Sen. Cornyn Statement On President’s Immigration Speech

I issued the following statement in advance of President Obama’s immigration speech that will be today in El Paso: 

We aren’t sure what the President plans to say today, but it’s highly unlikely he’ll mention a recent GAO report that found only 44 percent of our southern border is secure. He probably won’t echo his Director of National Intelligence who said the border poses a direct threat to our national security. And I don’t expect him to bring up Secretary Clinton’s comparison of the situation in Mexico to the insurgency in Colombia in the 90s.

It’s disappointing that the only time border security and immigration reform get President Obama’s attention is when he is campaigning. The bottom line is that nothing President Obama says, or where he says it, can change the fact that he failed to deliver on his promise to make immigration reform a priority during his first year in office.

Background:
I have introduced legislation that would put more boots on the ground, upgrade our outdated ports of entry, crack down on smuggling, and provide our border law enforcement with the resources they desperately need.

• $2 Billion Border Security Amendment: In 2010, I introduced a deficit-neutral border security amendment to the supplemental appropriations bill that would have provided much-needed resources for federal, state, and local law enforcement officers who work along the U.S.-Mexico border. The amendment would have dedicated $2 billion to priorities in six key areas: border security and technology, state and local law enforcement, southwest border taskforces, border enforcement personnel, detention and removal activities, and ports of entry.
• Ports of Entry Legislation: I introduced the Emergency Port of Entry Personnel and Infrastructure Funding Act of 2009 (S. 2767) in November 2009. Texas Border Coalition endorsed the bill, which would have made significant infrastructure updates to our ports of entry to boost security and efficiency in trade and traffic.