Supporting Justice for Victims of Sanctuary Cities Act

Floor Speech

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Mrs. MILLER. Madam Speaker, I would first like to thank my colleague from North Carolina (Mr. Budd) for his leadership on this important issue.

We still have a crisis on our southern border. While we have made progress, we need to finish the job.

We are continuing to construct our border wall, to strengthen our ports of entry, and to keep drugs and crime out of our communities. Yet, while President Trump, the heads of our Federal agencies, and congressional Republicans have joined together to draft good legislation and enforce our country's laws, we, sadly, have areas in our country that harbor criminals under the hypocritical title of sanctuary cities.

In defiance of our laws, many places like San Francisco, Los Angeles, New York City, and others have publicly pledged to serve as a safe haven for the dangerous criminals living in the shadows of our society.

Meaningful immigration reform is crucial, but removing dangerous criminals cannot wait. Crime affects every person in this country-- every citizen, every visitor, every single person, whether of legal status or otherwise. We have seen that anybody can be a victim of crime when our city leaders refuse to remove violent offenders off our streets.

These city officials have provided sanctuaries for lawbreakers but not for law followers. We need justice for those victims.

While city leaders protect criminals from deportation and frustrate our Federal immigration enforcers, it is well past time to create a pathway to justice for the law-abiding members of our communities.

If these sanctuary city officials will not protect their citizens, they must pay a price. They must be held accountable and responsible for their reckless negligence.

We need to allow victims and their families to sue these cities that have blocked our Federal agents from enforcing laws and shielded violent criminals from removal. President Trump spoke of this in his eloquent and powerful State of the Union Message.

I am proud to cosponsor the Justice for Victims of Sanctuary Cities Act introduced by Mr. Budd because my fellow West Virginians and many Americans know that this is the right thing for our country.

Good governance depends on transparency and accountability for our citizens and cooperation between Federal, State, and local leaders. Sanctuary cities deny these.

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