{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://www.thune.senate.gov/news/press-releases/thune-on-democrats-refusal-to-prioritize-national-security/", "Thune on Democrats\u2019 Refusal to Prioritize National Security", "2026-06-11", "2026", "2026-06", "Republican", "Senate", "SD", "John Thune", "T000250", "www.thune.senate.gov", "thune", "https://www.thune.senate.gov/news/press-releases/", "scraper", "Click here to watch the video.\n\nWASHINGTON \u2014 U.S. Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) today delivered the following remarks on the Senate floor:\n\nThune\u2019s remarks below (as delivered):\n\n\u201cMr. President, last week, Senate Republicans passed legislation to fund Border Patrol and Immigration and Customs Enforcement for the next three years.\n\n\u201cOn Tuesday, House Republicans passed the legislation.\n\n\u201cAnd yesterday, the president signed the bill into law.\n\n\u201cMr. President, I\u2019m proud that we got this done of course.\n\n\u201cRepublicans are deeply committed to ensuring a safe country and safe communities, and border security and immigration enforcement are key parts of that.\n\n\u201cNo country \u2013 no country \u2013 can be secure if bad actors can make their way freely across our borders, or if criminal illegal immigrants are able to operate freely within our neighborhoods.\n\n\u201cSo, as I said, I am proud that we got this done.\n\n\u201cBut, Mr. President, I also have to ask, how did we get here?\n\n\u201cHow did we get to the point where one party has completely abdicated any responsibility for our nation\u2019s security?\n\n\u201cAnd it\u2019s not just this bill, Mr. President.\n\n\u201cDemocrats have been playing fast and loose with our national security all year.\n\n\u201cTheir two record-breaking shutdowns strained our nation\u2019s critical national security agencies \u2013 particularly agencies at the Department of Homeland Security, which was shut down for a staggering 119 days all told this fiscal year.\n\n\u201cThe TSA, responsible for the security of our nation\u2019s airports, has seen a flood of resignations thanks to Democrats\u2019 decision to make these critical workers go without pay for quite literally months.\n\n\u201cAnd then there\u2019s border security and immigration enforcement.\n\n\u201cDemocrats absolutely refused to provide so much as a dollar \u2013 a dollar \u2013 to fund the agents who provide security at our nation\u2019s borders and remove criminal illegal immigrants from America\u2019s streets.\n\n\u201cI can\u2019t make that point enough, Mr. President.\n\n\u201cIf Democrats had their way, there would be zero \u2013 zero \u2013 physical presence at our nation\u2019s borders and zero agents to remove criminal illegal immigrants who do make their way into our country.\n\n\u201cIt is a breathtaking \u2013 breathtaking \u2013 level of irresponsibility.\u201cStill not done, Mr. President.\n\n\u201cBecause I haven\u2019t yet talked about FISA.\n\n\u201cSection 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act is our nation\u2019s most critical intelligence-gathering tool.\n\n\u201cPolicymakers across the federal government \u2013 from both parties \u2013 rely on Section 702 information on a near-daily basis.\n\n\u201cAnd we were well on our way to reauthorizing it, with Democrat and Republican lawmakers here in the Senate working on an agreement.\n\n\u201cAnd then \u2013 as has happened more than once this year \u2013 Democrats backed out.\n\n\u201cAnd now this critical tool is set to go dark on Friday.\n\n\u201cAnd what the consequences of that will be, we cannot predict.\n\n\u201cMr. President, it\u2019s striking how weak Democrats\u2019 ostensible \u201creasons\u201d have been for all of these actions.\n\n\u201cThey\u2019re blocking a critical national security tool because they don\u2019t like the president\u2019s temporary, short-term pick for acting \u2013 acting \u2013 DNI.\n\n\u201cThey shut down the federal government twice \u2013 and refused to fund border security and immigration enforcement \u2013 because they couldn\u2019t take yes for an answer.\n\n\u201cUltimately, Democrats have made it clear this year that for them, it\u2019s always politics over policy.\n\n\u201cAnd if our economy suffers, if our national security suffers, because of Democrats\u2019 decision to shut down the government or refusal to fund border security \u2013 well, Democrats are apparently just fine with that.\n\n\u201cMr. President, polls tend to show that Americans trust Republicans more than Democrats when it comes to crime and national security.\n\n\u201cAnd I think Democrats are making it very clear why that is.\n\n\u201cThe fact that Republicans had to act alone to fund security at our nation\u2019s borders is all the evidence you need to know to show that Democrats are fundamentally unserious about their national security responsibilities.\n\n\u201cRepublicans, of course, will continue to do everything we can to keep our country and our communities secure.\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s too bad the same cannot be said of Senate Democrats.\u201d", 1, "2026-06-18T06:41:00Z", "2026-06-18T06:43:25Z"]], "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.thune.senate.gov/news/press-releases/thune-on-democrats-refusal-to-prioritize-national-security/"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 0.8948100730776787, "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"}