[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 196 (Wednesday, November 29, 2023)]
[House]
[Pages H5957-H5970]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




  PROTECTING OUR COMMUNITIES FROM FAILURE TO SECURE THE BORDER ACT OF 
                                  2023


                             General Leave

  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members 
may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks 
and include extraneous material on H.R. 5283.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from Arkansas?
  There was no objection.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to House Resolution 891 and rule 
XVIII, the Chair declares the House in the Committee of the Whole House 
on the state of the Union for the consideration of the bill, H.R. 5283.
  The Chair appoints the gentlewoman from Michigan (Mrs. McClain) to 
preside over the Committee of the Whole.

                              {time}  1412


                     In the Committee of the Whole

  Accordingly, the House resolved itself into the Committee of the 
Whole House on the state of the Union for the consideration of the bill 
(H.R. 5283) to prohibit the use of Federal funds to provide housing to 
specified aliens on any land under the administrative jurisdiction of 
the Federal land management agencies, with Mrs. McClain in the chair.
  The Clerk read the title of the bill.
  The CHAIR. Pursuant to the rule, the bill is considered read the 
first time.
  General debate shall be confined to the bill and shall not exceed 1 
hour equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority 
member of the Committee on Natural Resources, or their respective 
designees.
  The gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Westerman) and the gentleman from 
Arizona (Mr. Grijalva) each will control 30 minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Westerman).
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Madam Chair, I yield myself such time as I may 
consume.
  Madam Chair, today I rise in support of H.R. 5283, legislation 
sponsored by my colleague from New York City, Congresswoman 
Malliotakis.
  This legislation would protect our national parks, prevent wasteful 
spending, and hold the Biden administration accountable for its failed 
border policies.
  The Protecting our Communities from Failure to Secure the Border Act 
of 2023 would prohibit the use of any Federal funding, leases, or 
contracts to construct housing facilities for illegal immigrants on our 
Nation's Federal lands.
  It would also put an end to the legally questionable lease that the 
Biden administration signed with New York City to house thousands of 
migrants at Floyd Bennett Field, which is owned and managed by the 
National Park Service.
  Madam Chair, our national parks have been described as America's best 
idea. They are places we go to experience the outdoors and spend time 
with our friends, family, and community.
  That was true of Floyd Bennett Field, which drew an average of 1 
million visitors per year for its ice skating rinks, petting zoos, UC 
cadet programs, bird watching, bike races, and much more.

                              {time}  1415

  If you go to Floyd Bennett Field today, you wouldn't see any children 
on playgrounds or fishermen dotting the shoreline. Instead, you would 
see massive tents, hastily thrown together over the last few weeks to 
house 2,000 migrants in semi-congregate facilities.
  This tent city has been called a recipe for disaster.
  Local Democrat and Republican elected officials, the U.S. Park Police 
Union, the Legal Aid Society, and the Coalition for the Homeless have 
all spoken out against using Floyd Bennett Field as a migrant housing 
facility.
  The Park Police Union testified before the Committee on Natural 
Resources that it was a, ``law enforcement nightmare and public safety 
disaster in the making.''
  Numerous organizations have raised concerns about inadequate bathroom 
facilities, cramped sleeping areas, and hazards for children.
  The local fire department said the area is a fire trap and lacks 
basic safety features, like fire hydrants. If that wasn't enough, the 
entire facility is located in a flood plain that floods even on days 
with light rain.
  Maybe the Biden administration would have known about these issues 
ahead of time had they not tried to get around the National 
Environmental Policy Act by improperly declaring this as an emergency.
  Perhaps it is no surprise that when the first busloads of migrants 
started arriving at Floyd Bennett Field, they turned right back around 
and refused to stay there.
  Migrant families are now warning each other against staying there, 
saying that the site is freezing cold, babies are suffering, it is not 
suitable for children, and believe it or not, there are no televisions.
  This entire boondoggle has been a colossal waste of time and American 
tax dollars.
  Why are we here? Because of failed Democrat policies.
  President Biden has failed to secure our border leading to a record 
number of migrant apprehensions last month.
  Liberal New York Democrats have turned New York into a sanctuary city 
whose right-to-shelter laws will cost an estimated $12 billion over the 
next 3 years just to house undocumented immigrants.
  The mission of the National Park Service is to conserve the natural 
and cultural resources for the enjoyment of future generations, not 
bail out the failed border policies of the Biden administration.
  The use of emergency declarations at Floyd Bennett Field is a result 
of a man-made problem that President Biden is responsible for.
  The border crisis is now everywhere in America, and what is happening 
at Floyd Bennett Field is something that highlights the failures at the 
southern border. This is the Biden administration's legacy for the 
National Park Service.
  Congresswoman Malliotakis' legislation will ensure that Federal lands 
throughout the country, including parks such as Hot Springs National 
Park in my district and the Grand Canyon in the ranking member's home 
State, remain natural wonders, not tent cities for illegal immigrants.
  Madam Chair, I thank Representative Malliotakis for her strong 
leadership on this effort. I support this bill, and I reserve the 
balance of my time.
                                         House of Representatives,


                                     Committee on Agriculture,

                                Washington, DC, November 14, 2023.
     Hon. Bruce Westerman,
     Chairman, Committee on Natural Resources,
     Washington, DC.
       Dear Mr. Chairman: This letter confirms our mutual 
     understanding regarding H.R. 5283, the ``Protecting our 
     Communities from Failure to Secure the Border Act of 2023''. 
     Thank you for collaborating with the Committee on Agriculture 
     on the matters within our jurisdiction.
       The Committee on Agriculture will forego any further 
     consideration of this bill. However, by foregoing 
     consideration at this time, we do not waive any jurisdiction 
     over any subject matter contained in this or similar 
     legislation. The Committee on Agriculture also reserves the 
     right to seek appointment of an appropriate number of 
     conferees should it become necessary and ask that you support 
     such a request.
       We would appreciate a response to this letter confirming 
     this understanding with respect to H.R. 5283, and request a 
     copy of our letters on this matter be published in the

[[Page H5958]]

     Congressional Record during Floor consideration.
           Sincerely,
                                            Glenn ``GT'' Thompson,
     Chairman.
                                  ____

                                         House of Representatives,


                                     Committee on Agriculture,

                                Washington, DC, November 14, 2023.
     Hon. Glenn ``GT'' Thompson,
     Chairman, Committee on Agriculture,
     Washington, DC.
       Dear Mr. Chairman: I write regarding H.R. 5283, the 
     Protecting our Communities from Failure to Secure the Border 
     Act of 2023, which was ordered reported by the Committee on 
     Natural Resources on October 26, 2023.
       I recognize that the bill contains provisions that fall 
     within the jurisdiction of the Committee on Agriculture and 
     appreciate your willingness to forgo action on the bill. I 
     acknowledge that the Committee on Agriculture will not 
     formally consider H.R. 5283 and agree that the inaction of 
     your Committee with respect to the bill does not waive any 
     jurisdiction over the subject matter contained therein.
       I am pleased to support your request to name members of the 
     Committee on Agriculture to any conference committee to 
     consider such provisions. I will ensure that our exchange of 
     letters is included in the Congressional Record during floor 
     consideration of the bill. I appreciate your cooperation 
     regarding this legislation.
           Sincerely,
                                                  Bruce Westerman,
                         Chairman, Committee on Natural Resources.
  Mr. GRIJALVA. Madam Chair, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Madam Chair, I rise in opposition to the legislation. I am 
disappointed that today we once again are discussing the continued 
Republican insistence that immigration is a Federal land emergency.
  I will continue to dispute this claim because instead of focusing on 
the root causes of our Nation's immigration crisis and challenges, my 
colleagues have chosen to double down on a distraction.
  I oppose this bill because it is a political stunt that will invite 
even more hateful anti-immigration rhetoric from the extreme MAGA wing 
of the Republican Party.
  The case of Floyd Bennett Field does not represent a threat to our 
public lands. Rather, it encapsulates the humanitarian crisis that we 
are facing caused by failed immigration policies from the past 
administration and from the failure of Congress to take any action to 
reform a broken immigration system.
  The crisis can be solved but only with real comprehensive immigration 
reform.
  Madam Chair, former President Trump, as I understand it, is still the 
frontrunner for the Republican Presidential nomination.
  News flash: Nothing has changed. He has stated that he intends to 
return to the White House with his supercharged plan that one of his 
closest confidants and noted white nationalist Stephen Miller described 
as a ``blitz.''
  Miller went on to say that, ``Trump will unleash the vast arsenal of 
Federal powers to implement the most spectacular migration crackdown.''
  Madam Chair, I include in the Record The New York Times article, 
``Sweeping Raids, Giant Camps and Mass Deportations: Inside Trump's 
2025 Immigration Plans.''

                [From the New York Times, Nov. 11, 2023]

 Sweeping Raids and Mass Deportations: Inside Trump's 2025 Immigration 
                                 Plans

         (By Charles Savage, Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan)

       Former President Donald J. Trump is planning an extreme 
     expansion of his first-term crackdown on immigration if he 
     returns to power in 2025--including preparing to round up 
     undocumented people already in the United States on a vast 
     scale and detain them in sprawling camps while they wait to 
     be expelled.
       The plans would sharply restrict both legal and illegal 
     immigration in a multitude of ways.
       Mr. Trump wants to revive his first-term border policies, 
     including banning entry by people from certain Muslim-
     majority nations and reimposing a Covid 19-era policy of 
     refusing asylum claims--though this time he would base that 
     refusal on assertions that migrants carry other infectious 
     diseases like tuberculosis.
       He plans to scour the country for unauthorized immigrants 
     and deport people by the millions per year.
       To help speed mass deportations, Mr. Trump is preparing an 
     enormous expansion of a form of removal that does not require 
     due process hearings. To help Immigration and Customs 
     Enforcement carry out sweeping raids, he plans to reassign 
     other federal agents and deputize local police officers and 
     National Guard soldiers voluntarily contributed by 
     Republican-run states.
       To ease the strain on ICE detention facilities, Mr. Trump 
     wants to build huge camps to detain people while their cases 
     are processed and they await deportation flights. And to get 
     around any refusal by Congress to appropriate the necessary 
     funds, Mr. Trump would redirect money in the military budget, 
     as he did in his first term to spend more on a border wall 
     than Congress had authorized.
       In a public reference to his plans, Mr. Trump told a crowd 
     in Iowa in September: ``Following the Eisenhower model, we 
     will carry out the largest domestic deportation operation in 
     American history.'' The reference was to a 1954 campaign to 
     round up and expel Mexican immigrants that was named for an 
     ethnic slur--``Operation Wetback.''
       The constellation of Mr. Trump's 2025 plans amounts to an 
     assault on immigration on a scale unseen in modern American 
     history. Millions of undocumented immigrants would be barred 
     from the country or uprooted from it years or even decades 
     after settling here.
       Such a scale of planned removals would raise logistical, 
     financial and diplomatic challenges and would be vigorously 
     challenged in court. But there is no mistaking the breadth 
     and ambition of the shift Mr. Trump is eyeing.
       In a second Trump presidency, the visas of foreign students 
     who participated in anti-Israel or pro-Palestinian protests 
     would be canceled. U.S. consular officials abroad will be 
     directed to expand ideological screening of visa applicants 
     to block people the Trump administration considers to have 
     undesirable attitudes. People who were granted temporary 
     protected status because they are from certain countries 
     deemed unsafe, allowing them to lawfully live and work in the 
     United States, would have that status revoked.
       Similarly, numerous people who have been allowed to live in 
     the country temporarily for humanitarian reasons would also 
     lose that status and be kicked out, including tens of 
     thousands of the Afghans who were evacuated amid the 2021 
     Taliban takeover and allowed to enter the United States. 
     Afghans holding special visas granted to people who helped 
     U.S. forces would be revetted to see if they really did.
       And Mr. Trump would try to end birthright citizenship for 
     babies born in the United States to undocumented parents--by 
     proclaiming that policy to be the new position of the 
     government and by ordering agencies to cease issuing 
     citizenship-affirming documents like Social Security cards 
     and passports to them. That policy's legal legitimacy, like 
     nearly all of Mr. Trump's plans, would be virtually certain 
     to end up before the Supreme Court.
       In interviews with The New York Times, several Trump 
     advisers gave the most expansive and detailed description of 
     Mr. Trump's immigration agenda in a potential second term. In 
     particular, Mr. Trump's campaign referred questions for this 
     article to Stephen Miller, an architect of Mr. Trump's first-
     term immigration policies who remains close to and is 
     expected to serve in a senior role in a second 
     administration.
       All of the steps Trump advisers are preparing, Mr. Miller 
     contended in a wide-ranging interview, rely on existing 
     statutes; while the Trump team would likely seek a revamp of 
     immigration laws, the plan was crafted to need no new 
     substantive legislation. And while acknowledging that 
     lawsuits would arise to challenge nearly every one of them, 
     he portrayed the Trump team's daunting array of tactics as a 
     ``blitz'' designed to overwhelm immigrant-rights lawyers.
       ``Any activists who doubt President Trump's resolve in the 
     slightest are making a drastic error: Trump will unleash the 
     vast arsenal of federal powers to implement the most 
     spectacular migration crackdown,'' Mr. Miller said, adding, 
     ``The immigration legal activists won't know what's 
     happening.''
       Todd Schulte, the president of FWD.us, an immigration and 
     criminal justice advocacy group that repeatedly fought the 
     Trump administration, said the Trump team's plans relied on 
     ``xenophobic demagoguery'' that appeals to his hardest-core 
     political base.
       ``Americans should understand these policy proposals are an 
     authoritarian, often illegal, agenda that would rip apart 
     nearly every aspect of American life--tanking the economy, 
     violating the basic civil rights of millions of immigrants 
     and native-born Americans alike,'' Mr. Schulte said.
       Since Mr. Trump left office, the political environment on 
     immigration has moved in his direction. He is also more 
     capable now of exploiting that environment if he is re-
     elected than he was when he first won election as an 
     outsider.
       The ebbing of the Covid-19 pandemic and resumption of 
     travel flows have helped stir a global migrant crisis, with 
     millions of Venezuelans and Central Americans fleeing turmoil 
     and Africans arriving in Latin American countries before 
     continuing their journey north. Amid the record numbers of 
     migrants at the southern border and beyond it in cities like 
     New York and Chicago, voters are frustrated and even some 
     Democrats are calling for tougher action against immigrants 
     and pressuring the White House to better manage the crisis.
       Mr. Trump and his advisers see the opening, and now know 
     better how to seize it. The aides Mr. Trump relied upon in 
     the chaotic early days of his first term were sometimes at 
     odds and lacked experience in how to manipulate the levers of 
     federal power. By

