[Congressional Record Volume 168, Number 61 (Wednesday, April 6, 2022)]
[House]
[Pages H4391-H4395]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                     CRISIS AT THE SOUTHERN BORDER

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 4, 2021, the Chair recognizes the gentlewoman from Colorado 
(Mrs. Boebert) for 30 minutes.
  Mrs. BOEBERT. Mr. Speaker, this past Friday, Biden's CDC, formally 
known as the Centers for Disease Control, but often referred to now as 
the center for Democrat control, announced that it would be ending 
title 42.
  At a time when liberal mayors across our country are extending mask 
mandates on our children in schools, and the American public is still 
being forced to mask-up on airplanes, the Biden regime has decided that 
protecting the American people from diseases, including but not limited 
to COVID, is not a priority if it comes at the expense of their amnesty 
and open borders agenda.
  Now, it is no coincidence that the Biden regime has decided to drop 
title 42, a policy that has been used to prevent communicable diseases 
from spreading into the homeland via illegal aliens entering our 
southern border.
  In fact, more than 2 million illegal aliens have been apprehended at 
our southern border since Joe Biden took office, and Border Patrol 
agents estimate another 70 percent of these illegal immigrants have not 
been apprehended. They call them got-aways. So, in fact, that means 
nearly 3.5 million illegal aliens have come across our border on 
Biden's watch.
  Now, Republicans and Democrats from both the House and Senate have 
condemned canceling title 42. Some have called it dangerous, and others 
have called it frightening. I call it an attack on the safety and 
security of the American people.
  It has been reported that by the time the mid-terms roll around in 
November of 2022, nearly 7 million illegal aliens will have crossed the 
southern border this year. That is larger than the populations of 
Denver, San Francisco, Atlanta, Washington, D.C., Boston, Seattle, 
Miami, Las Vegas, New Orleans, Portland, Tampa, and Detroit combined. 
Can you imagine?
  We have a product here that is working. We have a policy that is 
working to deter some people away from the border, but we are going to 
take whatever sliver we have that is keeping people out of our country 
illegally and do away with it.
  Maybe it is to overrun our system, maybe it is to create chaos; 8 to 
10 years of backlogs, so then the American people have to accept 
amnesty. I am not sure exactly what the plan is, but it certainly is 
intentional, and that is what members of the House Freedom Caucus are 
here to discuss tonight.
  I have with me members from the House Freedom Caucus who are going to 
address what has been going on at the southern border. We have been to 
the southern border multiple times to see firsthand what is happening--
the invasion that is taking place in our country--unlike the border 
czar, who has failed to visit the most dangerous parts of our southern 
border. I think she made a trip to El Paso. And then, of course, the 
Commander in Chief, who is in command of nothing, he hasn't been there 
at all.

[[Page H4392]]

  Mr. Speaker, I yield to the former chairman of the House Freedom 
Caucus, the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Biggs), my good friend.
  Mr. BIGGS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding to me. I 
would like to help set the stage here just for a moment. Imagine, if 
you will, 100,000 people entering the country illegally and stopped on 
our border just in the first 2 weeks of March of this year. But because 
of title 42, which allows the Border Patrol agents to immediately turn 
people away because of communicable diseases, that is the term used in 
title 42, they sent 50,000 of them back away. You don't have to imagine 
it because that is true. That is exactly what happened.

