Drugs and Illegal Immigration

Floor Speech

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Mr. RICE of South Carolina. Madam Speaker, Americans pay the price for our failure to secure our southern border in many, many ways. Our failure to control our southern border is a national disgrace.

Some of the ways Americans pay for our failure is through illegal immigration, reduced wages from illegal immigration, drugs, violent crime, human trafficking, gangs, abuse of our welfare system, and potential terrorism.

There are too many to explore here, but I want to focus on just a few of the larger problems. One is illegal immigration.

First, I want to say I am not anti-immigration. I am anti-illegal immigration.

You have to understand that, as a sovereign country, we have the right to decide who and how many people are allowed to become citizens of our country. And we are a very, very generous nation. Don't let anybody tell you that, because we are against illegal immigration, we are not a generous nation.

We accept 1.1 million legal immigrants per year. That is almost twice as much as the next highest country--1.1 million legal immigrants per year. Now, we can talk about that number--is it too high, too low--but that is what the law allows.

Most countries use their immigration system to make themselves more competitive, and that is what I am all about: make America great again, make the United States competitive again. You see, a competitive economy makes America the land of opportunity, and I am all about opportunity for my children and grandchildren and your children and grandchildren.

Most countries use the immigration system to make themselves more competitive by using high-skilled immigration. In other words, if you have a skill set or an educational background that that country needs, you go to the front of the line.

Our immigration system, on the other hand, is based on chain migration. Only 12 percent is skill based. That is less than half of what the average developed country provides. Canada and Mexico base much more of their immigration on skill set than we do here in America.

The result of our chain immigration-based system is that primarily low-skilled, uneducated people are admitted through our legal immigration system. In fact, over half of our legal immigrants--legal immigrants. I haven't even gotten to illegal immigration yet. Over half of our legal immigrants end up relying on our welfare system, and this clearly makes us less, not more, competitive.

President Trump and I agree that we should shift to a skill-based immigration system like Canada and Mexico have to grow our economy and create more opportunity for our children and grandchildren.

So all that is bad enough, that we base our immigration on chain migration, that 65 percent of the folks coming in here have a low skill set and over half of them end up on welfare, Medicaid, food stamps, and the like, but now let's talk about illegal immigration.

On top of that 1.1 million primarily unskilled legal immigrant workforce that we bring in every year, we have a flood of illegal immigrants. Nobody knows exactly how many, but it is hundreds of thousands of folks. The low end of the estimates is 300,000 to 400,000 people per year on top of the 1.1 million that we admit legally.

In a 2015 study, Harvard Professor George Borjas found that legal immigration, that 1.1 million legal per year, added 25 percent to the low-skilled workforce over the last 20 years.

Then you add illegals on top of that. Professor Borjas said, for every 10 percent you add in competition, you reduce wages by at least 3 percent.

Folks, if you add 25 percent more competitors, wages will go down. That is Economics 101.

If you look at this chart, this is a chart of wage increases in the United States from 2000 until now. You can see those folks at the upper end of the scale. They are not really affected by low-skilled illegal immigration, and their wages went up and went up substantially.

If you look at the 75th percentile, they are not affected either. Their wages went up and went up substantially.

But the median income, they are flat. They haven't had a raise in 20 years. The people at the 25th percentile and the 10th percentile, they haven't moved at all. They are the people who are the most hurt by illegal immigration, by competition from low-skilled illegal immigrants who work for nothing and who cheat hardworking Americans out of jobs and out of wages, and this chart proves it.

Let me tell you, not only does it cheat the people on the low end of the scale, but it actually helps the people on the higher end of the scale.

People like your children and your grandchildren with a high school education, people who are trying to get their heads above water but they can't because they are drowned by a flood of illegal aliens who work for practically nothing, this primarily affects those on the lower end of the income scale, as I just showed you, who just can't seem to get ahead.

Friends, Democrats used to say they are for the working man, and they love to talk about income inequality. The people on the high end have gone up; the people on the low end haven't. Well, guess what? Here is why. Illegal immigration plays a huge part in that.

So let's stop complaining about income inequality, and let's actually doing something about it. Let's secure our southern border, stop the flow of illegal immigrants who work for practically nothing and cheat the folks on the low end of the scale out of jobs and wages, and let's watch wages rise.

It is not that hard to understand. It is common sense. It is Economics 101. The American middle class has suffered for decades as a result of our uncompetitive economy, and illegal immigration is one of the primary reasons.

Now, let's talk about what illegal immigration does to our social safety net. In addition to drowning our middle class, illegal immigration strains our social safety net and costs taxpayers billions of dollars.

These figures are from the Center for Immigration Studies, and the chart represents the percentage of immigrant-led households in blue and native-born households in red.

The percentage of immigrant households that get food aid in America is 45 percent; native-born households, 21 percent. So illegal immigrants get twice as much food aid as native-born citizens.

Medicaid, 50 percent of illegal immigrants get some type of Medicaid benefit; only 23 percent of native-born Americans.

Cash benefits, when you include the earned income tax credit, 31 percent of illegal immigrants get some form of cash subsidy from the United States Government; only 10 percent of native-born Americans.

If you take all that in total, 63 percent of illegal immigrants get some type of government benefit, as compared to 35 percent of native- born folks.

The last column represents the percentage of uninsured. Twenty-four percent of the illegal immigrants have no insurance as compared to 7.5 percent of native-born households.

When you think about people showing up at the emergency room and hospitals, and the government and taxpayers having to cover the bill, 25 percent of the illegal immigrant families are one of the main sources of that problem.

