Senate Floor Speech
Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison
April 26, 2006 -- Page: S3538

EMERGENCY SUPPLEMENTAL APPROPRIATIONS FOR THE FISCAL YEAR ENDING SEPTEMBER 30, 2006

MRS. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, I rise to speak in favor of Senator Gregg's amendment. I appreciate the job Senator Gregg has done in his position as chairman of the Appropriations Subcommittee on Homeland Security, which has done so much to try to beef up our borders. Senator Gregg has been a leading proponent of strengthening control of our borders with Mexico and Canada.

I think this amendment is a very positive and productive one, adding $1.9 billion to homeland security and trying to do the things that would make access through our borders more secure. The US-VISIT Program, which sometimes stifles legitimate commerce on our borders will be provided $60 million. This will be used to integrate the biometric databases so they will work better and we will know who is in our country and to allow people who are legitimately in our country to be able to go back and forth. It adds funds for Customs and border protection. It adds money for construction of new stations, checkpoints and tactical infrastructure, Immigration and Customs enforcement.

I think this is an issue everyone in America is absolutely behind. We want to have control of our borders. I have had meetings with Hispanic-American leaders, and I have had meetings with small business people who are on the border, as well as throughout our country. Everyone believes that as a sovereign Nation and for the security of our country, we need to control our borders. We had 160,000 other-than-Mexican illegal aliens entering our country from all over the world last year through the Mexican border. This is unacceptable for a sovereign country not to know who is in our country, particularly when al-Qaida puts out the word that if you want to penetrate America, go through the southern border.

It is not good for Mexico. Mexico knows there are people coming through their southern border, all the way through Mexico, sometimes as a criminal element, and they are doing so to get to the United States.

So it is very important that we pass the Gregg amendment. What is different about the Gregg amendment from the Reid amendment is that it is offset, it is an agreed-to offset, with a reduction in spending in other parts of the bill, in order to pay for this effort to secure our borders, and strengthen our national security.

I think it is so important that we are focusing on the Coast Guard to upgrade their patrol aircraft, their ships, and their patrol boats. The whole Gulf of Mexico is a very vulnerable area, and we need to secure the coast, as well as the land border areas.

I urge my colleagues to vote for the fully offset Gregg amendment that will beef up our border security at a time when we all know this is a first priority.