00:00Mr. President, there is a difference between a refugee that is fully vetted that America
00:05has welcomed historically and should continue to, and we will.
00:10We worked for decades to be able to honor refugees and to be able to do our part in
00:15what's happening around the world.
00:17That same standard for refugees where an individual is identified, their family is vetted, they
00:22go through a process both through the UN and through the United States to be able to identify
00:26how to be able to help that family.
00:29That same definition for a refugee is also used as a definition for asylee.
00:33It's the same definition, but there's a dramatic difference between the two.
00:39The refugee has been fully vetted.
00:42We know who they are.
00:43We know the situation.
00:44We know the crisis that their family has gone through, and our nation, like multiple other
00:48nations around the world, engages to see what we can do to be able to help that family in
00:53trauma.
00:54That's who we are as Americans.
00:55It's who we'll continue to be.
00:57The challenge is, when we have thousands of people cross our southern border requesting
01:03asylum, who we don't know who they are, who they are not vetted, that begin to take advantage
01:10of American generosity.
01:13And it becomes a challenge for us to be able to filter who really qualifies as a refugee
01:18asylee as they're crossing the border, and who's just taking advantage of our system.
01:24That's a challenge.
01:25It's been a challenge for us for years, but it's dramatically accelerated in the last
01:29three years.
01:31This year, we'll have two and a half million people that will cross our southern border.
01:35The vast majority of those will ask for asylum, and they'll be released into the United States
01:41awaiting a hearing, sometimes eight to ten years in advance, to be able to make their
01:45case that they qualify.
01:48In the meantime, we don't know who they are.
01:51They've not been vetted.
01:52We don't have background information for those individuals.
01:56Last week, the FBI picked up eight individuals with direct ties to ISIS that were in our
02:04country that, in the last two years, had crossed our southern border, had blended in with the
02:10rest of the folks who requested asylum, and then disappeared into our country.
02:16Thankfully, our FBI was able to pick up that these eight individuals were in Los Angeles,
02:21New York, and Philadelphia, preparing to be able to carry out acts of violence in our country.
02:27We're grateful for the work of the FBI to be able to do that, but why aren't we filtering
02:31these individuals at the border?
02:35We're not evaluating criminal history, even in the country they're coming from.
02:40How do I know that?
02:41I know that because I work with DHS, and I'm fully aware of what their process is.
02:46We fingerprint individuals, and we see if they are on the terror watch list, that is,
02:52we know them, we've been tracking them internationally, or if they're on the Interpol international
02:59criminal list.
03:00But if they're on a list in their own country, we don't know that.
03:08Last week, Victor Antonio Martinez was picked up in my state of Tulsa, Oklahoma, sitting
03:13in a sports bar in Tulsa, where he had left out from Maryland after murdering Rachel Marin,
03:25a mother of five.
03:28Now he had fled to Maryland because he'd carried out acts of violence in Los Angeles, in a
03:33violent home invasion in Los Angeles.
03:36So he carried out an act of violence in Los Angeles, went to Maryland, murdered a mom
03:42there, then was headed to Tulsa.
03:45What do you think was about to happen in Tulsa?
03:46Oh, by the way, did I mention?
03:49He fled from El Salvador because he'd murdered someone in El Salvador.
03:53So he fled El Salvador, came to our southern border, requested asylum, came into the United
03:59States, attacked a family in Los Angeles, murdered a mom in Maryland, and then was arrested
04:04in my state of Tulsa.
04:07Please don't tell my folks in Tulsa.
04:10There's nothing to worry about on illegal immigration.
04:12This is all going fine at the border.
04:16We don't believe it.
04:19Because a violent multi-person murderer was on a national crime spree, and my state was
04:25next before he was picked up and arrested.
04:29Now extradited back to Maryland for the crime there.
04:34In New York earlier this year, Raul Castro Mata from Venezuela shot at two New York police
04:41officers.
04:43He's one of those folks from Venezuela that had come across asking for asylum.
04:48Earlier this month in Texas, an illegal immigrant was arrested when he'd broken into a private
04:53business and had committed a pretty large robbery there.
04:57In Florida, a SWAT team got into a shootout with an illegal alien who had killed a police
05:02officer just a few months ago.
05:05A Washington State illegal alien from Mexico was driving.
05:14He killed a Washington State police officer.
05:16The car was going 107 miles an hour.
05:19He was under the influence of marijuana at the time.
05:22Listen, I'm fully aware that not everyone that crosses the border is going to carry
05:26out acts of criminal activity.
05:28I'm fully aware of that.
05:33All I'm doing is asking a simple question.
05:36Are we checking criminal history at the border for the thousands of people that are coming
05:40across the border?
05:42And the answer is no.
05:44For the eight people that were picked up last week that were ISIS terrorist connected, those
05:52eight are individuals that were listed as special interest aliens.
05:57They are eight of the 53,000 special interest aliens that have entered our country this
06:04year across the southern border.
06:06Oh, and if you think that number is big, last year the number was 70,000 special interest
06:12aliens were released into our country last year.
06:16These are individuals that this DHS has declared at the border a potential national security
06:22risk.
06:25Yet instead of detaining them, the vast majority of them have been released on their own recognizance
06:30around the country somewhere.
06:34This body knows full well I'm willing to work with anyone on either side of the aisle to
06:39be able to solve this issue.
06:42Between now and the election, we're going to have another million and a half people
06:45illegally cross into our country.
06:47Between now and the end of the year.
06:50We've had 10 million people illegally cross in the last three and a half years.
06:56Ten million.
06:58If we don't stop this, every day we have folks that are coming in to find work, to connect
07:03with families, and folks that are also coming in to commit criminal acts.
07:09They're not fleeing from poverty, they're fleeing from the law in their own country.
07:16And they're carrying out acts of violence in ours.
07:19And when we can't tell the difference between the two, why are we defaulting to open rather
07:24than defaulting to close?
07:27Why are we literally telling the people in my state, that guy sitting next to you at
07:31the sports bar, we didn't know if he was a criminal or not, so we just let him in.
07:37We didn't know if he'd committed murder in his own country, so we just let him in.
07:43Why are we doing that?
07:45Why is that happening today on our southern border?
07:49And what are we going to do to stop it?
07:54I'm going to continue to come to this floor to bring this up, because it's not getting better.
07:59The executive action the President took two weeks ago to declare they're going to put
08:03new limits in place, everybody here should check the facts on it.
08:07We have the same number of crossings yesterday that we had four weeks ago before that executive
08:12action went into place.
08:14That executive action hasn't changed the numbers.
08:18What has changed is the way they're counting the numbers.
08:21They're now not including in the count the people who come to a port of entry who are
08:26not legally present.
08:28They're now not being included, so the numbers look smaller, but look at the asterisk in
08:33the fine print of who's now no longer being counted in the publicly released numbers.
08:39The numbers haven't changed, the way they're publishing the numbers have changed.
08:44And then this week, the President announced a new amnesty program for folks here in the
08:48country.
08:50That is now his 95th executive action announcing to the world that if you get across our border,
08:58you can stay.
09:01It's inviting people to be able to come into our country illegally.
09:06That's the wrong message to the world, and it's a message that we need to address.
09:13And we shouldn't just wait around until it gets better on its own.
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