[[Page H5959]]

     the end of his first term, cabinet officials and lawyers who 
     sought to restrain some of his actions--like his Homeland 
     Security secretary and chief of staff, John F. Kelly--had 
     been fired, and those who stuck with him had learned much.
       In a second term, Mr. Trump plans to install a team that 
     will not restrain him.
       Since much of Mr. Trump's first-term immigration crackdown 
     was tied up in the courts, the legal environment has tilted 
     in his favor: His four years of judicial appointments left 
     behind federal appellate courts and a Supreme Court that are 
     far more conservative than the courts that heard challenges 
     to his first-term policies.
       The fight over Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals 
     provides an illustration.
       DACA is an Obama-era program that shields from deportation 
     and grants work permits to people who were brought unlawfully 
     to the United States as children. Mr. Trump tried to end it, 
     but the Supreme Court blocked him on procedural grounds in 
     June 2020.
       Mr. Miller said Mr. Trump would try again to end DACA. And 
     the 5-4 majority of the Supreme Court that blocked the last 
     attempt no longer exists: A few months after the DACA ruling, 
     Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg died and Mr. Trump replaced her 
     with a sixth conservative, Justice Amy Coney Barrett.
       Mr. Trump's rhetoric has more than kept up with his 
     increasingly extreme agenda on immigration.
       His stoking of fear and anger toward immigrants--pushing 
     for a border wall and calling Mexicans rapists--fueled his 
     2016 takeover of the Republican Party. As president, he 
     privately mused about developing a militarized border like 
     Israel's, asked whether migrants crossing the border could be 
     shot in the legs and wanted a proposed border wall topped 
     with flesh-piercing spikes and painted black to burn 
     migrants' skin.
       As he has campaigned for the party's third straight 
     presidential nomination, his anti-immigrant tone has only 
     grown harsher. In a recent interview with a right-wing 
     website, Mr. Trump claimed without evidence that foreign 
     leaders were deliberately emptying their ``insane asylums'' 
     to send the patients across America's southern border as 
     migrants. He said migrants were ``poisoning the blood of our 
     country.'' And at a rally on Wednesday in Florida, he 
     compared them to the fictional serial killer and cannibal 
     Hannibal Lecter, saying; ``That's what's coming into our 
     country right now.''
       Mr. Trump had similarly vowed to carry out mass 
     deportations when running for office in 2016, but the 
     government only managed several hundred thousand removals per 
     year under his presidency, on par with other recent 
     administrations. If they get another opportunity, Mr. Trump 
     and his team are determined to achieve annual numbers in the 
     millions.
       Mr. Trump's immigration plan is to pick up where he left 
     off and then go much farther. He would not only revive some 
     of the policies that were criticized as draconian during his 
     presidency, many of which the Biden White House ended, but 
     also expand and toughen them.
       One example centers on expanding first-term policies aimed 
     at keeping people out of the country. Mr. Trump plans to 
     suspend the nation's refugee program and once again 
     categorically bar visitors from troubled countries, 
     reinstating a version of his ban on travel from several 
     mostly Muslim-majority countries, which President Biden 
     called discriminatory and ended on his first day in office.
       Mr. Trump would also use coercive diplomacy to induce other 
     nations to help, including by making cooperation a condition 
     of any other bilateral engagement, Mr. Miller said. For 
     example, a second Trump administration would seek to re-
     establish an agreement with Mexico that asylum seekers remain 
     there while their claims are processed. (It is not clear that 
     Mexico would agree; a Mexican court has said that deal 
     violated human rights.)
       Mr. Trump would also push to revive ``safe third country'' 
     agreements with several nations in Central America, and try 
     to expand them to Africa, Asia and South America. Under such 
     deals, countries agree to take would-be asylum seekers from 
     specific other nations and let them apply for asylum there 
     instead.
       While such arrangements have traditionally only covered 
     migrants who had previously passed through a third country, 
     federal law does not require that limit and a second Trump 
     administration would seek to make those deals without it, in 
     part as a deterrent to migrants making what the Trump team 
     views as illegitimate asylum claims.
       At the same time, Mr. Miller said, the Centers for Disease 
     Control and Prevention would invoke the public health 
     emergency powers law known as Title 42 to again refuse to 
     hear any asylum claims by people arriving at the southern 
     border. The Trump administration had internally discussed 
     that idea early in Mr. Trump's term, but some cabinet 
     secretaries pushed back, arguing that there was no public 
     health emergency that would legally justify it. The 
     administration ultimately implemented it during the 
     coronavirus pandemic.
       Saying the idea has since gained acceptance in practice--
     Mr. Biden initially kept the policy--Mr. Miller said Mr. 
     Trump would invoke Title 42, citing ``severe strains of the 
     flu, tuberculosis, scabies, other respiratory illnesses like 
     R.S.V. and so on, or just a general issue of mass migration 
     being a public health threat and conveying a variety of 
     communicable diseases.''
       Mr. Trump and his aides have not yet said whether they 
     would re-enact one of the most contentious deterrents to 
     unauthorized immigration that he pursued as president: 
     separating children from their parents, which led to trauma 
     among migrants and difficulties in reuniting families. When 
     pressed, Mr. Trump has repeatedly declined to rule out 
     reviving the policy. After an outcry over the practice, Mr. 
     Trump ended it in 2018 and a judge later blocked the 
     government from putting it back into effect.
       Soon after Mr. Trump announced his 2024 campaign for 
     president last November, he met with Tom Homan, who ran ICE 
     for the first year and a half of the Trump administration and 
     was an early proponent of separating families to deter 
     migrants.
       In an interview, Mr. Homan recalled that in that meeting, 
     he ``agreed to come back'' in a second term and would ``help 
     to organize and run the largest deportation operation this 
     country's ever seen.''
       Trump advisers' vision of abrupt mass deportations would be 
     a recipe for social and economic turmoil, disrupting the 
     housing market and major industries including agriculture and 
     the service sector.
       Mr Miller cast such disruption in a favorable light.
       ``Mass deportation will be a labor-market disruption 
     celebrated by American workers, who will now be offered 
     higher wages with better benefits to fill these jobs,'' he 
     said. ``Americans will also celebrate the fact that our 
     nation's laws are now being applied equally, and that one 
     select group is no longer magically exempt.''
       One planned step to overcome the legal and logistical 
     hurdles would be to significantly expand a form of fast-track 
     deportations known as ``expedited removal.'' it denies 
     undocumented immigrants the usual hearings and opportunity to 
     file appeals, which can take months or years--especially when 
     people are not in custody--and has led to a large backlog. A 
     1996 law says people can be subject to expedited removal for 
     up to two years after arriving, but to date the executive 
     branch has used it more cautiously, swiftly expelling people 
     picked up near the border soon after crossing.
       The Trump administration tried to expand the use of 
     expedited removal, but a court blocked it and then the Biden 
     team canceled the expansion. It remains unclear whether the 
     Supreme Court will rule that it is constitutional to use the 
     law against people who have been living for a significant 
     period in the United States and express fear of persecution 
     if sent home.
       Mr. Trump has also said he would invoke an archaic law, the 
     Alien Enemies Act of 1798, to expel suspected members of drug 
     cartels and criminal gangs without due process. That law 
     allows for summary deportation of people from countries with 
     which the United States is at war, that have invaded the 
     United States or that have engaged in ``predatory 
     incursions.''
       The Supreme Court has upheld past uses of that law in 
     wartime. But its text seems to require a link to the actions 
     of a foreign government, so it is not clear whether the 
     justices will allow a president to stretch it to encompass 
     drug cartel activity.
       More broadly, Mr. Miller said a new Trump administration 
     would shift from the ICE practice of arresting specific 
     people to carrying out workplace raids and other sweeps in 
     public places aimed at arresting scores of unauthorized 
     immigrants at once.
       To make the process of finding and deporting undocumented 
     immigrants already living inside the country ``radically more 
     quick and efficient,'' he said, the Trump team would bring in 
     ``the right kinds of attorneys and the right kinds of policy 
     thinkers'' willing to carry out such ideas.
       And because of the magnitude of arrests and deportations 
     being contemplated, they plan to build ``vast holding 
     facilities that would function as staging centers'' for 
     immigrants as their cases progress and they wait to be flown 
     to other countries.
       Mr. Miller said the new camps would likely be built ``on 
     open land in Texas near the border.''
       He said the military would construct them under the 
     authority and control of the Department of Homeland Security. 
     While he cautioned that there were no specific blueprints 
     yet, he said the camps would look professional and similar to 
     other facilities for migrants that have been built near the 
     border.
       Such camps could also enable the government to speed up the 
     pace and volume of deportations of undocumented people who 
     have lived in the United States for years and so are not 
     subject to fast-track removal. If pursuing a longshot effort 
     to win permission to remain in the country would mean staying 
     locked up in the interim, some may give up and voluntarily 
     accept removal without going through the full process.
       The use of these camps, Mr. Miller said, would likely be 
     focused more on single adults because the government cannot 
     indefinitely hold children under a longstanding court order 
     known as the Flores settlement. So any families brought to 
     the facilities would have to be moved in and out more 
     quickly, he said.
       The Trump administration tried to overturn the Flores 
     settlement, but the Supreme Court did not resolve the matter 
     before Mr. Trump's term ended. Mr. Miller said the Trump team 
     would try again.

