The Daily Signal - #517: What It's Really Like Inside a Migrant Processing Facility

Episode Date: July 30, 2019

The Department of Homeland Security expects the number of new illegal immigrants coming to the U.S. to top 1.1 million by the end of the fiscal year in September. The border crisis is much talked about in Washington, but little progress is being made to address it. Congressman Mark Green (R-TN) recently took a trip to the border to see for himself what things are like. In today’s episode, he shares his thoughts in an exclusive interview with Rachel.We also cover the following stories:-Trump hits China with new tariffs to take effect in September.-Justice Department will not prosecute former FBI Director James Comey for leaking classified documents.-The Senate passes massive two-year spending deal that busts spending caps.The Daily Signal podcast is available on Ricochet, iTunes, SoundCloud, Google Play, and Stitcher. All of our podcasts can be found at DailySignal.com/podcasts. If you like what you hear, please leave a review. You can also leave us a message at 202-608-6205 or write us at [e-mail]. Enjoy the show! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is the Daily Signal podcast for Friday, August 2nd. I'm Rachel Del Judas. And I'm Daniel Davis. The Department of Homeland Security expects the number of new illegal immigrants coming to the U.S. to top 1.1 million by the end of the fiscal year in September. The border crisis is much talked about in Washington, but little progress is being made to address it. Congressman Mark Green recently took a trip to the border to see for himself what things are like. In today's episode, he'll share his thoughts in an exclusive interview.

with Rachel. One more thing. If you're enjoying this podcast, please consider leaving a review or a five-star rating on iTunes and encourage others to subscribe. Now on to our top news. Well, the apparent truce in the trade war is over. President Trump announced on Thursday that he would impose 10% tariffs on another $300 billion of Chinese goods starting on September 1st. The president's announcement comes after trade talks with China this week resulted in little progress. The president tweeted, quote, We thought we had a deal with China three months ago, but sadly, China decided to renegotiate the deal prior to signing.

More recently, China agreed to buy agricultural product from the U.S. in large quantities, but did not do so. Additionally, my friend President Xi said that he would stop the sale of fentanyl to the United States. This never happened, and many Americans continued to die. trade talks are continuing, and during the talks, the U.S. will start on September 1st, putting a small additional tariff of 10% on the remaining $300 billion of goods and products coming from China into our country. This does not include the $250 billion already tariffed at 25%. We look forward to continuing our positive dialogue with China on a comprehensive trade deal and feel that the future between our two countries will be a very bright one, end quote. The Senate voted 67 to 28 to pass a two-year budget deal advancing it to President Donald Trump's desk for his signature.

The measure was controversial to both conservatives in the House and Senate, given that it, quote, increases spending by about $2 trillion over the next 10 years, but provides only $77 billion in offsets, according to Congressman Mike Johnson, who is chairman of the Republican SETI committee. The legislation was negotiated by Treasury Secretary Stephen Mnuchin and House Majority Leader Nancy Pelosi, and, according to Politico, quote, raises spending by $320 billion over current levels, lifts the debt ceiling for two years, and sets a course for funding the government without the fiscal brinkmanship of recent years, such as last winter's 35-day partial government shutdown over Trump's border wall project, end quote. Well, the Justice Department has decided not to prosecute former FBI director, James Comey for leaking classified information in the days leading up to his firing. Fox News cites unnamed sources familiar with the DOJ's deliberations, with one official saying,

quote, everyone at the DOJ involved in the decision said it wasn't a close call. They all thought this could not be prosecuted, end quote. During congressional testimony, Comey admitted to writing memos of his past interactions with President Trump. He said he gave those memos to a Columbia University law professor who then gave them to the New York Times. Notably, the FBI labeled those memos confidential rather than classified after Comey gave them to the professor. The DOJ's Inspector General Michael Horowitz had referred Comey for potential prosecution. Fox News reports that his report is now imminent. At least 1.1 million illegal immigrants are trying to cross the border by the end of the fiscal year, which is September 30th,