Last year, in my home county, Horry County, South Carolina--now, Horry County is a long way from the southern border, over 1,500 miles. But there was a claim brought against the school system in Horry County, South Carolina, by the U.S. Department of Justice. It seems that the Department determined that Horry County wasn't doing enough to accommodate students who couldn't speak English.

Well, you wouldn't think that would be that much of a problem in South Carolina, being that we are such a long way from the southern border. As it turns out, 5,511 out of 44,700 students in Horry County were English as a second language. That is 13 percent of the student body in Horry County, South Carolina. So the school board agreed to settle that claim by paying $600,000 more to provide more accommodation for those students who couldn't speak English.

Let's get off of illegal immigration and talk about one of the other great scourges that Americans endure as a result of our failure to secure our southern border.

In 2017, 72,000 Americans died from drug overdoses. That is up 100 percent in a decade. For most diseases and sicknesses, the cures are getting better and deaths are leveling off. It is the opposite for the drug scourge.

That 72,000 Americans who died in 2017--think about this, guys; listen to this--is more than traffic deaths, which was 37,000, and homicides at 17,000, combined. Traffic deaths and homicides killed 54,000 Americans in 2017. Drug overdoses killed 72,000 people. It is exploding.

Last year, there was a 38 percent increase in meth, 22 percent increase in heroin, and 73 percent increase in fentanyl seized at our southern border, and that is only what we seized. If that is not a crisis, I don't know what a crisis is.

The DEA reports that 300 Americans die every week from heroin, 90 percent of which comes across our southern border. Madam Speaker, 95 percent of the cocaine comes across our southern border, and much of the fentanyl comes across our southern border.

The opioid epidemic is ravaging communities across the country, including my home State and district. In the past 3 years, 2014 to 2017, the number of opioid-involved overdose deaths in South Carolina increased by 47 percent--47 percent--from 508 to 748.

In 2017, 134 opioid deaths were in my little congressional district that I represent, the Seventh District of South Carolina. I asked Sheriff Thompson in Horry County, and I asked Sheriff Boone in Florence County, where these drugs are coming from. They looked at me and said 80-plus percent comes from the southern border. That mirrors the reports from the DEA.

As the President has stated, the status quo response to the crisis at our southern border is no longer effective.

Nancy Pelosi said a wall as a part of the President's border security plan is amoral. I don't think so. But 72,000 Americans dead last year, I know that is amoral. 750 South Carolinians dead last year primarily from drugs coming across the southern border that we refuse to control, I know that is amoral. 132 residents of my district dead last year primarily from drugs coming across our southern border, I know that is amoral.

The scourge of drugs caused by our failure to control our southern border doesn't just affect us. It affects our southern neighbors as well.

Did you know there were more than 30,000 murders in Mexico last year? That is almost twice as many murders as we had, and they have a third of our population, so their murder rate is six times ours. Why is that?

Well, large portions of Mexico are controlled by drug cartels. You see, our failure to control our southern border has given these people unimaginable power and wealth. They outrank the government in more than half of Mexico, and they will fight to protect that power and that wealth.

Madam Speaker, 30,000 murders, six times the rate of murder in the United States, and it is largely our fault, because we haven't controlled our southern border. When a gang comes knocking on your door in Mexico or Guatemala and says they are going to take your son and he is going to be a part of their cartel, when they come and say, hey, your daughter is looking good, and they are going to grab her and sell her into human trafficking, what are you going to do? Are you going to sit there and take it?

I can tell you what a lot of them are doing. They are picking up everything they have, and where are they heading? They are heading to the southern border of the United States.

So the refugee crisis--think about this--because we have failed to control our southern border, because we have enriched and emboldened these drug cartels and drug lords, and we have allowed them to take over governing large parts of Central and South America, we have created the very refugee crisis that is creating a crisis at our southern border right now, because we have failed to control the flow of drugs. We have failed to stop these criminal organizations.

The Democrats claim they are for border security, but they refuse to take any action or even participate in good-faith negotiations. Just last week, Nancy Pelosi offered $1 toward additional border security. Hillary Clinton, Chuck Schumer, and Barack Obama, when they were Senators, all voted in favor of funding a border wall in 2006. Why are they against it now?

I will tell you why. It is their hatred for President Trump stopping them from doing what is best for their constituents. They see this as a political game, and they want to win, no matter what the cost.

Let me tell you what the cost was last year: 72,000 dead Americans, 750 in South Carolina, 130 in my district, and I promise you there were at least that many in Nancy Pelosi's district.

Democrats try to make this argument solely about a wall. President Trump has repeatedly said we do not need a wall for the entire length of the 2,000-mile border, but physical barriers in selected areas are both effective and necessary.

The Yuma border sector had the highest number of illegal crossings in the country before a barrier was built, resulting in a 95 percent decrease in apprehensions and a 91 percent decrease in crime. San Diego, once ground zero for illegal immigration, has seen a 92 percent decrease in apprehensions since the fence was constructed.

The $5.7 billion passed by the House Republicans in December would have enhanced border security, not just a wall. Any meaningful plan to deal with illegal immigration must also require employers to verify the employment status of workers they hire and penalize employers if they break the rules.

This system is called E-Verify, and it is already in place. It is managed by the Federal Government, but, amazingly, employers are not required to participate. So in addition to border security, we have to have E-Verify.

It is time to stop the politics and secure our border.

Democrats are terribly worried about who gets blamed for the shutdown. Frankly, I don't care who gets the blame. This is a fight, and it is a fight to keep drugs off our streets and out of the hands of our children. It is a fight to keep our communities safe. It is a fight for higher wages for hardworking Americans, for more jobs, and for our economy. And, friends, it is a fight worth having.

Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

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