a phone call so we can begin conversations. Ignoring this crisis 
will not make it go away. We have spent the last couple of months 
demonstrating that inaction will only make it worse.
  As I said, we have seen surges in the past but never like this. The 
busiest months are usually April, May, and June, not February and 
March, which indicates, by historical trends, it is going to get worse 
and worse and worse. If our facilities and our personnel are 
overwhelmed today, which they are, and we haven't yet reached the 
normal busy season, how much worse are things going to get? How many 
more children will die in the hands of these criminals on their way to 
the United States before we decide to take action?
  As the Presiding Officer and I have discussed before, there is nobody 
else to solve these problems except us. On something as important as 
this, it seems like a logical area for Republicans and Democrats to 
work together to try to take at least some modest steps to address this 
crisis. I hope the President will work with us and be part of the 
solution and not part of the problem.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oklahoma.
  Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, I was listening intently to the Senator 
from Texas, who is certainly familiar with the problems on the border. 
It happens that I spent 30 years down there as a builder and developer 
many years ago. I got to know the border people. They are trying to do 
a great job down there against some pretty impossible odds.
  You know, one thing I always think about is, it has nothing to do 
with Central American citizens or Mexicans; it is the people from the 
Middle East, terrorists from all over. Open borders don't work. So I 
applaud him for his efforts on that


        Drinking Water and Wastewater Infrastructure Act of 2021

  Mr. President, this week we have a real opportunity before us to pass 
the bipartisan Drinking Water and Wastewater Infrastructure Act of 
2021.
  If you listen only to the national media, you would think that 
Congress can't get together on much of anything, but this bill is a 
real example of how that is not always the case. The reason is simple: 
Everyone agrees that we need clean, safe, drinking water and to support 
State and local projects to protect water quality.
  There are tangible benefits for communities too. Just consider what 
the bill does for my State of Oklahoma. First, it will increase the 
Federal funding for local projects by over $315 million in the next 5 
years, an increase of 123 percent.
  More than that, the State retains the control to direct funds to 
projects they have identified. It is called local support. It is kind 
of a unique concept. It demonstrates clearly that we who are 
representing an area know more about the area than people who don't 
represent the area.
  This will increase funding for local projects. It will also provide 
needed resources to help Oklahoma achieve its comprehensive water plan, 
meeting its goal of using no more freshwater in 2060 than was used in 
2010.
  I am proud to cosponsor this bill because it not only recognizes that 
urban and rural communities have different water infrastructure needs, 
but it also provides specific benefits to rural States like my State of 
Oklahoma.
  A month ago, the Water Quality Division director of the State of 
Oklahoma Department of Environmental Quality, Shellie Chard, testified 
before the EPW Committee to highlight the challenges facing rural water 
systems and the innovation that they are using in rural States and 
communities to ensure safe and affordable drinking

[[Page S2215]]

water. She highlighted the need for assistance to small, rural States 
in complying with government regulations, and this bill does that by 
giving small and rural States access to Federal funding and assistance 
in complying with government regulations that are often more burdensome 
and overbearing for them.
  The bill also empowers rural communities to work with technical 
experts at nonprofit entities and State agencies to implement best 
practices and more efficiently comply with the Federal regulations. 
When a small town like Meridian, OK, needs help addressing harmful 
contaminants in their water system, local rural water organizations can 
provide consistent help and expertise, and they do. They are out there. 
They want to help. Dedicating resources to help our rural communities 
will ensure they spend more of their time and their money on community 
projects, not navigating a bureaucracy.
  More than just taking care of our water infrastructure today, this 
bill has an eye on the future by reauthorizing the Water Resources 
Research Act. The Water Resources Research Act supports cutting-edge 
water research at universities across the country, including Oklahoma 
State University in Stillwater. OSU will receive research funding over 
the next 4 years to study wastewater reuse, produced water from oil and 
gas operations, and more.
  The bill will also more than double the funding for the enhanced 
aquifer recharge research program. This program does essential work to 
refill the groundwater aquifers, especially in areas with water 
shortages, to sustain a reliable municipal water supply.
  I thank my colleagues Senator Carper and Senator Capito for working 
together to move this bill through the normal committee process and 
bring it to the floor. This is what bipartisanship means, and we do see 
this every day, in spite of what you might get from the media. I look 
forward to this bill being passed and enacted into law quickly. It is 
important that this not be the end of our bipartisan infrastructure 
work.