"Democrats have proven they don't believe in a secure border," Sen. Eric Schmitt (R-Missouri) tweets.
Democrats have proven they don’t believe in a secure border.
— Senator Eric Schmitt (@SenEricSchmitt) December 29, 2024
@realDonaldTrump will secure our border on day one. pic.twitter.com/u3mXu2sXWu
Sen. Schmitt is also quoted as blasting the "abuse" of the H-1B visa program.
Eric Schmitt blasts 'abuse' of H-1B visa program, says Americans 'shouldn't train their foreign replacements' https://t.co/7KvlvWj2Hd #FoxNews
— Bo Snerdley (@BoSnerdley) December 29, 2024
Republicans have been sounding the alarm about H1B visas for years. In 2021, Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Missouri) published a letter addressed to President Joe Biden urging the commander-in-chief to extend the freeze on temporary foreign worker entries into the United States.
Today I have called on President Biden to reverse his disastrous decision to restart H1B visas amid high unemployment and an illegal immigration crisis pic.twitter.com/BTHwwXl1Zs
— Josh Hawley (@HawleyMO) March 31, 2021
The following is an excerpt from Sen. Hawley's letter, the concluding paragraphs, to President Biden.
In periods of high unemployment, it makes no sense to allow a struggling labor market to be flooded with a wave of foreign competition. What makes even less sense is to willingly introduce further competition for U.S. workers at the same time that a disastrous illegal immigration crisis grows on our southern border. As at the border, failure to take meaningful action is, in itself, a policy decision with detrimental impacts for American workers.
I urge you to extend the temporary foreign worker entry suspension until the national unemployment rate has meaningfully declined, and until your administration has conducted a thorough review of nonimmigrant visa programs to ensure that American workers are fully and effectively protected from harm. In the meantime, I will continue to work to develop legislative solutions that will protect American workers and promote a quick recovery.
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One line in the letter particularly stands out. "Failure to take meaningful action is, in itself, a policy decision with detrimental impacts," Hawley writes.
The statistics, published by U.S. Customs and Border Protection, account for nothing short of a humanitarian emergency and a national security calamity. The volume of people being dealt with is in the millions. The range of potential threats posed is from basic criminality to terrorism.
Illegal immigration threatens the safety of our nation, and it disenfranchises those who are immigrating and have immigrated legally. Immigration laws must be enforced. The immigration system must be allowed to function in an orderly manner. A nation must have borders, and those borders must be secure.
President Joe Biden should already be armed with what is necessary to secure the border, relevant immigration laws under the Constitution flowing from Congress and agencies with agents to execute those laws. Securing the border should not be up for debate. President Biden and congressional Democrats may be ideologically inclined toward open-borders immigration policy, but as elected governing officeholders they should be inclined toward securing the border.
These problems persist because they are allowed to persist. But there is an account to take. Governing is not just about deeds of commission, but also omission. Elected leaders are, after all, watchmen who oversee the goings on in our nation. They steer and direct decision-making for the future, and they also are entrusted as custodians to ensure that the nation's current operations are free from disturbance and turmoil. As Sen. Josh Hawley writes, "Failure to take meaningful action is, in itself, a policy decision."
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