  If you extrapolate that out, because you can, just looking at it from 
January, February, March of this year, they turned away over a quarter 
million people under title 42.
  Now, when title 42 goes away on May 23, because that is exactly what 
this administration wants, you will double the amount of people who are 
coming in just through the apprehension route. We have another record 
month in March. Those numbers are just out. That means that you are 
going to be sitting on about 300,000 to 400,000 apprehensions that you 
are going to be releasing right into the United States of America.
  What does that do? Everybody in here knows this because you have been 
down to the border. I have been down to the border with you. The 
cartels are in it to make money. As they see this opening up, more and 
more people getting freedom to the United States caught and released, 
what they will do, and what they are already doing, by the way, is they 
will advertise.
  The NGOs that we help fund, that the United Nations funds, will 
advertise. It will be chaos, chaos on the border. My prediction is 
somewhere around 400,000 to 500,000 people a month coming in. But it 
actually could be more. A lot of people are talking about the ceiling 
now being 18,000 people a day when that goes away. I don't think it is 
going to be 18,000. I think it will exceed 20,000. If it exceeds 
20,000, that is 600,000 a month coming in. That is bigger than the city 
of Mesa in Arizona, which is Arizona's second largest city.
  You know what that means? In the last half of this year, the last 
half of the year alone, you are going to be sitting, as you said, at 
4\1/2\ to 5 million people brought into this country illegally, and 
that is not counting the get-aways. The get-aways last year were at 
least 800,000.
  It is enormous; it is dangerous; it is inhumane. I haven't even 
touched on the inhumanity of it. We are just talking up here. We are 
not getting granular. We are just talking about the overrunning of 
America, our culture, and our sovereignty. We won't have much of a 
nation after this is done.
  You said it yourself, is this incompetence? The answer is no, this is 
willful. This is willful, and this is what they want.
  Mrs. BOEBERT. Mr. Biggs, do you believe that the cartels have been 
emboldened during Biden's first year as President of the United States?
  Mr. BIGGS. Absolutely, 100 percent. Do you know how we know they have 
been emboldened? Because it used to be they would have the coyotes take 
the people up and locate them in the U.S. They don't do that anymore. 
The coyotes take them up, they put them on the border and say, ``We 
don't have to go in with you. Go in. Go in with your cell phone.'' Oh, 
by the way, Biden administration says now they are going to give away a 
cell phone to every illegal alien crossing the border.
  But they will just come across. I have seen it; you have all seen it. 
They are walking across, they are FaceTiming their friends back home: 
``Yeah, I made it in.'' They are dressed nice; they are dressed clean. 
The cartels are emboldened not just at the southern border any longer.
  This is spilling over into the country, and we are seeing violence 
along the border because of it, and you are seeing cartel members ship 
all over. If there are drugs being distributed anywhere in the United 
States, you have got cartels there.
  Mrs. BOEBERT. What about these illegal aliens who are coming through 
with the help of the cartel, what do they owe the cartel for getting 
into the United States?
  Mr. BIGGS. The average price right now is $4,000 to $7,000, unless 
you are from China, and then it is $35,000. Very few of these people 
have that to pay. Guess what happens? Either they can work it off by 
delivering illicit drugs, helping to smuggle human beings, including 
sex trafficking, or they come in, they get a job, and they are 
indentured servants. They are effectively slaves to the cartel, and 
they will never work it off, because the cartels are taskmasters at 
this. They know exactly how to keep these folks under their thumb.
  Mrs. BOEBERT. Mr. Biggs, you also chair the Border Security Caucus, 
and you recently brought in Secretary Mayorkas. Thank you for bringing 
him here to the Hill so we could ask some questions.
  Now, he was talking about title 42 being a CDC issue, and that is not 
really his issue to enforce. That is not his policy to enforce. What is 
a policy that he could enforce that would effectively secure our 
border?
  Mr. BIGGS. He could enforce the MPP, the migrant protection 
protocols. That is the remain in Mexico policy. What he could do is, 
instead of enforcing that at 9 people a day--that is the number we 
heard earlier this week, 9 people a day--you could actually enforce it 
the way it was intended to be enforced, and that would be thousands a 
day because we have thousands of folks coming in. That would be another 
deterrent. That is just one of the things that he could do.
  He could actually go in and encourage us to fix the Flores law or the 
TVPRA laws. All of those things would be deterrents. But, instead, he 
has opened it wide open. He has taken away any deterrent. Instead, he 
is basically encouraging people to come into this country illegally.
  Mrs. BOEBERT. Thank you. Now, one final question for you here. You 
are a businessman. We may have 7 million undocumented workers in our 
country by November. What does that mean for our economy?
  Mr. BIGGS. Well, first of all, the underground economy right now for 
people, my estimate is about 25 to 27 million illegal aliens in the 
country. You are going to bring in another 7 million, so you are going 
to have an underground economy. Those people who are not skilled 
laborers are going to have a tough time getting jobs. A lot of these 
folks are going to go on social welfare programs, even though they are 
not supposed to be allowed to. They will get on social welfare 
programs.
  We are already on the verge of stagflation right now, high inflation 
and a shrinking GDP. As that happens, and you bring in that many people 
undocumented, you are going to actually exacerbate both those problems, 
and we may see the likes of something we haven't seen since Jimmy 
Carter. It might even exceed what happened under Jimmy Carter, who was 
probably the most unfortunate and incompetent President in my lifetime.
  Mrs. BOEBERT. We have more Members joining us here from the House 
Freedom Caucus to talk about title 42. Thank you so much, Congressman 
Biggs, for your insight on this. I know that you work really hard in 
studying what is going on at the southern border.
  I have the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Norman) here now. Do 
you believe that this regime is responsible for signaling to poor and 
desperate people that now is the time to take this dangerous journey, 
to break our laws, to come into our country, and live under the 
freedoms and protections our country provides but not as a citizen?
  Mr. NORMAN. Well, first of all, thank you for organizing this 
discussion to inform the American people what is going on. As Andy has 
said, this President is willfully and directly causing this to happen 
to the American people.
  You are a businessperson. You run a restaurant. I am in the 
development world. Who would let anybody come into your business or to 
your home, not know who they were, not know why they were there?
  It is insane what this administration is doing. By taking title 42, 
as has been said, it prohibits--that is the only tool that President 
Trump had at his disposal and President Biden has, but he is doing away 
with it because that is what he is encouraging.
  Lauren, think about this, how unfair is it to that law enforcement 
agency,

