[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 171 (Wednesday, October 18, 2023)]
[Senate]
[Page S5063]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                            BORDER SECURITY

  Mr. LANKFORD. Madam President, the pain of this, though, is also 
something that we should pay attention to. We, as a nation, not only 
remember 9/11 and our response, but we also remember 9/11 was 
instituted by 20 people that were illegally present in the United 
States. We should not fail to remember that fact as well.
  Recent statistics coming across our southern border identified in the 
last 2 years--just the last 2 years--we have had 70,000 individuals 
that have been identified as what they call special interest aliens. 
These are individuals that came between the ports of entry, that were 
running through to try to evade being captured. They are identified as 
special interest aliens because they have this designation: They 
potentially possess a national security risk to the United States or 
its interests. So they are identified as a special interest alien.
  As I mentioned, we have had more than 70,000 of those that have 
crossed between our ports of entry just in the last 2 years. These are 
individuals from Syria, from Iran, from Iraq, from Pakistan, from west 
Africa, from locations where terrorism is known to exist, and we don't 
have any criminal history of those individuals.
  If you are thinking, I am glad we picked them up between ports of 
entry, well, let me finish the story for you. Most of those 70,000 
special interest aliens were identified between the ports of entry and 
then were released into the country under Biden's policy on how he 
handles immigration currently. Those 70,000 individuals that were 
identified as potentially possessing a national security risk to the 
United States or its interests are in the United States right now.
  Just in the past week, four individuals from Iran were picked up, 
multiple Syrians were picked up between our ports of entry and then 
released, awaiting a hearing in the future. And in current status right 
now, that hearing will be 8 to 10 years in the future. They are 
unmonitored. They are wandering around within our borders awaiting a 
hearing 8 to 10 years from now in the future, after being identified as 
a special interest alien.
  We grieve for Israel, but for some reason, there are some in this 
body and in the White House that will not pay attention to our own 
national security issues and the obvious exposure that literally 
everyone in the country can see.
  I can raise this issue with 100 people on the street outside this 
building, and all 100 would say, Oh, yeah, that is a risk. But for some 
reason, we can't get serious in this body to be able to take on the 
same thing, just to identify what are we going to do with individuals 
that are considered special interest aliens. Are we really going to 
just process them at the border and release them into the country? Or 
are we going to enforce our own sovereignty as just about every other 
nation does in the world? What are we planning to do on this?
  I would just say, for the basic function of our national security, we 
should enforce our borders, and we should not just release special 
interest aliens out into the country, as has been done for now the last 
2 years by the numbers of 70,000-plus.
  So I would hope this body would get serious about dealing with issues 
like asylum, parole, and all the different features that have been used 
to release these individuals into the country, that we could fix that 
before we have the next 9/11 in our country.

                          ____________________