U.S. Senator Katie Britt Makes Impassioned Plea for Action on Border Security
WASHINGTON, D.C., September 28, 2023 – U.S. Senator Katie Britt (R-Ala.) this week joined a group of Republican colleagues at a press conference to urgently call on the Biden Administration to finally reverse course and secure the United States’ southern border.
Since President Biden took office in January 2021, there have been more than 7.6 million illegal crossings at the border. In the past seven days, there has been an average of nearly 10,000 encounters daily, the highest since Title 42 ended in May. If current rates continue, September will see the highest total encounters of Fiscal Year 2023.
At the press conference, Senator Britt was joined by Senate Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), Senator John Cornyn (R-Texas), Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas), and Senator Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.).
A transcript of Senator Britt’s remarks can be found below:
“Democrats say we have no solutions. I guarantee you, if you take a look at this group up here, we have put forth solution after solution after solution after solution. Look at H.R. 2, and what you (Senator Cruz) are trying to move in the Senate.
Guys I would’ve never seen the border firsthand if this woman (Senator Blackburn) didn’t know that I needed to see it immediately upon entering the United States Senate. I followed up with a trip with John Cornyn, because they care. These people down there, Senator Blackburn would talk to them. She knew them. We walked through and we got to hear women tell us their story and their stories are brutalizing. And to Senator Cruz’s point, if you’re not telling it, that’s on you. Because when a woman sits there and she tells you not just about being raped, but how many times a day she’s raped, when she tells you about having to lay in that bed while they come in and out and in and out, it’s disgusting and it’s despicable.
Folks, you look at the number of people that have died at the border because Joe Biden has made it more and more enticing to come here.
Make no mistake, this is a result of failed policies. We could fix this. We can’t [merely] throw money at this and fix it. We have to actually change the policies. I looked in the eyes of CBP agents who said, ‘We’re exhausted, we’re not only having to be paper pushers, we’re also trying to do what we took an oath of office to do, and that is protect this border.’ But when they tell you about finding small children who have drowned in that river, or pulling a lifeless body of a woman who is pregnant with twins, it changes the way you think about what’s happening.
Drug cartels, guys – they have their tentacles all over this country. We need you to start telling that story. To Senator Cruz’s point, they (migrants) will tell you exactly how much they paid to get here. Then they’ll tell you where they’re going, what their job’s going be, and how much more they owe. Got it. And guess what? Just the other day in Alabama, a gentleman told me, if you will come back here with me in this neighborhood right behind you, you will see migrants who are here illegally, and they will tell you about the drug cartels coming around every other week to collect.
Guys. That’s not the American dream. That’s an American nightmare.
We know what policies work, President Trump had secured the border. We know what to do, we just have to have a leader who has the courage to do it, and I am so sick of Joe Biden lecturing us about the soul of America. Let me tell you. He needs to have the heart to actually listen to people, he needs to have the compassion to actually hear those stories, the willingness to work with people, and Joe Biden needs the courage to take decisive action.
We are standing here ready to do this, and what he put forth in the supplemental is an absolute joke. It will only facilitate this crisis more and more every day. By the end of his tenure, we will have over 10 million people here, which would make that, if you put everybody in one place, the 11th largest state in the United States of America.
Folks, this is out of control. We’ve got to do something. We would not allow this to happen in a third-world country. We certainly should not allow it to happen in the United States of America.”
High quality video of Senator Britt’s remarks can be downloaded for media usage here.
###
