[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 8 (Tuesday, January 10, 2023)]
[House]
[Pages H117-H118]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          SECURING OUR BORDER

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Georgia (Mr. McCormick) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. McCORMICK. Mr. Speaker, we have, right now, a situation where the 
President is visiting the border.
  In my line of work, as a young lieutenant, I flew along the border 
and knew that there was a problem in the early 1990s. As a matter of 
fact, in the mid-1990s, as a forward air controller, we had to stop 
operations at nighttime as vans bouncing around in the middle of our 
operations made us cease fire so we could chase illegal immigrants out 
of our firing ranges. Then, as an emergency medicine doctor, I treated 
patients who came here illegally.
  Most people don't realize the consequence of our actions, of our poor 
border security, and what it has done. We understand the numbers. We 
understand the millions that are coming across the border, 4 million 
since we have had a new President, but not the downwind consequences 
when you provide laws that encourage bad behavior and punish good 
behavior.

[[Page H118]]

  One of the things that most people don't realize is that when you go 
to the emergency room and are waiting in line behind a lot of people 
who came here illegally, you are not only waiting in line behind them 
but you are also paying for their bills. Many people are coming across 
the border to receive treatment for their chronic illnesses that cost 
millions of dollars per year, and those are several patients per 
hospital. We are talking about billions, even tens of billions of 
dollars, spent on people who come here illegally. It comes from 
taxpayer money, both out of your pocket and through your taxation, 
which adds to our debt, which, of course, is going to be paid for by 
our children.

  To make it worse, we punish those people who come here the right way. 
In my district, we have a huge immigrant population, people who come 
here from all over the world, whether it be India, Europe, South 
America, and they have to wait in line with a glutted immigration 
policy that makes it very difficult for them to follow the law. 
Meanwhile, we reward those people who break the law.
  I think we need to change our laws. I think we need to make it more 
streamlined for people who follow the law, who are good citizens, who 
paid their taxes, who have jobs, who create jobs, and make it more 
difficult for people who break laws.
  I think, right now, when you talk about the overwhelming number of 
people coming across the border, and when you have the President go 
down there and have the borders cleaned up so he can view something 
that doesn't really exist, which is a problem where we don't protect 
our sovereign border, which is one of the President's main 
responsibilities; where you have people's property violated; where you 
have people's rights violated; where you have crimes.
  Of course, as an emergency medicine physician, this last year I lost 
four patients who came in from fentanyl overdoses that I was not able 
to revive. Now, almost every single night, I do revive somebody, so it 
is something I literally witness almost every single shift, usually 
several times per shift.
  The opioid crisis is real, and it is something that is killing over 
100,000 Americans per year. Every year, we are setting a new record, 
and we have done nothing of consequence to really stem that tide.
  I think it is with the greatest earnest appeal to my fellow 
Republicans and Democrats that we watch after our own house. It is okay 
to be compassionate. It is okay to reach out and help people, but we 
have to do it the right way.
  Most importantly, we have to make laws that encourage good behavior, 
that people coming here are rewarded for following the laws. They are 
rewarded with citizenship when they do the right thing, and we are 
punishing people who come here with ill intent.
  Finally, I would like to point out that we are experiencing diseases 
here in America we haven't seen in decades. Where is it coming from? It 
is because we don't have good screening procedures.
  It used to be, to come to America, you couldn't even come here if you 
had glaucoma. Now you can come here with every kind of disease process 
there is, and we will never even know that you are even here.
  If you look at the terrorists coming across the border--we know that 
we have at least nine terrorists we have caught in the last month, but 
we don't know how many got away. It is because we have poor border 
security.
  So, it is not just for one thing; it is for many things that we need 
to secure our border, make sure that we are a sovereign Nation, and 
follow the law.

                          ____________________