[[Page H4393]]

that law enforcement official stopping a car not knowing who is in it, 
not knowing what his background is, having no information, how safe is 
that for that law enforcement officer?

                              {time}  2045

  Mr. NORMAN. Mr. Speaker, how unfair is it to the municipalities and 
the cities that are going to have to pay for the hospital care, for the 
schooling? How fair is that?
  Well, it is not. It is intentional. It is willful.
  As people ask me all the time, why is he doing this? He is burning 
the house down before, I assume, the November elections, which the 
House will turn over, and hopefully, we will elect Freedom Caucus 
members who have got the steel and the spine to do something about it.
  He sold out not only to the citizens; he sold out to China and those 
that he is indebted to. We are going to find out more and more about 
that as we move forward.
  Mrs. BOEBERT. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from 
Pennsylvania.
  Mr. PERRY. Mr. Speaker, I am so happy that the gentlewoman from 
Colorado organized this effort tonight. We need to be speaking about 
it, and of course, I would call on our friends from this side of the 
aisle.
  It is interesting that we are standing on this side of the aisle. I 
mean, thank goodness somebody is willing to stand over here and defend 
the country.
  Mr. Speaker, I call on my Democrat colleagues to start answering some 
questions and start defending their country from this invasion.
  But if the gentleman doesn't know this, if you do a quick 
calculation--this isn't Congressman Perry, Congresswoman Boebert, 
Congressman Roy, any of us up here. This is DHS. The Department of 
Homeland Security is bracing for 18,000 crossings a day, 18,000 people 
coming across the border illegally each day.
  Now, I don't know, for each one of you, the size of your town where 
you come from, but I suspect 18,000 in any town would make a pretty big 
dent unless you are talking about one of the major cities like Los 
Angeles or something like that.
  Even so, 18,000 a day, Mr. Speaker, that is over 6\1/2\ million 
people, if we keep that rate up, 6\1/2\ million people in 1 year 
illegally coming to our country.
  Congressman Norman or Congresswoman Boebert, could your business 
sustain something like that?
  Mrs. BOEBERT. Mr. Speaker, absolutely not. The city of Rifle just hit 
10,000 for our population. I mean, 18,000 people a day, that right 
there exceeds the little city of Rifle, Colorado.
  But this is something that we absolutely cannot endure, so I am glad 
that we have this time tonight to discuss this.
  Representative Good, you have been to the southern border. You have 
talked to Border Patrol agents. Can you tell me what you have seen, 
what you have heard from Border Patrol agents?
  Mr. GOOD of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I have been there four times in my 
first year, the first 14 months here in this Congress.
  February a year ago was the largest February in terms of illegal 
border crossings in the history of the country. We had 101,000 cross, 
some 3,000 a day, in February a year ago.
  We exceeded that by 64 percent this most recent February. We went 
from 101,000 to 165,000.
  Now, it is so bad with what this President has allowed to happen in 
the last year that 165,000 in a month doesn't sound like a really bad 
month for this President.
  That is because, again, it was 101,000 last February, but it 
increased as the year went on to where it was some 200,000 a month 
later on into the year, as we know, and 2 million in the first year 
this President was in office.
  As others have already pointed out, with him rescinding title 42, I 
guess he was afraid that is a policy, a law, that might help repel some 
illegals back across the border, might allow us to return some if we 
actually would enforce the law.
  So, we are rescinding title 42, which, as already has been said, will 
take it from 7,000 to 2\1/2\ times as large. Mr. Speaker, 18,000 a day 
is the average, 500,000 in the first 30 days.
  This President is on pace for some 10 to 15 million illegal entries 
into our country in his first and hopefully only term.