according to Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Chairman Ron Johnson of Wisconsin. The Wisconsin Senator said that Border Patrol agents who work at points of entry brought 3,000 people into custody per day on average in June. In a statement, Johnson said that given the massive volume of crossings, Americans should not be surprised that facilities processing illegals at the southern border are full. Johnson said, quote, given this flow, no one should be surprised that the Border Patrol stations are well beyond their capacity. Rather than point fingers to the brave men and women of DHS who have done their best with the limited resources we have provided them, members of Congress should be acting on legislation to solve the underlying problems, end quote. Up next, Rachel's exclusive interview with Congressman Mark Green about his trip to the border. If you're tired of high taxes, fewer health care choices, and bigger and bigger government,

it's time to partner with the most impactful conservative organization in America. We're the Heritage Foundation, and we're committed to solving the issues America faces. Together, we'll fight back against the rising tide of homegrown socialism, and we'll fight four conservative solutions that are making families more free and more prosperous. But we can't do it without you. Please join us at heritage.org. We're joined today on the Daily Signal podcast by Congressman Mark Green of Tennessee, who actually just came back from a trip to the border where you spent several days,

in El Paso. Congressman, thank you so much for joining us today. Rachel, thanks for having me on the show. Well, it's a pleasure to have you with us. So you just got back from El Paso, and you saw up close and personal the situation that we're in right now at our southern border. What are your major takeaways from this trip? I think first and foremost, the people of ICE and CBP are doing phenomenal work, and they've done phenomenal work in the midst of a massive crisis that overwhelm the border with limited resources. Now with the $4.6 billion, they have resources to add, you know, facilities and

resources, you know, food, water, all that stuff, trash, and all the things that you have to do when you run an operation like they do. But just first and foremost, their hard work and dedication to America. I think number two would be the absolute absurdity that our asylum laws have become and the perverse incentives that it's causing. And I'll give you an example. I think it was Monday night. I did a ride-along with CBP.

I'm out on the border, riding around with agents. And they apprehended three people in a family, a husband, wife, and a child. that were from Brazil. Now, Brazil is not any country that's, you know, nobody is suspecting Brazil of, you know, political, creating political refugees, et cetera. But they flew to Panama, and then from Panama flew to Cancun,

and then from Cancun, a combination of bust and walked to our border, walked across, and they came up to the Board of Pearl, patrol agents. It's not as if they're trying to run away. They go and turn themselves in because they know that if they do so with a child, and if after processing that child is determined to be theirs, they're just released into the country with a court date, you know, two to three years from now that they don't necessarily have to show up. And it's really crazy. I mean, we don't, with the asylum

laws the way they are, we don't have an immigration system in this country. I mean, people with a child come across the southern border, no matter who they are, where they're from, and they're just turned loose in the country. It's crazy. It's unreal. I was at the border in April, and they told us the same thing. Border Patrol said, we will pick up a family if there are kids, we'll process them, give them a court date.

And a lot of times they said these people never show up for that court date. 40% of the time they never show. And, you know, the remainder of the time, they get a court order that tells them to leave, and the vast majority of those don't look with a court order. That's why, you know, these ice raids that were vilified by the left and were effectively executed by the Obama administration, I might add, or the president is right, President Trump is right. We need to, you know, go and find those individuals that have a court order saying they need

to leave America. But I guess the third thing that really impressed me was, The absolute contrast, in fact, it's offensive what the Democrats have said about the border. You know, claiming that people are drinking out of toilets. I spoke to the CDP agent who was standing there when the woman described that she was getting water. And she said the Spanish word, the Guatemalan Spanish word for bathroom. And I know, I don't know about you, but I go to the bathroom and get a couple water out of my sink and drink it. that's essentially what the woman was saying.

