{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://www.capito.senate.gov/news/press-releases/video-capito-highlights-bidens-border-crisis-impact-on-united-states-national-security", "VIDEO: Capito Highlights Biden\u2019s Border Crisis, Impact on United States\u2019 National Security", "2023-11-29", "2023", "2023-11", "Republican", "Senate", "WV", "Shelley Moore Capito", "C001047", "www.capito.senate.gov", "capito", "https://www.capito.senate.gov/news/press-releases", "scraper", "Click here or on the image above to watch Senator Capito\u2019s floor speech.\n\nWASHINGTON, D.C. \u2014 U.S. Senator Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.), Vice Chairman of the Senate Republican Conference, today led her Republican colleagues in highlighting the multifaceted crisis at the southern border created by President Biden\u2019s inaction, as well as the impact this crisis creates on American communities and national security, and the need for substantive policy changes.\n\nHIGHLIGHTS:\n\nIMPACT ON AMERICA: \u201cThe American people see the numbers, but it's not just numbers. They see the actual human effects within their own cities and states of this rampant illegal immigration. It can no longer be ignored. In just the past year, there have been more than 2.4 million illegal encounters on our southern border. We've all seen them on our television sets. That is more than 180% increase since Fiscal Year 2019. 169 encounters with individuals on our country's terror watch list, six times the amount of past year, and fentanyl seizures along the U.S. Mexico border have hit record highs.\u201d\n\nWEST VIRGINIA CONCERNS: \u201cI hear about this topic from West Virginians frequently. Constituents have expressed border security concerns to me \u2013 things like the catastrophic, flawed, and failed Biden-Harris approach to immigration and the loss of control of our southern border. The vulnerable state that our communities are left in by the flow of human trafficking and illicit drugs currently coming across our border. And the need to bolster our national security with the increase in crossings from the terror watch list.\u201d\n\nNATIONAL SECURITY: \u201cAs Leader McConnell stated on this same floor yesterday, \u2018national security begins with border security.\u2019 We can and should take needed action to mitigate the threats that we face. This starts by securing our southern border and making the policy changes necessary to defend our homeland from nefarious forces abroad.\u201d\n\nREPUBLICAN SOLUTIONS: \u201cNow's the time to come to the table. Republicans stand for solutions that enforce and enhance not just the immigration laws that we have on the books, but the policy changes that we're advocating for. We back our hard working CBP agents and guards on the ground who are overwhelmed and under-supported. And, we need to finish the border wall and provide the necessary level of deterrence that we desperately need.\u201d\n\nTIME TO COME TOGETHER: \u201cI implore my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to recognize the importance of the effort and of this moment. We simply do not have time to waste. We need to come together, secure our southern border and fulfill the other national security obligations that are demanded of a nation as powerful as ours.\u201d\n\n# # #", 1, "2026-03-30T01:40:41Z", "2026-04-08T01:01:09Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://www.capito.senate.gov/news/press-releases/video-capito-highlights-bidens-border-crisis-impact-on-united-states-national-security"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 1.7996849492192268, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}