  I was in a Budget Committee hearing today with Congresswoman Boebert. 
We had Secretary Becerra there, the HHS Secretary. HHS has been called 
in not to help stop the border crossings but to help facilitate those.
  Mr. Speaker, I asked him today, I said: Who do you think should be 
let across our border, or who should be prevented from going across our 
border? Are there any restraints you would put upon anyone who wants to 
come across our border, or do you think everyone should be able to come 
across illegally?
  He said: Well, we are talking about violating the law. You are saying 
it is illegal. Why would we permit anyone to violate the law?
  Our President is violating the highest law of the land. The 
Constitution that we all and he swore to uphold, Article IV, Section 4 
says: ``The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union 
a republican form of government and shall protect them against 
invasion.''
  As we look to next year, I want to go on record and say--some of you 
were on the articles of impeachment with me. Congresswoman Boebert 
drafted those. How do we declare this the public health emergency that 
it is, the national security crisis that it is, the health crisis that 
it is, the social services crisis that it is, the education crisis that 
it is, and the unlawful process that it is and not hold this President 
responsible when we have the House majority, Lord willing, a year from 
now? How can we not impeach this President?
  Mrs. BOEBERT. Mr. Speaker, I agree that that absolutely needs to be 
brought up in the next Congress.
  Now, these appointed Secretaries, they really have turned our Border 
Patrol agents into travel agents. They are being shipped all throughout 
our country, these illegal immigrants, and every State is now a border 
State.
  Congressman Good is from Virginia. We have Congressman Ralph Norman 
here from South Carolina. I am from Colorado. But someone who has a 
front seat view here, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Roy), this has been 
a really hot topic for him, and rightfully so.

  Republicans and Democrats from both Houses of Congress have said that 
they don't support ending title 42, yet no legislation or action has 
been taken to reinstate it. What are your thoughts on that?
  Mr. ROY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman from Colorado (Mrs. 
Boebert), and I thank all colleagues from the House Freedom Caucus for 
joining me here on the floor.
  I thank my friend from Virginia, who joined me down in Del Rio, 
Texas, just a month ago, where we saw firsthand what is actually 
happening in real-time on the border, something that we know and, 
unfortunately, my colleagues on this side of the aisle refuse to 
acknowledge and refuse to do anything about.
  Now, as you all know, one of our Freedom Caucus colleagues from New 
Mexico (Ms. Herrell) filed, 14 months ago, a piece of legislation to 
require that title 42 be enforced at our border.
  For those listening at home, title 42 is our power as a country to 
stop communicable diseases and people with communicable diseases from 
coming across our border. It is an important tool that President Trump 
and his administration put in place in the last year of his 
administration to ensure that we stop the flow of people across the 
border from inundating and overwhelming Border Patrol.
  We knew this was coming. Fourteen months ago, we knew this was 
coming. A year ago, we came together. I filed a discharge petition as 
part of this team to say that we can force a vote on the floor of the 
House.
  Well, the Speaker of the House refuses to bring to a vote a measure 
to enforce title 42. Everybody listening at home, the Speaker of the 
House, who has control of the floor, refuses to bring forward a vote on 
title 42 to require enforcement of the border. We are trying to change 
that.
  We have almost every single Republican, I think save one, who has 
filed that, 210 signatures. We need 218. Where are my colleagues on the 
other side of the aisle? Where are those from border States?
  Mr. Speaker, we have zero Democrats on that title 42 discharge 
position.