Of course, Ocasio-Cortez thought she heard. She was drinking out of the toilet, the press immediately blew that out of proportion. The people that are down there are in great, I mean, it's great conditions, significantly better than where many of them have come from. Air conditioning, they are separated, you know,

by ages and by gender and things like that. But there are no cages. There's plenty of food. In fact, at the ice facility I toured, the dietician who is providing the menu and the, you know, the nutrition of it all is the same individual who does it for Fort Bliss, Texas, our soldiers. And the menus are identical. Wow. So they're getting fed the exact same thing that our soldiers are being fed. So this notion, this hyperbole, these incredibly false accusations from the left are offensive.

I mean, it just pales. I can't understand that they think that they can just walk all over the truth like this. I'm infuriated to that. So those are probably the three biggies that I walked away from my trip with. That's incredible. You mentioned, and I saw the photo that you posted on Twitter with the whole. situation surrounding when Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez

said that she had been down at the border and migrants were drinking water out of toilets and you said you mentioned this, you know, just now as well, that you were there and that's not the case. Are there any other misconceptions that were kind of brought to light when you were down there and actually saw what was happening versus what is being told on the media? Yeah, the nutrition piece, you know,

that's been something that both Ocasio-Cortez and others have talked about, there are snacks that you and I maybe would call sugary snacks, but they're there for the children to eat Doritos potato chips and things like that. Anyone who wants something can go up and get a snack 24-7. But they have meals, hot meals that are very nutritious, you know, as I mentioned earlier, using the dietician from the military base. So if you look at the snacks and we're to think, oh, gosh, let's tell everybody this is all the food they're getting and they're eating junk food, well, yeah, that might be a perception you could have by looking at the stack of juices and things like that. But the truth of the matter is they're getting hot meals that are very nutritious and then the snacks are just there to be available.

Another thing, too, they track everything. They track when the individuals eat. They even track when they shower. So they go to them and they say it's been, you know, 24 hours since you shower, you're on schedule to shower now. Obviously, they've got limited shower stalls, so they have to phase people through. So they go and say, hey, it's your turn. Your code popped up on the system, and it's your turn for a shower. And oftentimes people will say, no, I'm not interested.

You can't force them. But they're even tracking when these people are – when it's their turn for the next shower. and going to them and tell them. And these guys are doing an amazing job down there, and the mischaracterization, the falsehoods, the lies are absurd. Wow, that is really interesting. That's something I myself have never heard. I also wanted to ask you, you toured an ICE facility

and a Customs and Border Patrol Station. What were those experiences like? You mentioned they're not being cages. That was something that you did not encounter. What was that experience like? What did you see when you were there? Well, interestingly, One of the infirmaries we went through, there was an Iraqi who had flown to Central America and walked up and come across the southern borders.

I mean, people are coming from all over the world. But, I mean, if you're asking sort of the emotional sense, I think the biggest emotion I had was just frustration at the lives of the media and the far left. clearly the people are well taken care of. I think the other thing is, you know, I'm proud of my country, one, for how they're taking care of these individuals at the border. I'm also proud that people would want to come to America. I mean, obviously, we've done some things right, and we've got a great country, and, you know, people want to come here.

I understand we just have to have a system of laws that work. You know, I prefer merit-based immigration and things like that. But, you know, there was a great sense about how awesome our country is by the resources we're providing. But the actual cost that was quoted to me was $250 million just in health care alone, you know, for all of CDP delivered to individuals who come across the border. So, I mean, that's a lot of American taxpayer dollars going to take care of people who are. you know, trying to come into our country, and we're doing it right. So proud of my country, proud of CBP and ICE, you know, frustrated at the lives of the left. I guess that's my emotional response.

Yeah, and that's such an interesting response. And I feel like when we don't hear all the time, because we hear people on the left in lawmakers and Congress saying, oh, these people are crossing over and then they're being subjected to concentration camp like conditions, when in fact, I mean, there was a report out today in the Washington Examiner that said, I think 1.1 million people will have crossed into the border by September 30th. And these people want to come because there's something here and they want to be part of that. So I think that's such a unique and important perspective to remember. We just want to make sure people are doing it legally.

