{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://www.thune.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/press-releases?ID=748D19EB-74AF-4753-B6B2-AC885CB8E297", "Thune: Biden and Harris Own Four Record-Breaking Years of Illegal Immigration", "2024-09-18", "2024", "2024-09", "Republican", "Senate", "SD", "John Thune", "T000250", "www.thune.senate.gov", "thune", "https://www.thune.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/press-releases", "scraper", "Click here to watch the video.\n\nWASHINGTON \u2014 U.S. Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.) today spoke on the Senate floor about the Biden-Harris administration\u2019s record-breaking legacy of open-border chaos. Thune noted that the effects of rampant illegal immigration go beyond border cities that are already struggling with this crisis \u2013 it brings terror threats, deadly drugs, and unaccompanied children to communities around the country.\n\nThune\u2019s remarks below (as prepared for delivery):\n\n\u201cMr. President, August border numbers came out on Monday, bringing the total number of encounters at our southern border thus far for fiscal year 2024 to more than 2 million.\n\n\u201c2,033,260 to be precise.\n\n\u201cThe third-highest fiscal year total ever recorded \u2013 with another month still to go.\n\n\u201cThe highest total ever recorded was in fiscal year 2023.\n\n\u201cThe second-highest total ever recorded was in fiscal year 2022.\n\n\u201cAnd the fourth-highest total ever recorded was in fiscal year 2021.\n\n\u201cIn other words, Mr. President, President Biden and Vice President Harris have presided over four years of record-breaking illegal immigration at our southern border.\n\n\u201cThe problem started right away.\n\n\u201cOn the day he took office, President Biden began dismantling the border security policies of his predecessor.\n\n\u201cAnd illegal immigration began surging in response.\n\n\u201cAnd for three-plus years, President Biden and Vice President Harris essentially just stood around and watched.\n\n\u201cThey watched as record-breaking numbers of individuals surged across the southern border.\n\n\u201cThey watched as the Border Patrol and border cities struggled under the massive influx.\n\n\u201cThey watched as encounters of individuals on the terrorist watchlist shot up.\n\n\u201cVice President Harris was supposed to be President Biden\u2019s border czar.\n\n\u201cI\u2019d be hard-pressed to name anything she did to stop the influx.\n\n\u201cIf she did take any action, it was certainly ineffective, based on the steady increases in border encounters.\n\n\u201cMr. President, I don\u2019t have to tell anyone what the problems are with the kind of unchecked illegal immigration we\u2019ve been seeing.\n\n\u201cAs I said, the Border Patrol has been stretched thin for pretty much the entirety of the Biden-Harris administration.\n\n\u201cCities at the border and around the United States have struggled with the influx of migrants.\n\n\u201cAnd migrants themselves have suffered as they\u2019ve undertaken the perilous journey to our southern border, spurred on by the Biden-Harris administration\u2019s open-border policies.\n\n\u201cWorst of all, the Biden-Harris border crisis has left a gaping hole in our national security.\n\n\u201cThe kind of unchecked illegal immigration we\u2019ve been seeing is an invitation to dangerous individuals to enter our country.\n\n\u201cI mentioned that the number of individuals on the terrorist watchlist who were apprehended attempting to cross the southern border has shot up.\n\n\u201cAnd that\u2019s just individuals who were actually apprehended.\n\n\u201cWe have no idea how many terrorists or other dangerous individuals have made their way across our southern border without being apprehended.\n\n\u201cWe\u2019re closing in on 2 million known gotaways on the Biden-Harris administration\u2019s watch \u2013 that\u2019s individuals the Border Patrol saw but was unable to apprehend.\n\n\u201cHow many of those were dangerous people who should not be entering our country?\n\n\u201cU.S. Border Patrol chief Jason Owens, in a March interview with CBS News, said the number of known gotaways is keeping him up at night.\n\n\u201c\u2018That is a national security threat,\u2019 he noted. \u2018Border security is a big piece of national security. And if we don\u2019t know who is coming into our country and we don\u2019t know what their intent is, that is a threat. And they\u2019re exploiting a vulnerability that\u2019s on our border right now.\u2019\n\n\u201cThat same month, FBI Director Christopher Wray told the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, and I quote, \u2018We are seeing a wide array of very dangerous threats that emanate from the border.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018We are seeing a wide array of very dangerous threats that emanate from the border.\u2019\n\n\u201cThe June arrest of eight Tajikistan nationals with suspected ties to ISIS who had illegally entered the country, as well as the identification of more than 400 migrants who used an ISIS-affiliated smuggling network to enter the United States, are just two examples of the kind of threats we face \u2013 and the dangers of the chaos that President Biden and Vice President Harris have allowed to rage at our southern border.\n\n\u201cAnd, Mr. President, in addition to threats from terrorists and other dangerous individuals, the chaos at our southern border has unquestionably facilitated illegal cross-border activity like the smuggling of deadly drugs like fentanyl, which then make their way around our country.\n\n\u201cMy state of South Dakota is about as far from our southern border as you can get, but law enforcement officials consistently tell me that the illegal drugs they\u2019re dealing with have entered the country across our southern border.\n\n\u201cIn 2022 Minnehaha County Sheriff Mike Milstead estimated that 90 percent of fentanyl and meth in our state comes from Mexican cartels.\n\n\u201c90 percent.\n\n\u201cMr. President, I could go on.\n\n\u201cThere\u2019s a lot more to talk about when it comes to the Biden-Harris border crisis, from the mass amnesty the administration has offered to hundreds of thousands of individuals whose asylum cases have been closed without a decision, to the placing of unaccompanied children with possibly dangerous guardians (something Senator Grassley and Senator Lankford are currently working to rectify).\n\n\u201cBut I\u2019ll stop here.\n\n\u201cFour record-breaking years of illegal immigration, Mr. President.\n\n\u201cThe national security legacy of the Biden-Harris administration.\n\n\u201cMr. President, I yield the floor.\u201d", 1, "2026-03-30T01:40:41Z", "2026-04-06T18:46:43Z"]], "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/public/index.cfm/press-releases?ID=748D19EB-74AF-4753-B6B2-AC885CB8E297"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 1.5501820016652346, "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"}