[[Page H4394]]

  Now, as the gentlewoman from Colorado (Mrs. Boebert) noted, there are 
at least four noteworthy United States Senators who are Democrats who 
said we should not end title 42: Mr. Tester, Mr. Manchin, Ms. Sinema, 
and Mr. Kelly. Those four Senators have said we should not end title 
42.
  Now, I will wrap up and pass it to someone else just to say this: How 
many dead migrants is enough? How many dead Americans from fentanyl 
poisoning is enough? How much money in the pockets of dangerous cartels 
is enough? How many bullets need to fly at the border? How many homes 
need to be destroyed? How many cars need to be wrecked?
  How many DPS agents need to be killed or endangered? How many people 
need to be harmed before this administration will do its job? How many 
criminals need to be let off in the United States and not prosecuted 
under ICE? When are we going to change this and actually secure our 
country?
  Those are my questions for Secretary Mayorkas.
  Mrs. BOEBERT. Mr. Speaker, we talk about this issue regularly in our 
meetings with the House Freedom Caucus, and one question that comes up 
regularly is, where is Kamala Harris? Where is the border czar in this? 
Are there any plans for her to visit the southern border?
  Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Wisconsin.
  Mr. TIFFANY. Mr. Speaker, Kamala who? In all seriousness, it is 
unfortunate that Vice President Harris has not fulfilled her mission to 
be the border czar. It is awful.
  Did you see the news today in regard to the free phones that the 
White House Press Secretary talked about today, free phones for 
migrants?
  Think about it. I was down in Panama almost a year ago and went to 
the Darien Gap. Who did I see? IOM, the International Organization for 
Migration. Where do they get their money? They get a lot of their money 
from the United Nations. Who puts the most money into the United 
Nations? Yes, Americans do.
  Back home on the farm, we used to refer to this as--my colleague from 
Texas just said how many, how many? I would say to you also: How much?
  We used to refer to it as eating your seed corn. Americans pay an 
international organization to send debit cards for these people to take 
themselves up the Panama pipeline all the way to the southern border. 
Then you pay for a bus ride to get them to the airport. Then you pay 
for an airline ride: Philadelphia, Baltimore, wherever. They are going 
around the country.
  Then you pay for the education, the free education they are going to 
get.
  You pay for the healthcare.
  That is what you Americans are paying for every single day for over 2 
million people, and it is about to get worse.
  To highlight how it is going to get worse and how obtuse this side of 
the aisle is, we are sitting in the Committee on the Judiciary today 
creating another loophole in the Virgin Islands. There is another 
loophole that is being created for visa waiver privileges, something 
that we saw in the Mariana Islands that was created about a decade ago 
under the Obama administration where they allowed parole for people to 
be able to come in, Chinese nationals.
  There were maybe, like, eight births that were being done on those 
islands prior to this change that was quietly made in the law. It 
accelerated to--there were, like, 600 births of Chinese nationals that 
happened in the Mariana Islands as a result of this loophole.
  If you want to see the reporting on it, The Wall Street Journal did 
an excellent job. It was one of our intelligence agencies in 2017 that 
really dug into this.
  Yes, here is this huge loophole, and they want to now create it in 
the Virgin Islands. That is what we are voting on tonight in the 
Committee on the Judiciary.

