Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas visited the Texas-Mexico border Monday in support of all federal personnel who are working the frontlines protecting the border and to discuss the ongoing immigration crisis while calling for Congress to enact a comprehensive solution.
Mayorkas spoke at a press conference, strategically held at Eagle Pass, Texas, a key border crossing point where thousands of illegal aliens enter the United States every day. House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), along with a delegation of more than 60 House Republicans, reportedly toured the same border region last week to witness first-hand the border crisis.
The DHS secretary praised the U.S. Customs and Border Protection workforce for their hard work in immigration enforcement while encountering a “historic number of migrants in December, including large numbers of migrants who arrived at the border at one time, putting tremendous stress on our broken immigration system, our under-resourced facilities, the communities.”
Facing a formal impeachment proceeding by the GOP-led House Committee on Homeland Security on January 10, Mayorkas attempted to place blame for the border crisis on a divided Congress. “We now need Congress to do their part and act. Our immigration system is outdated and broken and has been in need of reform for literally decades. On this, everyone agrees. It is the very reason why President Biden submitted to Congress, on his very first day in office, proposed legislation,” he said.
“Now, three years later, I am privileged to be working with both Republicans and Democratic Senators who are working tirelessly on much-needed reform and long-overdue fixes to our system,” stated Mayorkas, adding, “We need Congress to provide the supplemental funding that President Biden requested months ago…. We have taken bold, necessary actions during the time that Congress has failed to act.”
The Austin American-Statesman reported that “Mayorkas listed several immigration-related initiatives the Biden administration launched in recent weeks, including streamlining the asylum-seeking process and opening what he called ‘safe mobility offices’ to assist migrants traveling from Central and South America. But a poll released Sunday by CBS News showed that nearly 6 in 10 Americans disapprove of the president’s handling of the migrant crisis at the U.S.-Mexico border.”
In response to the growing border crisis, Mayorkas shared a number of DHS needs, including “more Border Patrol Agents and more case processors so that the Agents can be out in the field doing the heroic work that is their fundamental mission. We need more Officers so that migration surges do not force mitigation measures of last resort, like (recent) bridge closures.”
Continuing to build his case, and playing the blame game, Mayorkas defended DHS efforts in protecting the border, noting a recent visit to Mexico to find a “regional solution” to the growing immigration crisis.
Mayorkas claimed, “The high number of migrants we have encountered at our southern border is a challenge that is not unique to the United States. Countries throughout our hemisphere — in fact, throughout the world — are experiencing an unprecedented number of displaced people fleeing poverty, authoritarian regimes, homes destroyed by extreme weather events, corruption, and violence.”
Reiterating his stance that the blame for the current situation at the U.S.–Mexico border lies with Congress, not with his leadership, Mayorkas closed his remarks by stating,
We will continue to do everything we can, and we will continue to enforce the law, but we need Congress to make the legislative changes and provide the funding that our frontline officers so desperately need. What is remarkable is that, through it all, the brave men and women of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, and their partners in the Department of Homeland Security, have and will continue to put on their uniforms, don their badges, and work at great risk to themselves in the service of their mission — to keep us and our country safe and secure.
I am proud to be here to recognize, commend, and thank them and their families for their service and their sacrifice. But they need and deserve more than just recognition. They need and deserve the support and resources only Congress can provide.