[[Page H5960]]

       To increase the number of agents available for ICE sweeps, 
     Mr. Miller said, officials from other federal law enforcement 
     agencies would be temporarily reassigned, and state National 
     Guard troops and local police officers, at least from willing 
     Republican-led states, would be deputized for immigration 
     control efforts.
       While a law known as the Posse Comitatus Act generally 
     forbids the use of the armed forces for law enforcement 
     purposes, another law called the Insurrection Act creates an 
     exception. Mr. Trump would invoke the Insurrection Act at the 
     border, enabling the use of federal troops to apprehend 
     migrants, Mr Miller said.
       ``Bottom line,'' he said, ``President Trump will do 
     whatever it takes.''
  Mr. GRIJALVA. Madam Chair, apparently, the plan that has Mr. Miller 
salivating includes mass roundups, mass incarceration, permanently 
ending DACA, and the construction of camps to hold migrants waiting to 
be processed and presumably later expelled from the country.
  This is the leader from the Republican Party--his platform on 
immigration.
  I wonder if MAGA Don thinks that he will build these camps on public 
lands. I hope not, but who knows, perhaps he even thinks Mexico will 
pay for it.
  Seeking asylum is a human right. We should be discussing how we can 
best support migrants in this time of crisis by providing additional 
resources to guarantee safety and well-being during the immigration 
process.
  We should be supporting cities like New York that are responding 
proactively to this crisis. Instead, we are taking up a bill that 
micromanages and limits local decisionmaking authority.
  If the Republicans wanted to protect our parks, they would have 
passed an appropriations bill that would not cut nearly half a billion 
dollars from the National Park budget. Such a cut would result in the 
loss of 1,000 park staff and will reduce the agency's maintenance and 
preservation funding.
  These extreme cuts are going nowhere in the Senate, and President 
Biden has promised to veto, so why waste that time.
  To protect our parks, we should empower our Federal land management 
agencies by providing them with the necessary resources to fulfill 
their mission and the mission to the American people. Instead, this 
bill would interfere with that work.
  Historically, the National Park Service has the authority to lease 
its property if the agency head determines that the lease will not 
obstruct the preservation of the property. Well, in the case of Floyd 
Bennett Field, the temporary lease will have minimal environmental 
impact.
  New York City will be investing millions of dollars to address the 
deferred maintenance and improve visitor amenities, leaving the site 
actually better than before. This idea that leasing the field this way 
will somehow degrade it is a red herring.
  The temporary lease will also have minimal impact on recreation. The 
park at Floyd Bennett Field we are talking about in this instance is 
the disused runway at an abandoned airport. That is why the site has a 
long history of leasing for nonrecreational purposes.
  It has been used for emergency responses, like during Hurricane 
Sandy, and even now it is used by NYPD and the New York City Department 
of Sanitation for exercises, including training their drivers in the 
use of heavy-duty vehicles.
  Madam Chair, New York City is urgently responding to a humanitarian 
crisis. We need to support that effort. Evicting the migrants at Floyd 
Bennett Field with no plan for keeping them from being homeless is not 
a real solution for New Yorkers. It is not a real solution for our 
national immigration debate. We need real immigration reform, not more 
unserious attempts to distract from the root of the problem.
  Madam Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Madam Chair, I yield 5 minutes to the gentlewoman from 
New York (Ms. Malliotakis), the lead sponsor of this bill.
  Ms. MALLIOTAKIS. Madam Chair, I thank the chairman for yielding.
  On September 15, 2023, against the strong public outcry from the 
local community in Brooklyn and across New York City, the lease signed 
by the Biden administration proposes to house at least 2,000 migrants 
at Floyd Bennett Field, Brooklyn, at a monthly rent of $1.7 million.
  Under the terms of the lease, the city, who will be reimbursed by the 
State, will pay the first 3 months up front and the city will be able 
to use 30 acres of land at the location. The total cost of the 
agreement is over $20.8 million.
  According to the mayor of New York City, Eric Adams, who himself has 
said this migrant crisis will destroy New York City, so far in fiscal 
year 2023, New York City has spent $1.4 billion to deal with this 
crisis. It is estimated that the taxpayers will be forced to pay $12 
billion by 2025 if this crisis is not handled, meaning, if we do not 
stop the unsustainable and unsafe flow of individuals coming through 
our southern border.
  Additionally, the mayor has said because of this crisis, he has to 
propose a 15 percent across-the-board cut for New York City services 
for our actual citizens. He wants to bring the number of cops to 1990 
levels; thousands of fewer cops on our streets than we had on September 
11, 2001.
  We are having a hiring freeze for not just the cops, but the school 
safety officers. There is no difference than the left's defund the 
police agenda than this. This is defunding the police to pay for 
citizens of other countries to receive free housing and services. They 
are just not calling it that.
  The gentleman who spoke prior on the other side of the aisle says 
that we have to get to the root of the problem. You are absolutely 
right. Our mayor, by the way, is misinterpreting the right-to-shelter 
decree, which is intended for homeless New Yorkers, mandating the city 
to house homeless New Yorkers, not citizens of other countries.
  Madam Chair, if there is any question about that, we sued, and a 
judge on Staten Island reaffirmed what we have been saying, that the 
city has no obligation to house citizens of other countries, and the 
decree was meant for homeless New Yorkers.
  However, the mayor continues to use luxury hotel rooms, crushing 
tourism in New York. They are using school spaces, whether they are 
former Catholic schools--and they have even used public school gyms and 
cafeterias at one point--or public and open spaces such as park land, 
and even assisted living facilities. They actually went so far as to 
kick a bunch of seniors out of assisted living facilities in my 
district and then turned around and made it a migrant shelter.
  How is that fair for the citizens of New York?
  Let's get to the root of the problem. The root of the problem is that 
the President of the United States chose to put in place executive 
orders that dismantled public safety, that took away the tools of our 
Customs and Border Patrol agents, that allowed for a free flow of 
individuals into the country, 1.7 million of them.
  We don't know who they are, where they are, or what their intention 
is. Then the other 6-million-plus that applied for asylum, guess what, 
50 percent of those cases are denied in court. People are abusing the 
asylum system to gain entry into this country, to be released into this 
country. Most don't show up to court. When they do, 50 percent of those 
cases are denied.
  We need to go back to enforcing the laws, making sure there is a 
proper process in this country for people, yes, to apply for asylum.
  My mother is a Cuban refugee. I support people coming to this country 
and applying for asylum the right way.
  What is the right way? The right way is you go to the next safe 
country.
  We have people from over 120 countries coming through the southern 
border. We only have two countries bordering the United States, yet we 
have people from 120 countries, which means the process is not being 
followed.
  Madam Chair, I will tell you something else. This is very unfair to 
immigrants. I don't know if the other side understands what this 
President is doing. He has a ``last in, first in approach,'' which 
means that the people coming over the border are having their cases 
heard first.
  So the people who have been waiting in line for years--and there is a 
10-year backlog right now because of this crisis the President 
created--those people are not being heard and they are having their 
cases pushed back even further. How is that right?

[[Page H5961]]

  Maybe you are the party that is anti-immigrant, that you are letting 
people who applied the right way, who came to this country the right 
way, to be stuck and pushed to the back of the line.
  Mr. GRIJALVA. Madam Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from 
New York (Ms. Velazquez), a distinguished member of the Natural 
Resources Committee.
  Ms. VELAZQUEZ. Madam Chair, I thank Ranking Member Grijalva for 
yielding.
  I rise today in opposition to this disingenuous bill introduced under 
the guise of protecting National Park Service land.
  If Republicans were really concerned about protecting our national 
parks, why did they vote to cut the National Park Service budget by 
approximately half a billion dollars in the appropriations bill that 
they passed less than a month ago?

                              {time}  1430

  The point here is not to protect the National Park Service. The point 
here is cruelty.
  If extreme MAGA Republicans really wanted to preserve public lands, 
why have they passed bills that include shameless giveaways of our 
public lands and waters to the destructive oil, gas, and mining 
industries?
  If Republicans really cared about our Federal lands, why have they 
continuously tried to gut bedrock environmental laws, like the 
Endangered Species Act, since taking the majority?
  Republicans do not care about our national parks. They are simply 
looking for more excuses to spread anti-immigrant rhetoric.
  I know firsthand that the situation in New York is a humanitarian 
crisis and not a partisan issue. If you want to tackle the root cause 
of this, let's get together to draft legislation. We have legislation 
that has been introduced--in many instances, bipartisan legislation. 
Let's get real and deal with the broken system that we have in this 
country and address comprehensive immigration reform.
  The Acting CHAIR (Mr. Moylan). The time of the gentlewoman has 
expired.
  Mr. GRIJALVA. Mr. Chair, I yield an additional 1 minute to the 
gentlewoman from New York.
  Ms. VELAZQUEZ. We must ensure that people fleeing violence and 
persecution, regardless of nationality or other demographics, can 
access asylum and the refugee resettlement system in this country, as 
required by law.
  New York City is doing all it can to accomplish this, but it cannot 
do it alone. The real solution here is to increase support for the city 
and the individuals exercising their protected right to seek asylum in 
the United States.
  The bill before us today is performative and vilifies migrants, 
making it harder for New York City to meet this moment.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Chair, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from 
Wisconsin (Mr. Tiffany), the chair of the Subcommittee on Federal 
Lands.
  Mr. TIFFANY. Mr. Chair, I rise in support of this legislation, which 
would prohibit the housing of illegal immigrants on Federal lands. I 
only wish it was not necessary.
  Unfortunately, thanks to the open borders policies of the Biden 
administration, America's public lands are now in danger of being 
converted into public flophouses for foreign migrants. Here we are.
  In an effort to house the exploding number of foreigners illegally 
flooding into our country, the Biden administration is already allowing 
the construction of an encampment at the Floyd Bennett Field in 
Brooklyn's Gateway National Recreation Area.
  They even waived NEPA, the National Environmental Policy Act, to 
permit it. You do not see any of the environmental groups raising a 
ruckus like they normally do when productive companies in the United 
States of America want to do something with natural resources. Where is 
the Sierra Club? Where is the National Resources Defense Council? Where 
is the Center For Biological Diversity when NEPA is being flouted once 
again?
  What is next? Illegal alien Bidenvilles on The National Mall here 
right in Washington, D.C.? Makeshift migrant towns on the rim of the 
Grand Canyon? Maybe they are going to the Apostle Islands National 
Lakeshore in my district to build encampments there on Lake Superior.
  As the President is fond of saying, this is no joke, folks.
  For decades, we have worked together across party lines to protect 
our iconic national parks, pristine wildlife refuges, and resource-rich 
national forests and rangelands. We have done so to conserve these 
areas for the wise use and future enjoyment of the American people.
  We can do that again by passing this bill and ensuring that the 
public lands we all cherish are not transformed into squatting grounds 
for a never-ending stampede of migrants.
  I will close with this. On January 20, 2021, the first day that 
President Biden was in office, he closed down energy independence in 
America by shutting down the Keystone pipeline, and he opened up the 
pipeline down to Panama to be able to bring millions of illegal 
immigrants into America.
  It is amazing to me to watch my colleagues on the other side of the 
aisle as they twist themselves into pretzels as we advance bill after 
bill, including the Floyd Bennett bill here, and they are in complete 
denial. ``Hey, America, everything is just fine.'' It is not.
  Mr. Chair, I support this bill, and I urge a ``yes'' vote.
  Mr. GRIJALVA. Mr. Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from 
Maine (Ms. Pingree).
  Ms. PINGREE. Mr. Chair, I thank my friend, Mr. Grijalva, for yielding 
me the time.
  Mr. Chair, this bill does nothing to address the immigration crisis 
facing our Nation. It does not help New York City, and it doesn't help 
the asylum seekers.
  I represent Portland, Maine, which, like New York, has welcomed an 
influx of asylum seekers this year. Portland has also struggled to find 
sufficient housing for our new neighbors.
  If Republicans are serious about getting asylum seekers out of 
shelters, then we should be debating my amendment to replace this 
misguided bill with my plan to get asylum seekers to work faster. 
Currently, asylum seekers must wait at least 6 months before they are 
eligible to receive work authorization. The bipartisan Asylum Seeker 
Work Authorization Act would cut this waiting time to 30 days, allowing 
asylum seekers to get to work faster and no longer rely on social 
safety net programs to survive.
  I have spoken to countless asylum seekers who are anxious to get to 
work and start supporting themselves and their families and contribute 
to their communities. We just need to get out of their way.
  I have also heard from employers from across the country who would 
jump at the chance to hire asylum seekers. At present, there are 9.5 
million job openings in the United States and only 6.5 million 
unemployed workers. That leaves a gap of 3 million job openings that 
businesses need asylum seekers to fill. That is why business groups 
like the United States Chamber of Commerce have endorsed my bill.

