{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://www.thune.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/press-releases?ID=AF529859-1F98-40D6-84FA-546C4C37431F", "Thune: Biden\u2019s Open-Border Policies Fuel Record-Breaking Surge of Illegal Crossings", "2022-09-20", "2022", "2022-09", "Republican", "Senate", "SD", "John Thune", "T000250", "www.thune.senate.gov", "thune", "https://www.thune.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/press-releases", "scraper", "Click here or on the picture above to watch the video.\n\nWASHINGTON \u2014 U.S. Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.) today discussed how the Biden administration\u2019s disastrous open-border policies have enabled out-of-control illegal immigration and created an unprecedented humanitarian and security crisis at the southern border. Thune noted that there were more than 2 million individuals apprehended attempting to illegally cross the southern border in the last fiscal year alone, the highest number ever recorded.\n\nThune\u2019s remarks below (as prepared for delivery):\n\n\u201cMr. President, last Friday, President Biden said the following during a speech: \u2018And we have a process in place to manage migrants at the border. We\u2019re working to make sure it\u2019s safe and orderly and humane.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Safe and orderly and humane.\u2019\n\n\u201cI have to ask, has the president visited the border lately?\n\n\u201cOh, that\u2019s right, he hasn\u2019t.\n\n\u201cIn fact, other than a drive-by of the border when he was a candidate for vice-president \u2013 and by drive-by, I mean his motorcade literally drove by \u2013 the president has never visited the border.\n\n\u201cNever.\n\n\u201cAlthough I have to say, even reading the news should be enough to make it clear to the president that the situation at the border is neither safe, nor orderly, nor humane.\n\n\u201cMr. President, in case the president isn\u2019t clear about what\u2019s happening at the border, let me just read from one news story from last week \u2013 this one from NBC News.\n\n\u201c\u2018A new surge of migrants \u2026 is overwhelming the Border Patrol and shelters in El Paso, Texas, where nearly 1,000 have been released near bus stations over the past week in hope that they will find their own way to their next destinations in the U.S.\u2019\n\n\u201cHere\u2019s the title of another, grim news article from last week: \u2018Texas border town requests refrigerators to store migrant bodies after drownings overwhelm mortuaries.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Texas border town requests refrigerators to store migrant bodies after drownings overwhelm mortuaries.\u2019\n\n\u201cAnd yet another news outlet reported: \u2018El Paso County Sheriff sounds alarm over Border Patrol overwhelmed due to migrants.\u2019\n\n\u201cThat article goes on to say, and I quote: \u2018Sheriff Richard Wiles stated Thursday, \u2018This incident raises a law enforcement concern because Border Patrol is so overwhelmed, undocumented immigrants may be released into communities with minimal or no screening.\u2019\u2019\n\n\u201cMr. President, does any of this make the situation at the border sound safe, or orderly, or humane?\n\n\u201cI don\u2019t think so.\n\n\u201cMr. President, the Biden administration has been characterized by record-breaking waves of illegal immigration across our southern border.\n\n\u201cAnd I mean \u2018record-breaking\u2019 quite literally.\n\n\u201cIn fiscal year 2021, U.S. Customs and Border Protection apprehended more than 1.7 million individuals attempting to cross our southern border illegally \u2013 the highest number of apprehensions ever recorded.\n\n\u201cAnd as for fiscal year 2022 \u2013 well, we exceeded last year\u2019s record-breaking number of apprehensions in June.\n\n\u201cThe final count of apprehensions for fiscal year 2022 will be well over 2 million.\n\n\u201cAnd, Mr. President, those numbers only count migrants who were actually apprehended.\n\n\u201cCBS News reports that there were, quote, \u2018an estimated 660,000 successful unlawful border entries that did not end in an arrest in fiscal year 2021, according to unpublished DHS figures.\u2019\n\n\u201c660,000.\n\n\u201cMr. President, I don\u2019t have to tell anyone \u2013 except maybe congressional Democrats and the White House \u2013 that these kinds of numbers have resulted in scenes of near chaos at the southern border.\n\n\u201cShelters have been overwhelmed, border facilities have been overwhelmed, the Border Patrol has been overwhelmed \u2026\n\n\u201cWho can forget the scene of 10,000 migrants camped under a bridge in Del Rio, Texas, last September?\n\n\u201cAnd just in case anyone is thinking things at the border have substantially calmed down, here\u2019s yet another headline from this month, this one from the Dallas Morning News, and I quote:\n\n\u201c\u2018Overcrowded processing center has Border Patrol releasing more migrants on El Paso streets: Migrants are being released from a facility filled at 3 times its capacity.\u2019\n\n\u201cThree times its capacity.\n\n\u201cMr. President, over the past few months, the governors of Texas and Arizona have been sending some illegal migrants to places like New York City and Washington, D.C.\n\n\u201cThere has been a predictable outcry.\n\n\u201cBut what is so striking about this situation is how upset these places seem to have become when dealing with just a tiny fraction of the situation that border communities and border states have to deal with on a daily basis.