House Republicans Present Bill as “Strongest Security Border Immigration Package Ever”

(VitalNews.org) – Chairmen from three committees introduced legislation on Thursday, April 27th, that was described by House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-LA) as “the strongest border security package that Congress has ever taken up.”

The chairmen of the three committees, Representatives Michael McCaul (R-TX), Jim Jordan (R-OH), and Mark Green (R-TN), presented their proposals at a press conference, whilst simultaneously criticizing the Biden administration for its open borders policy which has seen at least five million illegal immigrants cross the southern border since January 2021.

Mark Green factored in an extra 1.4 million illegal immigrants who have most likely crossed the southern border undetected and said the 6.4 million-plus illegal immigrants represented a number greater than all those who crossed over under both President Trump and President Obama combined in the previous eight years.

Green’s chairmanship of the Homeland Security Committee focuses on the physical aspects of the immigration crisis, including funding for the incomplete border wall and retention bonuses for US Border Patrol agents. At the same time, it proposed the withholding of federal funding for any NGOs that continued to provide illegal immigrants with food, shelter, and travel facilities.

Jordan’s component of the bill focuses on immigration enforcement policies, specifically addressing the broken asylum process which has seen the number of cases backlogged in immigration courts rising to over two million.

According to TRAC data from Syracuse University, most of the illegal immigrants claiming asylum are not detained when they cross the border and are instead released into the US to await their asylum hearings, which take an average of four years to process.

McCaul’s portion of the bill focuses on encouraging the Biden administration to bring the asylum system under control by entering into agreements with other countries.

However, while nearly all House Republicans are expected to support the bill, the majority of Democrats are expected to oppose it, even though the Title 42 border barrier expires in May 2023.