  My commonsense proposal would make no changes to the asylum process. 
It would simply reduce the amount of time that asylum seekers are 
barred from filling critical job openings.
  As President Reagan once said, immigrants are one of the most 
important sources of America's greatness.
  Mr. Chair, I urge my colleagues across the aisle to join me in 
supporting this commonsense, bipartisan solution.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
Minnesota (Mr. Stauber).
  Mr. STAUBER. Mr. Chair, I rise today in support of H.R. 5283, the 
Protecting our Communities from Failure to Secure the Border Act, which 
I am proud to cosponsor.
  Plenty of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle will stand 
here today and protest that this bill is unnecessary. They will 
complain Republicans shouldn't be taking up this piece of legislation. 
The truth is, if it weren't for the disastrous policies of this 
administration, I don't think we would find ourselves even considering 
this bill. It is plain and simple: Republicans are taking action to 
address our southern border crisis because the Biden administration has 
failed to do so. They have failed to protect the American people.
  Mr. Chair, 2 weeks ago, they broke a record. In just 1 week, 15,000 
illegals came across our southern border.

[[Page H5962]]

  The district I represent in northern Minnesota contains hundreds of 
miles of northern border with Canada. The 547 miles of border shared 
with Canada are patrolled by only two mobile agents right now because 
the current agents are being reassigned to in-process the illegals 
coming through our southern border. Now, our northern border is not 
secure because of this administration. There are 547 miles of border 
that are wide open, and the cartels and coyotes have figured it out.
  Earlier this fall, in Bemidji, Minnesota, an 11-year-old girl was 
sexually assaulted, and 11 illegal immigrants were found at the scene 
of that crime.
  For those of you who don't know where Bemidji is, it is not along our 
southern border. It is over 2,000 miles away. Bemidji and every 
community across this Nation have been turned into a border community, 
putting Americans at risk.
  The Acting CHAIR. The time of the gentleman has expired.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Chair, I yield an additional 30 seconds to the 
gentleman from Minnesota.
  Mr. STAUBER. Now, even our Federal lands meant for conservation, 
recreation, and development of our great natural resources are being 
turned into campgrounds for traffickers and terrorists who are marching 
into our country and breaking our immigration laws.
  Northern Minnesota is also home to vast amounts of public lands, 
including the Chippewa and Superior National Forests, Voyageurs 
National Park, and the Grand Portage National Monument.
  It is a shame that we even have to consider this piece of legislation 
because of the Biden administration's open border policy that is making 
our Nation less secure. We have no idea who is coming into this Nation, 
and it is not appropriate that we keep this open border.
  Mr. Chair, I support this piece of legislation.
  Mr. GRIJALVA. Mr. Chair, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  I think a soft reminder is important now, as we point to these asylum 
seekers and those who are seeking refugee status in this country and 
those who are going through the immigration process.
  It is important to note that they are not the first. Almost everybody 
who speaks on this floor today can trace their lineage to somebody who 
wasn't here in this country when the indigenous people, the first 
Americans in this country, were here.
  I think we need to be careful not to stereotype, not to be ugly, and 
not to be abusive about a crisis and human tragedy that we see before 
us that we should be attending to rather than exploiting.
  Mr. Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. 
Menendez), a valued colleague.
  Mr. MENENDEZ. Mr. Chair, I thank my friend and colleague from Arizona 
for yielding and for his leadership on this issue.
  I rise today because while House Republicans vilify families that are 
coming to the United States for refuge, House Democrats and the Biden 
administration are working to address immigration challenges with real 
solutions.
  As many cities are welcoming asylum seekers and migrant families, 
House Democrats are fighting to provide resources to local governments 
that are processing migrant arrivals. House Democrats are fighting to 
relieve the immigration court backlog and provide stability for those 
stuck in the system. House Democrats are fighting to allow people to 
work and support their families. House Democrats are fighting to 
improve processing at the border.
  To be clear, this bill does not provide any solutions for our 
communities. This bill does not address the core issues driving 
migration. It does not provide resources to local governments that are 
handling migrant arrivals. It does nothing. In fact, it does the exact 
opposite of being productive by limiting available facilities to house 
migrants while they go through a process to which they are legally 
entitled. This bill has no purpose other than to score cheap political 
points for House Republicans.
  When House Republicans are ready to discuss real solutions, we will 
be ready to work with them. Right now, I encourage all of my colleagues 
to vote ``no'' on H.R. 5283.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Chair, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from 
Wyoming (Ms. Hageman).

  Ms. HAGEMAN. Mr. Chair, as if Biden's border crisis isn't bad enough, 
this administration is now seeking to convert our national parks, 
America's most cherished national treasures and historical sites, into 
tent cities for illegal aliens.
  Such actions not only debase our national heritage but blatantly 
violate numerous Federal statutes, including those covering management 
and protection of our national parks, NEPA, and the Administrative 
Procedure Act.
  How bad is this latest move to convert our national parks to 
ungovernable tent cities? While Wyoming's efforts to prevent 
catastrophic wildfires destroying our national forests are met with 
intensive scrutiny from the unelected bureaucrats in this 
administration, President Biden is categorically exempting the housing 
of thousands of individuals in our national parks from any type of 
environmental review.
  This double standard is indefensible, and the Biden administration's 
refusal to engage with Congress on this bill only confirms that fact. 
We need serious reforms to end the flood of illegal immigrants into our 
Nation, not half measures that fail to correct the disaster of this 
administration's own making and endanger what is the very best idea 
America ever had.
  Mr. Chair, I urge my colleagues to protect our national parks by 
voting in favor of the bill.
  Mr. GRIJALVA. Mr. Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
Illinois (Mr. Garcia).
  Mr. GARCIA of Illinois. Mr. Chair, I rise today in strong opposition 
to this extreme anti-immigrant bill put forward by my colleague from 
New York.
  I represent Chicago, a city founded by an immigrant and a city that 
to this day welcomes immigrants. Although this year has tested us, 
Chicagoans have stepped up to embrace our new neighbors.
  As a proud immigrant representing a predominantly immigrant, diverse 
district, I take offense to the blatant attacks against my 
constituents. Outrage about public lands is just another excuse for 
Republicans to vilify immigrant communities. If they really cared, they 
wouldn't bulldoze through public lands and wildlife habitats while 
destroying our environment in their zeal for a border wall. They also 
wouldn't try to sell our public lands off to the highest corporate 
bidder.
  There are many ways to create a more just immigration system. This 
bill is certainly not one of them, and I urge my colleagues to oppose 
it.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Chair, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentlewoman 
from Virginia (Mrs. Kiggans).

                              {time}  1445

  Mrs. KIGGANS of Virginia. Mr. Chair, I rise today in support of H.R. 
5283, the Protecting our Communities from Failure to Secure the Border 
Act.
  For 3 years, Americans have experienced the repercussions of the 
Biden administration's failed border policies.
  In fiscal year 2023 alone, over 2.4 million migrants were apprehended 
illegally crossing our southern border with drug smugglers, human 
traffickers, terrorists, and other dangerous criminals taking advantage 
of our porous border.
  This crisis has affected every facet of our Nation, including our 
National Park Service.
  In September, the Biden administration signed a lease with New York 
City to house at least 2,000 illegal migrants in a tent encampment at 
Floyd Bennett Field in Brooklyn which sits on Federal land.
  This encampment conflicts with Federal law, takes away from the 
field's taxpayer-funded recreational activities, and raises serious 
safety concerns both for those who would be housed there and for those 
who live nearby, as it puts an undue burden on law enforcement.
  A couple of months ago in the Natural Resources Committee, we 
actually heard from people who represented the Park Service and lived 
and worked in New York City, including law enforcement. I feel that it 
is our job as Representatives to be listening to the people who 
actually live and work in those communities to have legislation that 
makes an impact there.

[[Page H5963]]

  They are the ones that told us about the security concerns and the 
concerns from tourists. What were the children and people who are 
encamped there doing on a daily basis?
  Some of the issues they had were with criminal activity and how it 
interfered with the recreational purposes of that park. Americans 
shouldn't be deprived access to national parks and lands paid for by 
their tax dollars because of this administration's destructive 
immigration policies.
  This bill, that I was proud to work on as a member of the Natural 
Resources Committee, would reverse the decision to lease Park Service 
land to New York City to house illegal migrants and prohibit the Biden 
administration from doing so with any Federal lands in the future.
  Mr. Chair, I came to Washington to restore commonsense leadership, 
and with this bill we have an opportunity to do just that.
  Mr. Chair, I urge my colleagues to join me in supporting H.R. 5283.
  Mr. GRIJALVA. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
New York (Mr. Goldman).
  Mr. GOLDMAN of New York. Mr. Chairman, boy, you would think this was 
the Congress of New York State, given how much focus my colleagues on 
the other side of the aisle put on New York State. I will tell you, as 
a Member of Congress from New York City, we are doing just fine.
  This bill, however, is not at all just fine. It is yet another ploy 
by the Republicans to score political points without actually 
addressing the desperately needed reforms to our immigration system.
  Immigration is a Federal issue, yet New York City, where both this 
bill's sponsor and I come from, is bearing the financial burden of this 
issue.
  This bill would make it harder for cities and States to get Federal 
support for immigrants who, like so many of our descendants, are 
fleeing horrible conditions in their home countries to seek a better 
life in the United States.
  On both sides of the aisle, we agree we have to fix our broken 
immigration system. Defunding migrant housing sites is not the 
solution.
  Instead of closing down these sites and sending children potentially 
into the street and the cold, let's focus on legislation that actually 
does make our communities safer. Let's focus on fixing the fentanyl 
trade problem we have and the human trafficking problem that is 
plaguing our southern border.
  That is why, as an amendment to this bill, I proposed my Disarming 
Cartels Act, that would stop the flow of more than 500,000 American-
manufactured guns into the hands of the drug cartels in Mexico, who are 
responsible for the bulk of the crime that occurs on the southern 
border.
  Over 70 percent of the guns recovered from crime scenes in Mexico 
come from the United States. Hundreds of thousands of American-made 
guns are sent to Mexico every year because you cannot get a gun quickly 
in Mexico. That, of course, is too much common sense. That would 
actually solve the problem. That doesn't score political points.
  The Acting CHAIR. The time of the gentleman has expired.
  Mr. GRIJALVA. Mr. Chair, I yield an additional 1 minute to the 
gentleman from New York.
  Mr. GOLDMAN of New York. Mr. Chair, that does solve the problem. This 
does not solve the problem. This is just a political ploy, a messaging 
bill, that does nothing to solve our open borders.
  Every single Republican witness that has come before the Homeland 
Security Committee this Congress has acknowledged that the outflow of 
American-made weapons of war to the cartels in Mexico is a massive 
cause of crime at the border.
  Why won't you address it? Why won't you join it?
  Why won't you even allow the bill to come to the floor?
  Is it the gun lobby?
  Is it because you just want to use immigration as a political cudgel, 
and you don't want to find solutions?
  Instead of fear-mongering, let's get some solutions together. Let's 
work together. We are ready. We just need a partner that will stop 
messaging and start solving problems.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Chair, it sounds like we have bipartisan support 
for H.R. 2, the Secure our Borders Act, which was passed out of this 
Chamber that would secure our border and would address the fentanyl 
crisis. Maybe some of our colleagues weren't paying attention when we 
brought that up and debated it and passed it. Hopefully, they can go 
talk to Senator Schumer who represents New York, and get that bill 
through the Senate and on President Biden's desk.