  They want to create another loophole, and they are, like, oh, it will 
only be a few people. Do the American people believe that?
  Mr. ROY. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate my fellow border Stater being down 
here. You hold those Mounties back up there, okay? Keep them at bay.
  Mr. TIFFANY. Mr. Speaker, every State is a border State, including my 
State of Wisconsin.
  Mr. NORMAN. Mr. Speaker, it is not just the phones. What about the 
gas cards that are in the latest budget that the President had? What 
about that?
  Just to put some context to this, Texas, I think you have about 15 to 
20 million people. South Carolina has 5.3 million. That is the number 
that is going to be coming into this country in the next 4 months if 
the pace continues.
  It is a travesty. It is something that Americans have to be aware of 
and stop. God help us all if they do exactly what was said. To fund all 
of this, America is at the breaking point.
  Mr. TIFFANY. Mr. Speaker, so if I may extend my point a little bit. 
Think about it. Tonight, we are debating, in the Judiciary Committee, 
creating another loophole. It shows how unserious they are, how they do 
not have the interests of the American people at hand. They want to 
create another loophole, and this one is in the Virgin Islands, not in 
the South Pacific.
  People are going to be able to be funneled in here by the thousands 
as a result of that loophole--just another way to bring people into 
this country to compete against hardworking Americans who have to not 
only try to make their way up the scale, the economic ladder here in 
America, but now, with inflation, they have to fight that, too.
  Mrs. BOEBERT. Mr. Speaker, we are wrapping up here. We have 30 
seconds.
  Mr. Speaker, I ask the chairman for his final thoughts.
  Mr. PERRY. Mr. Speaker, my final thoughts are that there are 
Democrats that are decrying this. We can do something about it, and 
they can do something about it right here in this House. They can walk 
right down there to the well and sign this discharge petition. We don't 
need all of them; we need eight of them.
  Bring the bill up. If they don't believe we ought to continue to try 
and secure our border with title 42, they can vote against it, but let 
us have a vote.
  We are just asking for a vote. Let's see what the vote count is, and 
then the American people will know who stands with them and who stands 
for a wide-open border because that is what we are going to have. Think 
about that.
  To the gentlewoman from Colorado (Mrs. Boebert), we certainly 
appreciate her putting this together for us and providing the 
opportunity to come and talk on behalf of our constituents that are 
very concerned about this.
  Mr. TIFFANY. Mr. Speaker, the chairman could lead the way. He could 
lead the way.
  Mr. ROY. Mr. Speaker, I would only add that I have seen some reports 
that there are a number of Democrats in the Senate joining with 
Republicans in the Senate to try to do something about this. I hope 
that is true.
  But my little warning to that is, I keep hearing words about, well, 
let's keep title 42 in place until we see a plan. Look, I don't want 
one of these plans full of words, okay? I want the border secure. I 
want title 42 enforced. That ought to be the metric that we are gauging 
everything by.

                              {time}  2100

  Mr. GOOD of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, it is simple. Complete the wall. 
End catch and release. Reinstate remain in Mexico and title 42. Require 
E-verify. Take amnesty off the table.
  Speaker Mrvan, we would love to have you on that petition.
  Mr. NORMAN. Mr. Speaker, sign the petition.
  Folks, have the courage to call your Congressman. And, folks, it is 
time, as Winston Churchill said: ``Sometimes doing your best is not 
good enough.'' We have to do what is required to close this border.
  Mrs. BOEBERT. Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleagues from the House 
Freedom Caucus for joining me here on the House floor tonight to 
discuss this issue.
  I would encourage all Members of Congress--both bodies, the House and 
Senate--to talk to a Border Patrol agent. Ask them about the policies 
that they need to secure our southern border. I guarantee you, they 
won't be telling you they need funding or personnel or even 
infrastructure. They

[[Page H4395]]

just need the policy to do their jobs so they can go home feeling like 
they have accomplished something and have protected American citizens.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

                          ____________________