At Subcommittee Hearing, Democrats Fact Check Inaccurate Extremist GOP Rhetoric on Immigration, Border Security

Washington, D.C. (April 17, 2024)—Rep. Robert Garcia, Ranking Member of the Subcommittee on National Security, the Border, and Foreign Affairs, led Subcommittee Democrats in emphasizing Republicans’ lack of credibility on border policy after rejecting a bipartisan border security package and using racist rhetoric to fearmonger about immigrants.

“This hearing is a political stunt.  But the majority can’t hide the evidence: immigration benefits everyone.  Immigrants work hard and grow our economy.  The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office—the experts we rely on—found that immigration will add $7 trillion to our economy over the next 10 years,” said Ranking Member Garcia in his opening statement.

The hearing included testimony from David J. Bier, Director, Immigration Studies, Cato Institute;  Ken Cuccinelli, Senior Fellow for Immigration and Homeland Security, Center for Renewing America;  Bill Waybourn, Sheriff, Tarrant County, Texas;  and Mike Chapman, Sheriff, Loudoun County, Virginia.

Subcommittee Democrats admonished Republicans’ politicization of the border, which panders to Donald Trump instead of meaningfully addressing border security and the root causes of migration. 

• Ranking Member Garcia noted in his opening statement:  “My colleagues in the majority have no credibility on these issues. They’re blocking funding for asylum officers and immigration judges. They’re trying to slash the Shelter and Services Program, which the border patrol calls a critical tool to aid cities and states who deal with migrants who are waiting to have their asylum cases reviewed.”  
• In response to a question from Ranking Member Garcia on Donald Trump’s border policies, Mr. Bier stated that:  “Well, when we restrict legal immigration and asylum, we incentivize people to cross the border illegally.” Mr. Bier continued:  “It’s counterproductive. It’s a failed policy. It resulted in more evasions like I talked about. That’s a problem for security. We want Border Patrol to focus on serious threats, not people coming for safety and opportunity in this country.”    

Subcommittee Democrats condemned Republican rhetoric that dehumanizes migrants legally seeking asylum.

• Ranking Member Garcia highlighted that:  “The demonization of migrants and immigrants is wrong, and we can all agree that we are concerned about all crime committed by anyone.  We should focus on reducing that, but we should not be demonizing noncitizens as somehow, rapists or murderers or worse than because they actually do commit less crime.”
• Pointing out the cruelty of Republican rhetoric on immigration, Rep. Maxwell Frost said:  “Since the beginning of his campaign for President, Donald Trump in 2015 has been consistently propagating hateful, extremist rhetoric about immigrants, including falsehoods depicting all Mexican immigrants as criminals as drug dealers and as rapists.  At a campaign event just last month, Trump claimed that immigrants are poisoning the blood of this country.” 
• In response to a question from Ranking Member Garcia about the violent effects of Donald Trump’s dehumanizing rhetoric about immigrants, Mr. Bier noted that it is white nationalists perpetrating mass violence:  “If you look at the number of criminals who have engaged in mass shootings, you’re looking at the Pittsburgh shooter, El Paso, Buffalo, Charlottesville—you go down the list, and there are so many times where you hear this “Great Replacement” rhetoric being used to justify.” 

Subcommittee Democrats emphasized their commitment to work with the Biden-Harris Administration to enact humane, comprehensive solutions to fix our broken immigration system.  

• Rep. Stephen Lynch explained that “after months of negotiations, a bipartisan coalition in the U.S. Senate unveiled the National Security Supplemental that included a bipartisan border agreement proposing the most significant border security forms in nearly thirty years, and that was President Biden’s request.” 
• Mr. Bier testified that the Biden-Harris “Administration is trying to improve the situation ... It has opened a few legal pathways for entry, which, although limited, have reduced illegal crossings by hundreds of thousands.” 
• Rep. Dan Goldman highlighted the need to address the harmful effects of illegal gun trafficking:  “I urge my Republican colleagues, who do not discuss guns once in their seminal border security package, to join us in trying to actually solve the problem.  And to solve the problem, you need to stop the export of American-made guns to the drug cartels so that that will limit and eliminate their power.” 

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