  Mr. Chair, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from California (Mr. 
LaMalfa).
  Mr. LaMALFA. Mr. Chairman, I appreciate the effort here today. Now it 
is a gun problem. I believe we are moving illegal immigrants into 
national parks in New York, and I suppose around the rest of the 
country, because we have a numbers problem. No, it isn't a gun problem.
  It isn't even that the immigration system is so broken, it is just 
not being enforced. We have laws in place that would actually work if 
they were enforced. It is crazy. No wonder people think Congress is out 
of its mind with some of the stuff that goes on because we, oh, are 
going to fill up the parks, starting in New York and other areas of the 
country, and it will end up in the West because we don't have enough 
space.
  There is a green light at our open border. We have had sanctuary 
cities inviting them in, and now they are seeing the results, finally, 
of Democrat policies that have put us in this place.
  Indeed, this is not a long-term problem, so much as it has been 
intense the last 3 years during the Biden administration. This is not a 
commonsense solution I hear on the other side about guns or filling the 
parks with illegal immigrants. It is about controlling the border where 
the root cause is and not trying to gloss over it with this sort of 
policy.
  Mr. Chair, this is a good policy to get started in the right 
direction.
  Mr. GRIJALVA. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from 
Texas (Ms. Garcia).
  Ms. GARCIA of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I rise today in strong opposition 
to this bill.
  If MAGA Republicans want a real, bipartisan solution for our broken 
immigration system, they should sign up and support my American Dream 
and Promise Act.
  Today, our country is home to millions of Dreamers. These are people 
who were brought to the United States as children and grew up here. In 
their heart, in their mind, and in their soul they are Americans except 
on paper.
  This is their country. This is their home. If Congress does nothing, 
we will lose our neighbors, our family members, and friends. We will 
lose fellow Americans.
  With the American Dream and Promise Act, House Democrats have a 
plan--with bipartisan support--to finally create a pathway to 
citizenship for Dreamers and immigrant families.
  Make no mistake, this is not a partisan issue. Over 70 percent of 
Americans favor a law providing permanent legal status to Dreamers. 
This is a real solution. The American Dream and Promise Act will have a 
life-changing effect on every single district in this country.
  Take it from me, I was born and raised in south Texas. I recognize 
the importance of securing our border to protect the integrity of our 
Nation.
  Extreme MAGA Republicans have introduced a pitiful excuse to spread 
anti-immigrant rhetoric. Their bill fails to protect this country. It 
will not make us safer.
  Their bill weaponizes the Federal Government against those who have 
the least. It mocks what this country stands for.
  The gentlewoman from New York should look out into the New York 
Harbor to the statue that embodies the American promise: ``Give me your 
tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.''
  In America, we welcome those fleeing harm. We welcome those who 
believe in the American Dream. Americans support Dreamers and Dreamers 
support America. I am opposed to this bill.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from 
Alabama (Mr. Carl).
  Mr. CARL. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of this important bill, 
H.R. 5283, the Protecting our Communities from Failure to Secure our 
Border Act of 2023.

[[Page H5964]]

  In a time where the security of our Nation is at great risk because 
of illegal immigrants, this bill takes huge steps to address the 
challenges we face at our borders and prohibits the housing of illegal 
immigrants on federally managed lands, including those under the 
National Park Service, U.S. Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management, 
and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
  We have got a real crisis in this country. We can't wait any longer 
to address it.
  Since President Biden has taken office, there are over 6.5 million 
illegal crossings in the U.S. that we know of--that we know of is the 
important part.
  It is absolutely critical we secure our borders and enact measures 
that discourage further waves of illegal immigrants. We can't keep 
encouraging further waves of illegal immigrants to come here by 
offering free housing on Federal lands.
  Mr. GRIJALVA. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished 
gentleman from New York (Mr. Meeks), the ranking member of the Foreign 
Affairs Committee.
  Mr. MEEKS. Mr. Chairman, I rise today to say to my Republican 
colleagues: Stop the xenophobic rhetoric about asylum seekers and draft 
some meaningful policy that addresses the migrant crisis in New York 
and across this country.
  Deception and extremism are what my colleagues across the aisle are 
spewing. In this so-called piece of legislation, they claim that 
Federal land will be hurt. The Floyd Bennett Field lease does not put 
any of our public lands in harm's way.
  In fact, this same field was used 11 years ago during Superstorm 
Sandy as a disaster relief center for New Yorkers displaced by the 
hurricane. Republicans had zero opposition to that.
  Those who are voicing their feigned concern for our public lands are 
the same people who have repeatedly pushed policies to defund and 
degrade our public lands. In this Congress alone, Republicans are 
trying to slash the National Park Service's budget by nearly half a 
billion dollars. These are not ideas of a party that has actual 
concerns about our public lands and parks.
  Instead, this is an example of extremists trying to push policies 
that vilify migrants rather than provide sensible solutions to a real 
crisis.

                              {time}  1500

  Democrats, on the other hand, are working every day to put people 
over politics. The Biden administration, for example, granted temporary 
protected status to one-half million Venezuelans so they can 
financially support their families and join the American workforce as 
they await their asylum court dates. Now those are real results in 
putting people over politics.
  Democrats are ready to work on legislation that addresses the migrant 
crisis in a humanitarian manner, but we need Republicans to stop 
wasting time with their terrible and extreme bills and join us in 
getting back to work.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Chair, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from 
Georgia (Mr. Collins).
  Mr. COLLINS. Mr. Chairman, you would think by just listening to this 
debate that we were sitting here debating funding and we were debating 
guns, and that is actually not the case.
  You see, Mr. Chair, what the Biden administration is trying to do is 
just another glaring example in a long list of glaring examples of what 
they have done to destroy the American fabric as we know it.
  Mr. Chair, you can look at inflation, and you can look at the 
wokeness in the military, but this is actually about an invasion, and 
now they are wanting to take a national park and turn it into a migrant 
camp.
  I want to tell you something, Mr. Chair: If you give this 
administration an inch, they will take a mile. That is just the 
beginning of this.
  People want to go see their national parks. They want to go see the 
Grand Canyon. They don't want to see a grand caravan.
  Instead of punishing Americans for its failures, the Biden 
administration should look to actual long-lasting solutions to the 
border crisis. House Republicans, Mr. Chairman, knew exactly right. We 
have already acted by passing H.R. 2, the Secure the Border Act.
  Mr. Chair, I want to urge all of my colleagues to support this bill 
and protect our national parks.
  Mr. GRIJALVA. Mr. Chairman, as a reminder, seeking asylum is a human, 
legal right protected by international law and United States law, 
period.
  Instead of wishing that that was not the case, Republicans should 
work with Democrats and the administration to move a meaningful 
response to this humanitarian crisis and dealing with the issue of 
comprehensive immigration reform. Unfortunately, we are here debating a 
senseless stunt of a bill instead.
  Mr. Chair, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from Chicago, 
Illinois (Mrs. Ramirez).
  Mrs. RAMIREZ. Mr. Chair, we just got back from a week with family. 
Many of us sat around the table, and we thanked God for the family, for 
the children, and for the ability to have a roof over their head. Some 
of you remembered that your family came 100, 200 years ago. In my case 
they came 40 years ago from Guatemala, and now we are back here with 
the same rhetoric that we continue to play over and over and over. 
Republicans are using human beings as bargaining chips to try to 
realize their extreme and their very harmful policies.
  Despite their efforts to cut funding for land protection, cut social 
safety net services, and bankrupt our Federal infrastructure, they also 
want us to believe that providing emergency refuge and services to 
asylum seekers is what is causing all our economic problems.
  Now, let me talk about that for a second. Immigrants are not the 
problem. They are an asset. They are actually a solution to improve our 
economy.
  If you go to the neighborhood ALDI like I do, Mr. Chair, I see three 
people working there, and when I talk to the cashiers, they say to me: 
Congresswoman, get those work permits. We need workers.
  There are 11.5 million people ready to help fill the almost 9 million 
open jobs right now. Those open jobs are disrupting the supply chain, 
and they are increasing inflation. These immigrants are ready to 
support the 245 million Americans, many of them living in our own 
communities, living in counties with shrinking populations. They are 
ready to invest in housing markets, and they are ready to grow our 
local economies.
  Mr. Chair, if you actually ask our people: What keeps you up at 
night?
  It is not being able to pay rent.
  What keeps people up at night is that they have to work two jobs just 
to raise two children.
  What keeps people up at night is that they can't afford milk and they 
can't afford other things.
  It is not an undocumented person.
  So let's talk about the economy because that is exactly what people 
want us to be able to address.
  Immigrants are ready to increase our national GDP by up to $1.7 
trillion over the next decade.
  We should be working to address the root cause of this issue by 
ensuring their successful resettlement and integration instead of 
shaming them and then going back home and thanking God for family, 
community, and country.
  I ask my colleagues to reject this bill. Let's get to the real work 
of delivering work permits for all and establishing pathways to 
citizenship today and improving our economy.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Chair, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from 
California (Mr. McClintock).
  Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Chairman, I would first remind the Democrats that 
illegal immigration is not a human right. It is a Federal crime.
  Now, the national parks were set aside for the use and enjoyment of 
the American people, but President Biden is now expropriating these 
lands for the benefit of the 3 million illegal immigrants whom he has 
deliberately released into our country. This bill would halt that 
abomination, and I wholeheartedly support it.
  Nevertheless, the misuse of our public lands is, frankly, the least 
of our problems. The impact this is having on social services, our 
schools, our hospitals, our homeless shelters, the safety of our 
neighborhoods, the security of our country, and the rule of law itself 
has been catastrophic.
  Elections have consequences. The American people need to decide 
whether they want this to continue or whether they will replace this 
President with

[[Page H5965]]

one who is determined to recover not only our Nation's lands but our 
Nation's sovereignty.

  Mr. GRIJALVA. Mr. Chairman, yes, elections do have consequences, and 
one of the responsibilities that elections provide to the United States 
Congress and the House of Representatives, let me remind my colleagues, 
is our broken immigration system, and that is a problem only Congress 
can solve.
  We have seen what happens when Republicans try to solve this from the 
White House. The Trump administration set an unprecedented pace for 
executive action on immigration. These restrictive policies did not 
solve the crisis. Instead, they increased the backlog in immigration 
proceedings, separated children from their families, banned foreign 
nationals from predominately Muslim countries, and cut refugee numbers 
to the lowest in decades, among other things. So this is on Congress to 
fix.
  Unfortunately, as long as Republicans refuse to support real, 
substantive reform that is fair, humane, and equitable for all parties, 
then we will continue to see immigration-related crises of the makings 
of Congress and in this particular instance of the making of the House 
majority Republicans.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from 
Arizona (Mr. Ciscomani).
  Mr. CISCOMANI. Mr. Chairman, I thank Chairman Westerman for yielding.
  Mr. Chair, I rise today in support of this bill in my district which 
includes parts of the Tucson sector where we are currently seeing 
record levels of illegal crossings of over 15,000 per week.
  The administration's efforts to turn our national parks into shelters 
not only does not solve the problem or even address it, but it only 
further exacerbates and furthers the crisis which is both one of 
national security and one of humanitarian consequences, as well.
  Migrants are literally dying as they make their journey into the 
United States. Turning these national parks into shelters only 
encourages migrants to make this dangerous journey.
  As an immigrant myself, I can say that this is no way to help 
immigrants seeking asylum. The reality is that the asylum system has 
been abused.
  My State, along with every State in the country, is feeling the 
impact of this administration's failures.
  I support this bill, as I cannot stand for migrants and asylum 
seekers being treated inhumanely and sheltered in national parks while 
our local communities bear the burden of this administration's 
failures.
  Our CBP agents are undermanned, underserved, overwhelmed, and 
unsupported. Our security is threatened, and migrants continue to be 
abused. This is unacceptable. We are better than this, Mr. Chair, and 
this bill begins to address this crisis.
  Mr. Chair, I urge my colleagues to support this legislation.
  Mr. GRIJALVA. Mr. Chair, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Chairman, it is interesting to hear my Republican counterparts 
wax eloquently about their concerns for our national parks during this 
debate. They didn't say a word about the tremendous damage done to 
cultural resources by Trump's disastrous border wall along the southern 
border in Arizona primarily. They did not speak to that issue at all.
  In fact, now they want to condition aid to Ukraine and possibly 
Israel, who are key U.S. allies, on the construction of even more miles 
of an ineffective and destructive border wall.
  It is one thing to have a debate about a basic philosophical 
difference and policy difference that we have in terms of immigration 
reform. It is another to use half-truths and disinformation and to be 
disingenuous in presenting what is a reality. The reality on the 
southern border in Arizona is serious, and I have not denied and will 
not deny that it is a crisis.
  Nevertheless, this is a crisis that must be worked on humanely and 
not by stereotyping and profiling people because of their country of 
origin as the reason that we make the harsh comments that are being 
heard today.
  Pandering is not the solution. Constructive and pragmatic immigration 
reform is what we need to do. That is not being done, and this bill 
doesn't do it.
  Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from 
New York (Mr. LaLota).
  Mr. LaLOTA. Mr. Chairman, I rise today in support of the Protecting 
Our Communities from Failure to Secure the Border Act of 2023.
  Since President Biden took office and Secretary Mayorkas took charge 
of the Homeland Security Department, the United States has seen 7.5 
million encounters nationwide, 6.2 million encounters at the Southwest 
border, and 1.7 million known got-aways who evaded U.S. Border Patrol.