So not only did you tour government facilities like ICE and CBP, you also had some meetings with local businesses and ranchers in the area. What are you hearing from Americans who essentially live on the border and experience this crisis day in and day out? Well, they're incredibly frustrated. And I missed the meeting with the ranchers when they sat down with the ranchers. That was on the end of day two. But I talked to people in El Paso and business leaders there as I interacted with folks.

And they're frustrated. They are overwhelmed. You know, many, obviously there's crime related to. to this. So they're fearful in that regard. But yeah, I missed the actual meeting with the ranchers, which was scheduled for the Tuesday afternoon, like Tuesday afternoon. And some of your Democrat colleagues, I heard they traveled to the border last month. Do you think your experience was similar to theirs, or do you know of areas where both of your trips differed or there were different takeaways from those two different tracks of visits to the border?

Well, clearly they have different takeaways than us. I mean, they come away saying, you know, just the opposite of what we're saying, which blows my mind. But I will say this, many of the CBP guys shared with us that the volume was down. And we, when I did my ride-alongs on the border, I could see the Mexican National Guardsman actually standing watch across the border. President Trump's trade threats clearly had an impact. Mexico responded and the number of people coming across the border has significantly decreased. That's something that's relatively new in the past several weeks. Now, Mexico put those guys on a 45-day deployment, so the Border Patrol is aware of this. They anticipate, or the way they described it is they think that they're in the eye of the storm.

And that once those 45-day National Guard call-ups are over in Mexico, they anticipate that the volume will increase again. Let's hope Mexico continues to do its part at its southern border. Of course, now there's the agreement with Guatemala, too, which will help. But that's probably the biggest difference in the past several weeks. You mentioned the asylum laws earlier at the start of our conversation. What do you think are some of the biggest loopholes in our current immigration system that need to be fixed, whether it's asylum laws or other, now that you've been there, what are some things that you're seeing, okay, we need to definitely change how this works? Well, you know, the court cases and all that stuff that led, you know, we talk about, everybody calls it the Flores Amendment or the Flores Agreement. But the result of all of it is that a child, if there's a child, and if it goes through the process of being verified that it is.

with the right people. And by the way, one of the things we learned on this trip is that 30% of the people that come over with children, they're fraudulent, meaning they either rented the child. We actually heard that, but that there were people renting their child to come across and be used basically as a visa. That's what this whole Flores thing does, is that it allows, if there's a child, and it's connected with that individual and it's not fraudulent, then they get released immediately into the country.

They get a court date in the future, and that's it. So it's a visa into the United States. The child becomes a visa, and, you know, that's got to be fixed. That is the central thing that has to be fixed. Also, the ability to determine credible fear at the border. You know, if we can immediately determine credible, fear, then there are people that we could return that wouldn't have to wait on a court date. So those are two of the biggest things that need to be fixed.

What would you say during the course of your trip, maybe one of the biggest things that might have reinforced your position about the crisis there or changed it, maybe something that was surprising or something that just reinforced what you've seen, what you've been told by others who actually live there about the crisis that we're seeing? I was a little surprised to hear the number of 30% on, you know, fraudulent families, so to speak. I thought that was, I thought that was much larger than I would have expected. Other surprises, you know, I was surprised to hear how supportive the people on the border are of the president's initiatives. They are very supportive of the tariff threats and the impact that's had.

And those are probably the two biggest surprises for me. What does your take given? There's been a lot, you know, it's no secret President Trump campaigned on building a wall along the southern border. And there's been opposition to that in Congress and elsewhere. Do you think a wall will help and why do you think there has been such opposition to it? Yeah, I think wall. The wall absolutely helps. It is hard to get over, so people go around it.

