Senate GOP offers solutions to ‘crisis turned catastrophe’

Amber CoakleyJuly 14, 2022

U.S. Sen. James Risch (R-Idaho) attends a Senate Foreign Relations Committee in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)

U.S. Sen. James Risch (R-ID) attends a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on U.S. policy towards Belarus at the Dirksen Senate Office Building on June 09, 2021 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)

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UPDATED 6:22 AM PT – Thursday, July 14, 2022

The GOP is expressing its commitment to finding real solutions for the southern border crisis that continues to unravel under the Biden administration. On Wednesday, several Republican senators held a press conference to announce how they plan to end the crisis.

Ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Sen. James Risch (R-Idaho) and Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) introduced a new bill called the Solving Border Crisis Act. Risch said although it’s unlikely the current administration will change course, this bill could serve as a “blueprint” for the next administration.

“I can’t stress enough the importance of implementing these solutions immediately to protect our sovereignty and national security,” stated the Idaho lawmaker. “We will be pressing hard to move this legislation, but we are not naïve. We are here because the administration wants to have the situation the way it is because they could fix it and the could fix it easily. This isn’t going to change unless the administration reverses course and they probably won’t.”

The Biden administration’s dismantling of the effective immigration system it inherited has created a full-blown disaster at the southern border.

That’s why @senrobportman & I have introduced the Solving the Border Crisis Act to prevent this disaster from getting any worse. pic.twitter.com/Hao8GVNykd

— Jim Risch (@SenatorRisch) July 13, 2022

He also noted that the current administration has dismantled the work of 45th President Donald Trump who worked hard to secure the US border. However, as Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) pointed out, this is not only a border crisis, but a drug smuggling crisis as well. He said it’s no longer just border states being affected while citing an increase in the number of deaths and overdoses from fentanyl all across the US.

“The Democrats and Joe Biden have turned American into one big sanctuary city and have turned every state into a border state,” Barrasso stated. “In my home state of Wyoming, we’ve seen triple the number of deaths from fentanyl in the last two years.”

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) even predicted South Texas will become red due to the Biden administration’s negligence to the southern border.

“I am predicting right now in November we will see South Texas, which has been electing Democrats for over 100 years, South Texas is going to elect at least two and maybe three new Republican members of Congress,” he asserted. “All of whom are Hispanic woman, all of whom are are seeing the crime, disease and suffering and misery caused by Joe Biden’s open borders.”

This comes as 2.6 million migrants have crossed the border illegally since Biden took office. This figure doesn’t include those who avoided apprehension by border security.