Protecting Women's Health from Corporate Interference Act
Floor Speech
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Ms. MIKULSKI. Mr. President, I rise today to talk about an urgent crisis at our border in which over 250 children a week are coming from Central America, fleeing horrific gang violence--horrific gang violence--to seek refuge and asylum in the United States of America.
This is being called a crisis at the border. Well, it is a border crisis, but the crisis actually begins in Central America, where brutal, violent gangs, based on organized crime, are either trying to recruit the boys into organized crime, drug smuggling, human trafficking, or to recruit the girls into human trafficking in other just dangerous and repugnant circumstances.
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But when you go to the border the way I have, you will see that the situation is dire. It is dire because, as these children come to the border, crossing the Rio Grande--probably within really almost a 50-mile stretch of the Grande; it is not over the 1,900 miles of the Grande--they come and, actually, they do not try to sneak in, they come right up to where the border control is and they have pieces of paper with their name on it. They are then taken into custody by border control. They are placed into holding cells that are designed for adult males. They were designed to hold drug smugglers, narcotraffickers, and now they hold as many as 20 or 30 or 40 children, while under the law they are to be placed in the hands of the Health and Human Services Agency while their legal and asylum status is being verified.
Well, I am telling you, the entire infrastructure for dealing with these children--from the way the border control is trying to take care of them, the overrunning of the capacity of these holding cells, to the backlog on processing their legal and asylum determination, to really trying to place them in facilities under the care of Health and Human Services--the situation is dire.
The President of the United States has asked for emergency funding to deal with it. I hope we consider this emergency funding. The amount of money the President is seeking is $3.7 billion. This is to care for the humanitarian needs of the children, the enforcement at the border, the identifying of their legal status under a law passed under the administration of President Bush to deal with the trafficking of children, both boys and girls, and also for robust deterrence in the home countries where these children are coming from. But the deterrence comes from breaking down and prosecuting organized crime syndicates of the smugglers and the traffickers.
We are also asking for money to conduct a massive educational campaign advising Central American families against the dangers and false hopes of this journey. The journey is, indeed, dangerous. They come on foot. They come by car. They ride the tops of a train that is referred to as The Beast. There was one little girl who I spoke to with Secretary Johnson. She had stayed awake for 2 days on the rooftop of a train, terrified that she would fall off and be mutilated, just to be able to make it into the United States of America. And why did she make such a perilous, dangerous journey? It was because they were trying to recruit her into these violent and vile ways.
We need to make sure Central America, with our help, goes after the seven organized crime units that we know are sparking this, that are trying to recruit these kids; giving them false promises too, that if they come to this country, they will be able to get a free pass somehow for getting into this country. We need to be able to stop this and be able to deal with it in the most effective way.
The President's program actually does outline the money to be able to do that. When the children do come, as I said, while they are awaiting their legal status to be determined, they are placed in the hands of HHS. Now, HHS does not run group homes. HHS does not run foster care. HHS funds it, and they need to be able to turn to local communities to be able to have these children be able to stay.
I saw fantastic work being done while the children were being placed at Lackland Air Force Base and the social services were being run by--under contract of a faith-based organization--the Baptist church. I know the distinguished Presiding Officer knows a lot about human services. I myself am a social worker, and I will tell you that faith-based organization is really running a good program for these kids.
But we are running out of money. We need money for food and shelter for the children. We need money for the border agents. We need money for transportation to shelters and also transportation, when we can, returning these children home. We need money for immigration judges and legal services for the children to determine their asylum status, and, as I said, we need the muscular deterrence in the home country breaking up the organized gangs that then create the violence that then sets these children on this journey.
The best way to make sure the surge of children is stopped is not by harsher immigration laws. It is by making it hard on the drug dealers and the human traffickers, the smugglers, the coyotes. Because they are the ones who are the reason they are coming.
Looking at the data--looking at data--we see that these children are coming not only where there is high poverty, but that children are coming where there is a high level of crime, particularly homicide, murder, and other recruitment of children. These children are almost being recruited by child soldiers in their own country to engage in violent criminal activity.
So we need to be able to look at this
emergency supplemental and be able to meet the human needs while the children are here, make sure we fund the judges, the immigration judges and the legal services, to determine their asylum status, and be able to take care of them.
Already, 60,000 unaccompanied children have come into our country during this last year. In the 2 weeks I toured the border, I saw young children as young as 5 with one instruction: Cross the border, turn yourself in, and try to get as safe as you can. Border agents find these children often dehydrated, malnourished, and usually a victim of some type of trauma. Also, they have heard false promises from the smugglers about what it will be when they come here.
These smugglers--as part of these dangerous gangs and cartels--see women and children as a commodity to be bought, sold, transported, as if they were cargo. Children leave these homes based on lies. They think they are coming to an area where they will never have to go home or that they will be safe. I hope we then pass this appropriations. I hope in passing the appropriations we will be able to protect the safety of the children, we determine their legal and asylum status, and we have this muscular deterrent strategy in the home country.
There are those who want to have a new immigration policy or want to repeal the George Bush law. I would caution that because, remember, our problem is not the children; our problem is what causes the children to come. We have to go after what causes the children to come; and that is the drug dealers, the smugglers, the coyotes, those who are engaging in such violent crime.
The host countries, along with Mexico, need to help deal with this, and we need to marshal our law enforcement resources to be able to help them do this. Now they say: Let's bring in the National Guard at the border. What is our National Guard going to do? When these little kids cross the Rio Grande, they are going to go right up to that soldier, put their arms around his or her leg, and say: I need to be safe. Can you help me? What is the National Guard going to do? It is not a border enforcement problem; it is a criminal gang problem in Central America.
So we need to be able to be sure we are targeting the right areas in order to solve this problem. The children are not the threats. They are coming here because they are threatened themselves. We need to meet these urgent humanitarian needs, and we need to focus on our hemisphere to break up the gangs and crime.
Later on today we are going to have a briefing for every single Senator so they can ask the questions about this situation. Who are the children? Why are they coming? What are their legal rights under the law? But how can we effectively deal with this children's march, where the children are in danger in their host country and on the long journey to this one?
We are also asking that this $3.7 billion be designated as an emergency.
There are those who will want to take from other domestic programs. I would caution that. In fact, I would object to the very idea. The President has said this is an emergency because under the Budget Control Act of 2011 it meets the criteria that it is sudden, urgent, unforeseen, and temporary, deals with the loss of life, property, or our national security interests. I think it meets that test. I do not want to take offsets from existing programs to do this. It is unexpected. It is significant. We can deal with it, but let's not do it at the expense of other programs designed to help the American family and the American middle class.
I know there are others who want to speak on this issue. I will have more to
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say later, but for now let's examine the urgent supplemental and let's really solve the problem at the border and what causes it to be a problem for us.
I yield the floor.
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