  New York City is where many of these 1.7 million got-aways now live, 
and that is because of two policy choices: the administration's open 
border policy and New York's sanctuary city policies.
  Instead of changing his open border policies, President Biden has 
decided the way they are going to fix this mess is to lease Federal 
land, national parks, to build tent cities.
  Are they kidding me?
  Mr. Chair, this is not the solution. We also need to be 
disincentivizing sanctuary city policies, and I believe we should end 
Federal funding for the purpose of aiding this crisis in those 
jurisdictions.
  Mr. Chair, I urge all of my colleagues to vote ``yes'' on this 
legislation.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Chair, may I get an update on the time remaining.
  The Acting CHAIR (Mr. Cline). The gentleman from Arkansas has 6 
minutes remaining. The gentleman from Arizona has 4\1/2\ minutes 
remaining.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. GRIJALVA. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may 
consume.
  We have heard the argument today, and indeed for years now, that 
migrants crossing our border are the primary ones responsible for the 
tens of thousands of American lives tragically lost to fentanyl 
overdoses each year. It is a tragedy that we can all not only 
sympathize with but want to do something desperately about.
  Nevertheless, that story is simply false. Fentanyl is overwhelmingly 
smuggled into the United States by American citizens where it is then 
also consumed by American citizens. That is a fact.
  In 2021 more than 86 percent of convicted fentanyl traffickers were 
U.S. citizens. More than 90 percent of fentanyl seizures occur at legal 
crossing points and interior checkpoints, not illegal immigration 
routes, and just 0.02 percent of migrants arrested by Border Patrol are 
found to possess fentanyl.
  Mr. Chair, I include in the Record a piece from The American Prospect 
exploring how customs loopholes allow smugglers to ship fentanyl and 
its precursor chemical to the United States without inspection or law 
enforcement.

                 [The American Prospect, Nov. 27, 2023]

           The Amazon Loophole Is Driving the Fentanyl Crisis

                            (By David Dayen)

       One of the more frustrating things about public policy in 
     the United States is how the dominance of corporate interests 
     makes simple reforms that could save thousands of lives 
     impossible. To wit: Here is the story of how Amazon and other 
     retailers are facilitating the epidemic of deaths from 
     fentanyl.
       We know that fentanyl deaths rose 279 percent from 2016 to 
     2022. Two-thirds of the 110,000-plus overdose deaths in 
     America last year were due to fentanyl. It is the leading 
     killer of Americans aged 18 to 49, and it has devastated 
     communities across the country.
       Drug enforcement efforts in the U.S. have historically 
     targeted supply through a so-called ``war on drugs.'' But 
     reducing the amount of fentanyl on the street need not 
     involve military-style operations in Central and South 
     America. China is the source of most of the chemical 
     compounds that cartels use to make fentanyl in illicit drug 
     labs. Without these raw materials, much of the fentanyl trade 
     would be stopped.
       Now, of course this would not halt opioid addiction or use 
     by itself; traditional smuggled heroin would likely fill in 
     the gap. But fentanyl is orders of magnitude more dangerous 
     than heroin thanks to its extreme potency, which is a 
     principal cause of the overdose epidemic. The tiniest of 
     measurement errors can lead to an overdose, and black-market 
     drug dealers are not exactly known for their responsible 
     metrology.
       Customs enforcement officials have begun to charge Chinese 
     firms that produce and ship these precursor chemicals (and 
     produced fentanyl as well, and President Biden, in a summit 
     earlier this month, pressured Chinese President Xi Jinping on 
     the matter. The U.S. and China agreed in principle to a deal 
     where China would limit the flow of fentanyl

[[Page H5966]]

     in exchange for the U.S. rolling back restrictions on China's 
     forensic police institute.
       But while Chinese cooperation is welcome, the bigger 
     problem is that the vast majority of fentanyl chemicals sent 
     from China are not inspected at all. That's because of 
     something called the ``de minimis'' rule.
       Section 321 of the Tariff Act of 1930 allows for goods 
     under a certain value to be shipped into the U.S. without 
     tariffs, fees, or inspections. Anyone who has flown on 
     international travel is familiar with this from their 
     declaration card when they return to the U.S.; if you got 
     some trinkets from abroad that are of a nominal value, you 
     don't have to submit them to customs officials.
       In 2016, that nominal, or de minimis, value, went up from 
     $200 to $800. There are only two countries in the world that 
     have a higher de minimis value than the U.S.; China's de 
     minimis value is less than $10.
       Why did this change happen? Because
     e-commerce firms, primarily Amazon, wanted to be able to 
     bring in goods from China to their warehouses or even 
     directly to their customers without any taxes or tariffs. In 
     fact, it's often been characterized as the ``Amazon 
     loophole.''
       Chinese shippers have been known to package shipments in 
     separate boxes to keep under the $800 threshold, or send 
     goods to distribution centers just outside the United States, 
     where packages are broken up to get under the de minimis 
     threshold and sent into the country.
       These small shipments have exploded in frequency. In fiscal 
     year 2018, 410.5 million de minimis packages were sent. By 
     fiscal year 2022, that number was up to 685.1 million. Some 
     experts put that number much higher. One analysis estimates 
     that the official figure for the trade deficit with China 
     last year was short by $188 billion after accounting for de 
     minimis shipments.
       While there's practically no information available about 
     these shipments (many have no data at all except for a 
     mailing label), there is mounting evidence that one of the 
     most common de minimis items is fentanyl, as Michael Stumo of 
     the Coalition for a Prosperous America has written. This 
     stands to reason, as fentanyl's potency means it is highly 
     valuable by weight. ``The overwhelming volume of small 
     packages and lack of actionable data,'' the U.S. Office of 
     Customs and Border Protection wrote earlier this year, 
     ``impacts CBP's ability to identify and interdict high-risk 
     shipments that may contain narcotics, merchandise that poses 
     a risk to public safety, counterfeits, or other contraband.'' 
     It's highly likely that precursor chemicals are moving from 
     China to Mexico under de minimis rules as well.
       It was not the original intention of de minimis rules to 
     build a parallel, off-the-books customs system, used often 
     for illegal goods shipping. But that's what the Amazon 
     loophole has facilitated. Congress is aware of the problem. A 
     bill from Sens. Tammy Baldwin (D-WI) and Bill Cassidy (R-LA) 
     would reduce de minimis thresholds to the level of trading 
     partners (meaning that the de minimis threshold on Chinese 
     goods would fall to under $10). A separate bipartisan, 
     bicameral bill would simply ban de minimis shipments from 
     ``non-market'' economies, as well as countries on a priority 
     watch list for using de minimis, which would target China.
       The House Select Committee on China has investigated 
     rampant use of the Amazon loophole from fast-fashion 
     companies using forced labor. One textile industry official 
     described de minimis as akin to ``handing a free trade 
     agreement to China and the rest of the world.'' The chairman 
     of the China committee, Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-WI), has 
     expressed optimism that legislation reforming de minimis 
     would pass this year (though passing anything in Congress is 
     incredibly optimistic).
       Of course, this is terrible news for the companies 
     exploiting the loophole for tax benefits, like Amazon and 
     other online retailers. So they are firing up their lobby 
     engines. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the National 
     Foreign Trade Council (a trade group of importers) deny that 
     counterfeit goods or fentanyl enter the U.S. through de 
     minimis shipments at all, while arguing that CBP gets plenty 
     of information about what's in the packages. Lobbyists and 
     their allies are also complaining about higher CBP costs for 
     inspections of small packages, while not mentioning that it 
     would be the importer who would have to pay those charges.
       Keep in mind that when indictments were handed down on the 
     companies sending precursor chemicals for fentanyl to drug 
     cartels, they were reportedly packagd to appear as dog food, 
     nuts, or motor oil. The ``benefits of free trade'' are hard 
     to discern in a recently expanded loophole intended mostly to 
     save Amazon money that is now facilitating the fentanyl 
     crisis.
       There's another beneficiary of the de minimis loophole: 
     digital advertising companies, which benefit from ads from 
     Chinese fast-fashion firms like Shein and Temu that make 
     liberal use of the loophole. Financial Times reporter Rana 
     Foroohar reported recently that one-third of the revenue 
     growth from Meta this year is due to these two fast-fashion 
     firms.
       The Biden administration could actually use executive 
     authority to remove certain de minimis exceptions. But in a 
     meeting last week about combating the entry of fentanyl, 
     administration officials actually claimed that reauthorizing 
     the warrantless spying provisions of the Foreign Intelligence 
     Surveillance Act was critical to stopping the supply. There 
     isn't much evidence that surveillance dragnets would deal 
     with the fentanyl trade, and Congress is highly unlikely to 
     rubber-stamp government spying once again.
       Drug addiction is largely a medical issue, and expanding 
     treatment is likely to pay higher dividends than a loser's 
     game of trying to stem the flow of supply. But the fact that 
     fentanyl is coming in through ordinary shipping services 
     without inspection seems to be the low-hanging fruit here. 
     The process of customs inspection has been almost totally 
     circumvented, to the benefit of two groups: e-commerce 
     companies raking in cheap goods from China, and drug 
     traffickers. The latter may be a universally hated scourge, 
     but the former is quite powerful. And so abuse of the 
     loophole continues.
       The question for lawmakers and the White House then 
     becomes: How many Americans are they willing to sacrifice so 
     Amazon doesn't have to pay a little bit in import fees?

  Mr. GRIJALVA. Mr. Chair, U.S. citizens are providing both the supply 
and the demand for fentanyl and other illegal drugs. The organized 
criminal syndicates on both sides of the borders are the ones profiting 
off the billions and billions of dollars from the misery and deaths 
that fentanyl has caused.
  Instead of addressing these root causes that have led to the tragic 
opioid epidemic, Republicans want to lay the blame on migrants seeking 
a life in this great Nation of ours, being free from persecution and 
free from hatred and fear.
  That is another piece of disinformation. I think it is important to 
know that we are talking about an issue where that bitter taste and 
that deadly taste was introduced to the American people by Big Pharma, 
nice homegrown American corporations that provide pharmaceuticals to 
this country.
  They introduced the habit to the country. Organized crime has taken 
it over. American citizens are being hurt, and American citizens are 
hurting other citizens.
  Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.

