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Floor Speech

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Mr. YOUNG. Madam President, ``much better than you all expected.'' That is what President Biden said when asked about the conditions at the border after the expiration of title 42. ``Much better than you all expected.''

At the end of a week that saw a record 10,000 illegal crossings a day, he says, ``much better than you all expected.''

Those were just the ones that were stopped by the U.S. Customs and Border Protection. The President's statement is clearly disconnected from the on-the-ground reality at our border. Everyone knows that. And as far as I can tell, the Biden administration's policy, when it comes to the southern border, is largely to do the opposite of what the previous administration did.

This is the ``Costanza'' policy of border security. Whatever the previous President did, do the opposite. Within his first 100 days in office, President Biden stopped construction of the border wall, but he didn't stop there. He halted deportations, but he didn't stop there. He suspended the ``Remain in Mexico'' policy. As a result of these and other actions, there have been at least 6.4 million--6.4 million-- illegal border crossings at the southern border since the President assumed office.

Now, to put that in perspective--and this is just the number of people whom we have seen and been able to track come across the border illegally, so we know there are far more--but I represent a State, the great State of Indiana, where the population is 6.8 million.

That is a whole lot of people. Since 2021, hundreds of thousands of children have been trafficked across the southern border. Eighty-five thousand unaccompanied children are now missing. Last year, overworked and underappreciated Border Patrol agents apprehended more than 12,000 illegal immigrants who had already been convicted of a crime. Again, just the ones we have been able to apprehend.

This year, this year so far, those agents have stopped 82 people, according to my most recent count, from crossing the border, and they are on the terror watchlist.

Fentanyl smuggled across the border from Mexico is now the leading cause of death for Americans between ages 18 and 49. Record numbers of migrants are dying, swept away in the currents of the Rio Grande. So many, in fact, that law enforcement has to keep refrigerated trucks at the ready to store the drowned bodies.

The administration pretends that its lax border policy is somehow humane. It is the benighted, ultra-MAGA conservatives, the mean Republicans, in this vision who are inhumane.

Well, I have to say, swamping our law enforcement officers, overwhelming our resources, allowing lethal drugs to spread through our communities, not discouraging migrants from a deadly journey to the border, this is inhumane.

And saying so and demanding a measure of border security is not anti- immigrant. It is pro-American.

These are not Republican talking points; these are the sentiments of regular Americans. The failure to plan for the end of title 42 to enforce our immigration laws to secure the southern border is a disaster. Americans, no matter their political party, know it. But the President of the United States does not seem to understand.

In New York City, where illegal migrants have displaced homeless veterans in hotels, Mayor Eric Adams said: ``The President and the White House have failed this city.''

The truth is, when it comes to the border, the President and the White House have failed this country.

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