And what that does is it allows the CBP to basically concentrate their efforts. It channelizes the flow of immigrants, migrants, and so they can concentrate efforts and look for, you know, the really bad characters, like MS-13, terrorists, and the drug, the cartels, the crime that's happening. So you see this stuff, if you can kind of narrow the distances over which you have to look, you can find that needle in the haystack and hopefully either stop drugs, stop MS-13 gangs, and other crime that's happening. Now, obviously, once the immigration laws are fixed,

then there'll be more that they can do with regards to immigrants. Right now, it's those drugs and, you know, the criminal element that are really the priority to stop. Well, during your trip, I know that you mentioned you also visited some ports of entry. What was that experience like? What did you see? And what are some reforms in those spaces that you believe need to be made after being there? I think the, you know, the entry control points are very good. They're well managed.

You know, there is this constancy of people coming, though. And I don't see an end to that any time soon until we change the laws. But they do a very good job of inspecting. I think they need more modern technology in terms of x-ray technology. Right now, they're not looking into every single vehicle, every single transport vehicle that comes over. clearly that's an opportunity for bad things to happen. It would be great if they had more resources in that area. The other thing I think they could change is, you know,

they're not inspecting any of the vehicles going back. And, you know, I think that is clearly an opportunity to identify some of the criminal element that are coming in and going back. So I would like to see them inspect more of the traffic that's. flowing south. Given your time visiting and speaking with ICE and CBP officials, what would you say is the mood of those who work so hard to protect the border? Are they overwhelmed?

Are they frustrated? Do they feel like they're being listened to? What was the mood that you experienced in getting to spend time with them? Well, they're great Americans. They love the country and they're for the rule of law. They are encouraged right now because of the support that the president's given and because the $4.6 billion got approved. I think if I had visited prior to that, there had been a lot of frustration. But the morale seems to be significantly higher after those two things.

The decreased low from the tariff threats and the $4.6 billion in resources that were approved by Congress, they were in good spirits. They were encouraged and clearly they love the country. Well, so you come from Tennessee's 7th Congressional District and while you don't represent a border state, are there ways that you've seen your state has even been impacted by illegal immigration even though you're not right at the border? Well, sure. We see a lot of job displacement. We see a lot of wages are decreased, you know, and undercuting.

cut because of the employment of illegals. You know, Tennessee has some pretty strong laws. If you have more than 25 employees, you have to e-verify, which I think is a good thing. And then we also have sanctuary city laws. In fact, I myself wrote one and got it past that if a city becomes a sanctuary city, that city will lose its state economic development funds. That was my sort of anti-sanctuary city bill. and it is now law in Tennessee.

So while we have some pretty strong laws in place, there are still individuals that are hiring people that they are, you know, it's illegal to hire. And I think that is undercutting wages and displacing Americans from jobs. Well, final question. If you could leave your Democrat colleagues and even Americans around the country with one reflection or remark about what you saw, this past week about the crisis at the border, what would that be?

We're a great country, and we are doing great things to take care of these individuals who are flocking to our country. And the CBP and the ICE people are people of heart, and they care, and they're doing everything within their power to manage the crisis. We just need to make sure that Congress fixes the laws and gives those minimum and women the resources they need to do their jobs. Well, Congressman Green, thank you so much for joining us today. It's always a pleasure to have you on the Daily Signal podcast.

Thanks. Well, that's going to do it for us today. Thanks for listening to the Daily Signal podcast brought to you from the Robert H. Bruce Radio Studio at the Heritage Foundation. Please be sure to subscribe on iTunes, Google Play, or SoundCloud, and please leave us a review or a rating on iTunes to give us any feedback. Rob and Virginia will be with you on Monday. The Daily Signal podcast is executive.

produced by Kate Trinko and Daniel Davis. Sound design by Lauren Evans and Thalia Ramprasad. For more information, visit DailySignal.com.