                              {time}  1515

  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Chair, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from 
Georgia (Mr. Carter).
  Mr. CARTER of Georgia. Mr. Chair, I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  Mr. Chair, I rise in support of H.R. 5283, the Protecting our 
Communities from Failure to Secure the Border Act of 2023.
  Mr. Chair, these days, every State is a border State, even New York 
State. Our national parks are treasures that should be enjoyed by the 
public, not used to house illegal immigrants. That is what the Biden 
administration wants to do, and we have already seen this unfolding on 
Federal land in New York. Not only is this unsightly, but there are 
tremendous security concerns given the lack of oversight; not to 
mention that this is a horrible misuse of taxpayer dollars, which 
should be used to enhance our Federal lands for our citizens.
  Under this bill, President Biden and Secretary Mayorkas will no 
longer be able to use your tax dollars to shelter illegal immigrants 
who could be threats to our national security and personal safety.
  Mr. Chair, I urge my colleagues to support this bill.
  Mr. GRIJALVA. Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Chair, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from New 
York (Mr. D'Esposito).
  Mr. D'ESPOSITO. Mr. Chair, I am a proud cosponsor of H.R. 5283, 
Protecting our Communities from Failure to Secure the Border Act, and I 
thank my fellow New Yorker, Congresswoman Malliotakis, for introducing 
this critical legislation.
  President Biden's border crisis has made every State a border State, 
every city a border city, every county a border county.
  As the crisis continues, we have seen migrants being housed in a 
facility at JFK Airport and, more recently, we have witnessed migrant 
shelters being erected at Floyd Bennett Field. The Floyd Bennett Field 
shelter will house hundreds and eventually thousands of migrants on 
land owned and operated by the National Park Service, a plan I 
continuously have been critical of.
  I am proud to be a former member of the NYPD, having spent well over 
a decade investigating crimes in the Big Apple. Floyd Bennett Field 
houses

[[Page H5967]]

many critical components of the NYPD, and as the NYPD works to 
negotiate a new lease to stay on Floyd Bennett Field for years to come, 
the city is moving in thousands of migrants. This decision is both 
unwise and unsafe.
  We must find solutions to the migrant crisis, and the answer is 
securing our border.
  Mr. GRIJALVA. Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Chair, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from 
Iowa (Mrs. Miller-Meeks).
  Mrs. MILLER-MEEKS. Mr. Chair, I rise today in support of H.R. 5283 by 
Representative Malliotakis, the Protecting our Communities from Failure 
to Secure our Border Act of 2023.
  Our national parks should be used by our families for recreation. 
They should not be used as a cover-up for President Biden's failed 
border policies. Since President Biden took office, there have been 
over 6.4 million illegal crossings of our southern border, including 
169 on the terrorist watch list. Yet, instead of implementing more 
border security and reinstating the policies that worked, this 
administration is housing migrants in our schools and now in our 
national parks.
  Meanwhile, there are ICE facilities that are sitting empty, such as 
the Adelanto ICE processing facility in California. This 2,000-bed 
facility, which is already fully funded, has sat empty since April 2020 
due to a court injunction.
  We must be fully utilizing the ICE facilities we already have that 
are prepared to care for migrants versus burdening our communities that 
don't have the proper resources or facilities.
  Mr. Chair, I urge my colleagues to stop this lawlessness at our 
southern border and protect our national parks from becoming tent 
cities for illegal immigrants.
  Mr. GRIJALVA. Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Chair, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from the 
State of Washington (Mr. Newhouse).
  Mr. NEWHOUSE. Mr. Chair, the Biden administration has failed to 
secure our border and has allowed historic levels of illegal migrant 
crossings. Now, they have decided to house migrants on America's public 
lands. This is simply unacceptable.
  Our national parks should serve as areas of recreation for Americans 
to enjoy. Instead, our lands are being used as a backup plan for 
housing migrants because of a failure to secure the border and a 
refusal to work with Congress to find commonsense solutions.
  As chairman of the Western Caucus and as a member of the Homeland 
Security Subcommittee on Appropriations, I am proud to support this 
legislation to ensure America's public lands serve the American people, 
their interests, and to prevent the misuse of our national parks.
  Mr. GRIJALVA. Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Chair, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from 
Idaho (Mr. Fulcher).
  Mr. FULCHER. Mr. Chair, our Nation's security is at risk. This is due 
to the Biden administration's failure to secure our southern border. 
Since he took office, over 6.4 million illegal immigrants have entered 
our country from the South. There are at least 279 on the FBI's 
terrorist watch list and that is just what we know of.
  Terrorists from across the world see our southern border as an easy 
way to enter the U.S. Lord only knows what other threats are coming 
into our country with bad intent. My home State of Idaho is comprised 
of over 62 percent Federal land, so this is beyond just concerning to 
me. Idaho has also been gravely impacted by this border crisis, despite 
its geographical separation from the South.
  Mr. Chair, I am proud to support Protecting our Communities from 
Failure to Secure the Border Act of 2023. I encourage my colleagues to 
do the same.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Chair, I believe I have about as much time left as 
the Biden administration put into the permitting process on Floyd 
Bennett Field. I am prepared to close, and I reserve the balance of my 
time.
  Mr. GRIJALVA. Mr. Chair, in closing, we are having a debate on a 
piece of legislation that is not really the intent of the legislation. 
The intent of this legislation is to begin to continue to develop the 
narrative anti-immigrant, xenophobic rhetoric that the Republican 
majority feels is going to be their pathway to electoral success in 
2024.
  I think the American people are going to be able to see that if you 
want to talk about our national parks and the public use as being the 
priority, Democrats are prepared to work with the Republican majority 
to protect them and to enhance those resources.
  If we are going to talk about immigration and we are going to talk in 
an atmosphere where the dog whistles don't become barks on this issue, 
Democrats are prepared to do that. We are prepared to sit down and look 
at the aspects of legalization, security, and fighting the syndicated 
crime that is causing much hurt in this country and in Mexico. We are 
prepared to do that, but we are not prepared to deal with this issue as 
a ruse, as a stunt, as a political performative act leading to 2024.
  If they are serious about immigration reform, if we are serious about 
protecting our public lands and waters, we are serious about it, too.
  Mr. Chair, I urge all Members of the House to vote ``no'' on this 
legislation, and I yield back the balance of my time.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Chair, again, I encourage my colleagues to support 
H.R. 5283, and I yield back the balance of my time.
  The Acting CHAIR. All time for general debate has expired.
  Pursuant to the rule, the bill shall be considered for amendment 
under the 5-minute rule. In lieu of the amendment in the nature of a 
substitute recommended by the Committee on Natural Resources, printed 
in the bill, an amendment in the nature of a substitute consisting of 
the text of Rules Committee Print 118-15, shall be considered as 
adopted. The bill, as amended, shall be considered as the original bill 
for the purpose of further amendment under the 5-minute rule and shall 
be considered as read.

                               H.R. 5283

       Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of 
     the United States of America in Congress assembled,

     SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

       This Act may be cited as the ``Protecting our Communities 
     from Failure to Secure the Border Act of 2023''.

     SEC. 2. PROHIBITION ON PROVIDING HOUSING TO SPECIFIED ALIENS.

       (a) In General.--No Federal funds may be used to provide 
     housing to specified aliens on any land under the 
     administrative jurisdiction of the Federal land management 
     agencies, including through leases, contracts, or agreements.
       (b) Revocation of Lease.--The lease between the United 
     States of America/United States Department of the Interior/
     National Park Service and the City of New York for the 
     Premises known as Portions of Floyd Bennett Field, in the 
     Jamaica Bay Unit of Gateway National Recreation Area (NPS 
     Lease# L-GATE912-2023, Commencement Date - September 15, 
     2023) is hereby revoked.
       (c) Definitions.--In this section:
       (1) Federal land management agencies.--The term ``Federal 
     land management agencies'' means the National Park Service, 
     the Bureau of Land Management, the United States Fish and 
     Wildlife Service, and the Forest Service.
       (2) Housing.--The term ``housing'' means a temporary or 
     permanent encampment used for the primary purpose of 
     sheltering specified aliens.
       (3) Specified alien.--The term ``specified alien'' means an 
     alien who has not been admitted, as such terms are defined in 
     section 101(a) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (8 
     U.S.C. 1101(a)).

  The Acting CHAIR. No further amendment to the bill, as amended, shall 
be in order except those printed in Part A of House Report 118-280. 
Each such further amendment may be offered only in the order printed in 
the report, by the Member designated in the report, shall be considered 
as read, shall be debatable for the time specified in the report 
equally divided and controlled by the proponent and an opponent, shall 
not be subject to amendment, and shall not be subject to a demand for 
the division of the question. All points of order against such further 
amendments are waived.


                  Amendment No. 1 Offered by Mr. Ogles

  The Acting CHAIR. It is now in order to consider amendment No. 1 
printed in part A of House Report 118-280.
  Mr. OGLES. Mr. Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.
  The Acting CHAIR. The Clerk will designate the amendment.
  The text of the amendment is as follows:

       At the end of the bill, add the following:

[[Page H5968]]

  


     SEC. 3. REPORT.

       (a) In General.--The Secretary of the Interior and the 
     Secretary of Agriculture shall jointly submit to the 
     appropriate congressional committees an annual report that 
     includes--
       (1) the number of specified aliens that have been provided 
     housing on any land under the administrative jurisdiction of 
     the Federal land management agencies; and
       (2) information regarding the countries of origin of such 
     specified aliens.
       (b) Definition.--In this section, the term ``appropriate 
     congressional committees'' means--
       (1) the Committee on Natural Resources and the Committee on 
     Agriculture of the House of Representatives; and
       (2) the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources and the 
     Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry of the 
     Senate.

  The Acting CHAIR. Pursuant to House Resolution 891, the gentleman 
from Tennessee (Mr. Ogles) and a Member opposed each will control 5 
minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Tennessee.
  Mr. OGLES. Mr. Chair, $451 billion, that is the cost of the American 
taxpayer of caring for illegals who broke our laws and unlawfully 
entered our country.
  My amendment simply requires the Secretary of the Interior and the 
Secretary of Agriculture to jointly submit an annual report, just a 
report, to Congress that includes the number of aliens that have been 
provided housing on federally managed lands and information regarding 
such aliens' countries of origin.
  This will be critical data, Mr. Chairman, and this amendment should 
have bipartisan support.
  This administration is extending an open invitation for foreign 
nationals to invade our country and undermine the sovereignty of the 
United States. As a reward, they are going to have their housing, 
education, and every cost taken care of. If these illegal aliens need a 
trip to the hospital, they don't need to meet a deductible because the 
American taxpayer pays for it.
  Between 16.8 million and 29 million illegals currently reside in the 
United States, an incentive for more to come freely. There were 341,000 
apprehensions at U.S. borders to the north and southwest made in 
September. That is 1 month; setting an all-time record. There were 
309,000 apprehensions calculated in October.
  Mr. Chairman, this has to stop. We are a sovereign Nation. We have a 
right to manage our lands. We have a right to say no.
  Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. GRIJALVA. Mr. Chair, I claim the time in opposition to the 
amendment.
  The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman from Arizona is recognized for 5 
minutes.
  Mr. GRIJALVA. Mr. Chair, this amendment is, frankly, completely 
unnecessary. It would require preparation and submission of an annual 
report in perpetuity regarding the migrants housed on certain public 
lands. Yet, the underlying bill would essentially ban any such housing.
  It is a permanent requirement for reporting on nothing, paid for by 
the taxpayer.
  Over the years, I have heard plenty of skepticism from my Republican 
colleagues about some of the reports that Congress requires of the 
executive branch. Usually, though, I can at least see the argument for 
those other reports, but I have to say it is interesting to see my 
Republican colleagues in favor of this one.
  That said, I don't think this amendment is worth fighting over 
either. Having these reports would not be useful, but it would not be 
actively harmful either. I only hope that House Republicans would 
change their minds about slashing the budgets of these departments and 
will instead give Federal workers the funding they need to carry out 
their missions, which will now also include generating these annual 
reports.
  Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. OGLES. Mr. Chairman, I acknowledge my colleague's comment 
regarding laws; that this bill, if passed, would essentially ban folks 
from being housed on Federal lands. It should also be noted that there 
are laws on the books that require our border to be secure, and, yet, 
this administration ignores those laws. This amendment requires 
accountability to the aforementioned.
  Mr. Chair, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from 
Arkansas (Mr. Westerman).
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Chair, I rise in support of this commonsense 
amendment offered by the gentleman from Tennessee. This good amendment 
will provide transparency and hold the Biden administration accountable 
for their ongoing failure to secure the southern border.
  Now, it is unfortunate that this amendment is necessary, but the 
Biden administration has refused repeated requests from the committee 
over the past several months to produce documentation regarding the 
exact number of illegal immigrants housed on our Federal lands.
  We must ensure that our Federal lands, which have been specifically 
set aside for the enjoyment and benefit of American people, are not 
used to bail out the Biden administration from their manmade crisis and 
emergency and their unwillingness to secure our southern border.
  The Biden administration has allowed millions of illegal immigrants 
to flood into our country, staggering figures that have strained 
communities from our border all the way to New York City.
  As Republicans continue to push for border security measures, it is 
vital that we ensure that our Federal lands are not being co-opted as 
housing for massive floods of illegal immigrants.