\n\n\u201cWashington, D.C., declared a state of emergency.\n\n\u201cThe New York City mayor was outraged.\n\n\u201cMr. President, while I\u2019m in no way dismissing the challenges of dealing with thousands of illegal immigrants, let me just put this situation in perspective for a minute.\n\n\u201cWashington, D.C., a city of around 700,000, has received somewhere around 9,400 migrants over a span of five months.\n\n\u201cNew York City \u2013 a city of around 8.4 million \u2013 hasn\u2019t even received as many as D.C.\n\n\u201cCompare that with the situation in Eagle Pass, Texas \u2013 a town with a population of just 29,000 \u2013 which sees 10,000 migrants a week.\n\n\u201cA week.\n\n\u201cMr. President, for a party that likes to pride itself on compassion, the lack of compassion Democrats and the White House display on this issue is really astounding.\n\n\u201cEven after catching a tiny glimpse of what it\u2019s like to deal with an influx of illegal immigration, Democrats have apparently zero compassion for the border communities and states that have to somehow manage the arrival of thousands of illegal immigrants on a daily basis \u2013 along with all the logistical and security challenges that involves.\n\n\u201cAnd there are real security challenges.\n\n\u201cCertainly many of the migrants crossing our southern border illegally are simply looking for a better life \u2013 even if they\u2019re trying to circumvent legal pathways to enter \u2013 but there are also a lot of potentially dangerous individuals coming across our border and passing through border communities.\n\n\u201cGang members. Drug traffickers. Human smugglers. And other criminals.\n\n\u201cIn one recent week, Border Patrol agents in the Rio Grande Valley Sector along the southern border arrested 21 gang members, two sex offenders, and three migrants with prior convictions for various crimes.\n\n\u201cAnd the White House and Democrats don\u2019t just display a lack of compassion for border communities.\n\n\u201cThey also display a real lack of compassion for the individuals attempting to enter our country illegally.\n\n\u201cThere is nothing compassionate about an immigration policy that encourages individuals to come here illegally \u2013 with all the risks that entails.\n\n\u201cMr. President, earlier I mentioned a border town that was seeking increased morgue facilities because it was dealing with the bodies of so many individuals who had drowned while attempting to enter this country.\n\n\u201cDeaths at the southern border have surged under the Biden administration \u2013 undoubtedly because the administration\u2019s lax immigration policies and obvious lack of concern about securing the border have encouraged individuals to attempt to come here illegally.\n\n\u201cAccording to Department of Homeland Security numbers that have been reported, 748 migrants have died at our southern border so far this fiscal year.\n\n\u201cThat is a lot of lives lost, Mr. President.\n\n\u201cA lot of lives.\n\n\u201cMr. President, one illegal immigrant speaking to a news outlet this month said of the border, and I quote, \u2018It\u2019s open, not closed. The border is open. \u2026 Everybody believes that the border is open. It\u2019s open because we enter, we come in, free. No problem.\u2019\n\n\u201cThat is the message that President Biden\u2019s immigration policies have conveyed.\n\n\u201cAnd the longer he continues with his de facto open-border policies, the more individuals are going to be encouraged to attempt the dangerous journey across our southern border.\n\n\u201cMr. President, the massive spending package \u2013 the so-called Inflation Reduction Act \u2013 that Democrats shoved through the Senate last month contained hundreds of billions for Democrats\u2019 Green New Deal priorities \u2013 like tax credits for wealthy Americans to buy electric cars and more than $60 billion for \u201cenvironmental justice priorities.\u201d\n\n\u201cThere was also, of course, an $80 billion funding infusion for the IRS \u2013 a majority of it allocated for more IRS audits and increased enforcement, including the hiring of additional IRS agents.\n\n\u201cNowhere were there any resources for addressing the crisis that has been raging for more than a year now at our southern border.\n\n\u201cDuring debate on the bill, Republicans gave Democrats five opportunities to vote for amendments aimed at providing resources to secure the border.\n\n\u201cDemocrats rejected all of them.\n\n\u201cApparently Democrats are willing to spend a lot of time and effort \u2013 and government money \u2013 on their Green New Deal and finding new ways to collect taxpayer dollars to help fund their big-government spending plans.\n\n\u201cBut when it comes to protecting Americans and ensuring a humane situation at our southern border, Democrats just can\u2019t be bothered.\n\n\u201cMr. President, the situation at our southern border is appalling.\n\n\u201cAnd if the president really had any interest in making the process at the border \u201csafe, orderly, and humane,\u201d he\u2019d be making securing our southern border a priority.\n\n\u201cUnfortunately, given his record so far, I think it\u2019s more likely that we\u2019ll see the scenes of chaos \u2013 and human suffering \u2013 continue.", 1, "2026-03-30T01:40:41Z", "2026-04-06T18:29:59Z"]], "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=AF529859-1F98-40D6-84FA-546C4C37431F"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 0.937323085963726, "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"}