                              {time}  1530

  This amendment and the underlying bill will ensure that our Federal 
lands are not misused.
  Mr. Chair, I thank the gentleman from Tennessee for offering this 
thoughtful amendment, and I encourage my colleagues to join me in 
support of the amendment.
  Mr. GRIJALVA. Mr. Chairman, again, in our view, this amendment is 
unnecessary, but it is not actively harmful, either. I hope we can move 
on. I hope that everybody is satisfied, that they got their little 
clips done in terms of being strong, hard, anti-immigrant people and 
got those little sound bites done already. I think it is time that we 
move on.
  Mr. Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.
  Mr. OGLES. Mr. Chair, I yield myself the balance of my time.
  Mr. Chairman, with this bill, part of what we are trying to 
accomplish is securing our border, securing our country. There are 
hard-earned taxpayer dollars being sent to house illegals.
  In New York alone, Mayor Adams has said that housing illegals could 
cost up to $12 billion. That is $12 billion that could be used for 
children in need, to educate our children, for children who are 
underperforming in school. That is $12 billion that the city of New 
York could use for our veterans.
  We have to prioritize Americans. We have to prioritize the security 
of our border.
  I was in Tucson in August, and I was in an area that was even then 
controlled by the cartel. Now, we hear because of the war, the 
shooting, the lawlessness in that very sector, that the Border Patrol 
has had to pull back.
  There is a war going on at our southern border, and it could be 
stopped, Mr. Chairman. It is time to close, to secure, our border. You 
have women and children who are being raped daily at our southern 
border, and this administration is doing nothing about it. I have had 
enough. All this amendment does is require a report. It requires 
accountability.
  Mr. Chairman, I urge adoption, and I yield back the balance of my 
time.
  The Acting CHAIR (Mr. Hunt). The question is on the amendment offered 
by the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Ogles).
  The amendment was agreed to.


                Amendment No. 2 Offered by Ms. Velazquez

  The Acting CHAIR. It is now in order to consider amendment No. 2 
printed in part A of House Report 118-280.
  Ms. VELAZQUEZ. Mr. Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.
  The Acting CHAIR. The Clerk will designate the amendment.
  The text of the amendment is as follows:

       At the end of the bill, add the following:
       (d) Applicability.--The prohibition in subsection (a) does 
     not apply to housing that

[[Page H5969]]

     the Secretary of the Interior certifies meets the following 
     criteria:
       (1) The proposed housing is for specified aliens who were 
     transported to the State of the proposed housing (the 
     ``Destination State'') from another State (the ``Originating 
     State'').
       (2) Such transport was funded, arranged, or otherwise 
     assisted by the Originating State.
       (3) The Originating State--
       (A) failed to provide more than 48 hours of notice to the 
     Governor of the Destination State of such transport;
       (B) failed to provide the specified aliens being 
     transported with full and truthful information regarding 
     their destination and regarding the Destination State's 
     assessment of the likely conditions for the specified aliens 
     at their destination;
       (C) willfully, knowingly, or recklessly misrepresented, 
     including through omission, to the transported specified 
     aliens their destination, their right to refuse the 
     transport, and the expected conditions for them at their 
     destination; or
       (D) otherwise inveigled the specified aliens into such 
     transport.

  The Acting CHAIR. Pursuant to House Resolution 891, the gentlewoman 
from New York (Ms. Velazquez) and a Member opposed each will control 5 
minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentlewoman from New York.
  Ms. VELAZQUEZ. Mr. Chair, I rise today in support of my amendment, 
which would allow the Secretary of the Interior to provide housing when 
States sending asylum seekers to New York City fail to meet certain 
conditions.
  Today, there are over 65,900 asylum seekers currently in the care of 
the city. To respond to this influx, our city has opened 213 sites, 
including 18 large-scale humanitarian relief centers.
  A guiding principle of New York City's response has been that people 
fleeing violence and persecution deserve a functioning asylum and 
refugee resettlement system in this country.
  To my colleagues who are intent on labeling these people illegal, I 
ask, do they not have the legal right to seek asylum enshrined under 
the Geneva Refugee Convention and U.S. law?
  Asylum seekers are human beings who have fled disaster, conflict, and 
persecution to come to the United States for a better life. They 
deserve to be treated with respect and dignity. They should not be used 
as pawns in cruel political stunts.
  Politicians from States like Texas and Florida have bused asylum 
seekers to New York to get on cable news. These buses are often sent 
with little to no communication from officials in those States. Tens of 
thousands of migrants have been sent to New York from various 
originating States, no matter if they wanted to come or not. They may 
not have a clue about the conditions they will find in New York or the 
resources available to them.
  As temperatures fall below freezing, there are lines of asylum 
seekers waiting outside of centers because they have reached their 30-
day limit at city-run shelters. They have nowhere else to go. However, 
here we are, debating a bill that will close Floyd Bennett Field.
  My amendment will ensure that asylum seekers--not illegal aliens but 
asylum seekers--who are bused from State to State without support, 
scant information, and no other options can access the resources they 
deserve. Specifically, my amendment allows the Secretary of the 
Interior to authorize the use of land controlled by the National Park 
Service for the purpose of housing migrants when a State fails to 
provide 48 hours' notice to the receiving State or provide truthful 
information to the migrants about where they are being transported to 
or provide the opportunity to refuse the busing.
  We have heard hundreds of migrant stories about not knowing where 
they are being sent. We cannot allow this practice to continue without 
consequences. My amendment will help create an accountability system 
for the States that decide to deceptively bus migrants to other States 
like New York.
  Mr. Chair, I urge my colleagues to support this amendment, and I 
reserve the balance of my time.
  Ms. MALLIOTAKIS. Mr. Chair, I claim the time in opposition to the 
amendment.
  The Acting CHAIR. The gentlewoman from New York is recognized for 5 
minutes.
  Ms. MALLIOTAKIS. Mr. Chair, the sponsor of this amendment asked the 
question: Do these individuals have a legal right to apply for asylum? 
The answer is yes. The thing is, they are supposed to be applying from 
the next safe country. We have over 120 countries represented at our 
southern border. We are only bordered by two. Therefore, they are not 
following the process and are coming illegally.
  The cartels are the ones benefiting from the current process as it 
is. I hope the other side understands that these individuals, every 
single one of them, are paying the cartels thousands of dollars to be 
trafficked into the United States. That money is then used to continue 
to pump fentanyl into the United States, killing Americans. Let's stop 
bankrolling the drug cartels that are profiting from this human 
trafficking.
  Next, let me point out that this process is not safe for anyone--not 
the migrants, either. That is why I don't understand why my colleagues 
want to continue to encourage people, instead of applying from the next 
safe country, to take this treacherous journey at the hands of the drug 
cartels.
  By the way, my colleague Tony Gonzales, who represents Eagle Pass, 
just told me that 14 individuals drowned this Thanksgiving weekend 
alone in Eagle Pass.
  We have the Doctors Without Borders report that says in Panama alone, 
in just 1 month, hundreds of women and children were raped. We know 
that is a common occurrence, so why are we encouraging people to take 
that treacherous journey instead of applying from the next safe 
country?
  Lastly, Floyd Bennett Field, it was mentioned that it was unsafe, as 
indicated in the lawsuit brought by the councilwoman and others. I am a 
party to that lawsuit. It floods. There was no NEPA process. All of a 
sudden, my colleagues on the other side don't want to conduct a full, 
thorough NEPA environmental impact statement as required by law.
  Why did they bypass that? If they didn't, they would know that it is 
a flood zone and unsafe for people to be living there.
  Mr. Chair, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from 
Arkansas (Mr. Westerman).
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Chair, I rise in opposition to the amendment 
offered by the gentlewoman from New York.
  If this amendment were adopted, it would make this bill probably 
worse than where we are with the status quo because it would require 
the Secretary of the Interior and the Secretary of Agriculture to 
provide housing when the States couldn't provide the housing.
  Therefore, States that have declared themselves sanctuaries, like New 
York, could just say they are not providing housing. It is then back to 
the Secretaries of Agriculture and the Interior to provide the housing, 
which would probably result in more migrant shelters on Federal lands.
  Our Federal lands were not designed or intended to encamp migrants, 
especially not our national parks. Again, the mission of the National 
Park Service is to conserve these areas ``in such a manner and by such 
a means as will leave them unimpaired for the enjoyment of future 
generations.'' Nothing about constructing tent cities for illegal 
migrants protects this land for the enjoyment of current or future 
generations.

  The mission of the National Park Service also specifies conserving 
unimpaired the natural and cultural resources and values of the 
National Park System. Nothing about constructing tent cities for 
illegal immigrants conserves the natural and cultural resources of 
Floyd Bennett Field or the Gateway National Recreation Area.
  This amendment cannot be implemented in a practical manner. It 
creates a complex verification system based on subjective standards for 
which the Secretaries of the Interior and Agriculture have no 
expertise. This amendment would entangle these agencies further into 
our immigration debacle rather than acknowledging they should never 
have been included in this debate in the first place.
  Mr. Chair, I strongly oppose this amendment.
  Ms. MALLIOTAKIS. Mr. Chair, the bottom line here is that we need to 
secure the border. We passed H.R. 2, which can stem this unsustainable 
flow. Unfortunately, a lot of my colleagues on the other side of the 
aisle

[[Page H5970]]

voted against H.R. 2. That is the real solution. We need to secure our 
border.
  Let's revert to the policies that were working previous to Joe Biden 
dismantling our border and making it open. It is unsafe and 
unsustainable for both American citizens as well as the individuals who 
are taking the treacherous journey at the hands of the drug cartels, 
which are profiting off of this human trafficking. Our government 
should not allow it to continue.
  Mr. Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.
  Ms. VELAZQUEZ. Mr. Chair, I yield such time as he may consume to the 
gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Grijalva).
  Mr. GRIJALVA. Mr. Chair, I rise in support of this amendment. This 
amendment draws attention to the dubious and deceptive strategy of 
placing migrants on buses under false pretenses and without any 
coordination or even a courtesy call.
  Both Governor Abbott and Governor DeSantis have demonstrated that 
they are more interested in ginning up the MAGA base on Twitter than 
finding meaningful solutions to the challenges facing our immigration 
system, the refugee crisis both nationally and particularly in their 
States.
  Migrants are people, not political pawns. We can have disagreements 
over immigration policy. That is fair game. However, the dehumanizing 
games and political stunts need to stop.
  Mr. Chair, I associate myself with the remarks of the gentlewoman 
from New York, the sponsor of the amendment.
  Ms. VELAZQUEZ. Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.
  The Acting CHAIR (Mr. LaMalfa). The question is on the amendment 
offered by the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. Velazquez).
  The question was taken; and the Acting Chair announced that the noes 
appeared to have it.
  Ms. VELAZQUEZ. Mr. Chair, I demand a recorded vote.
  The Acting CHAIR. Pursuant to clause 6 of rule XVIII, further 
proceedings on the amendment offered by the gentlewoman from New York 
will be postponed.
  Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Chair, I move that the Committee do now rise.
  The motion was agreed to.
  Accordingly, the Committee rose; and the Speaker pro tempore (Mr. 
Hunt) having assumed the chair, Mr. LaMalfa, Acting Chair of the 
Committee of the Whole House on the state of the Union, reported that 
that Committee, having had under consideration the bill (H.R. 5283) to 
prohibit the use of Federal funds to provide housing to specified 
aliens on any land under the administrative jurisdiction of the Federal 
land management agencies, had come to no resolution thereon.

                          ____________________