Chip Roy, the author of some of the best legislation to deal with the border crisis, joins Firebrand to discuss the situation on the ground in Yuma, Arizona, where the House Judiciary Committee held a field hearing on the situation.
00:00:30.000We're in the right place. This is the movement for you.
00:00:33.180You ever watch this guy on television? It's like a machine. Matt Gaetz.
00:00:38.000I'm a canceled man in some corners of the internet. Many days I'm a marked man in Congress, a wanted man by the deep state.
00:00:45.940They aren't really coming for me. They're coming for you. I'm just in the way.
00:00:50.980Welcome back to Firebrand. We are broadcasting live out of room 2021 of the Rayburn House Office Building here in Washington, D.C., our nation's capital.
00:01:03.940And today's episode is going to bring you behind the scenes into the negotiations and the specific policy prescriptions for this border crisis.
00:01:13.840And we know we're going to get no help from the Democrats at all.
00:01:17.160So it's critical to know what the leading Republicans are thinking, where the pushback is coming from, what we think we can do, where we see poison pills and red lines.
00:01:27.260Chip Roy, the author of some of the best legislation to deal with the border crisis, joins Firebrand.
00:01:34.960We're going to have a great discussion for you. And we have got folks tuning in from everywhere.
00:01:39.440Just during our preview, folks checked in from Texas, Alaska, a lot of people from Ohio, Missouri, had some New Yorkers, Pennsylvania, a Californian, Oklahoma, Tennessee, and of course, the best state in the country, the Sunshine State, my home state of Florida.
00:01:58.600So last week, I left Florida, went to Yuma, Arizona, where the House Judiciary Committee held a field hearing on the condition of the border.
00:02:07.340And Americans living on the border are tired of being neglected.
00:02:12.960They want their voices heard. And before the hearing, we had this opportunity to get a grasp of the situation on the ground, seeing how services were stretched, how people were treated.
00:02:25.000And we visited the border itself, a hospital, a food bank.
00:02:28.900And believe me, what I discovered will absolutely shock you, or even will it anymore, with how much we've seen our border turned into a turnstile.
00:02:39.120Millions of people here without permission or process.
00:02:43.280When we went, the first thing we did when I landed in Yuma was tour the regional hospital.
00:02:48.060Now, you've heard Democrats talk about hospital access and health care and a whole lot of elections, but they don't seem to mind when the hospitals are overrun by illegals in communities on the front line of this crisis.
00:03:01.780And that's exactly what was going on in Yuma, Arizona.
00:03:06.280Newborn babies are not getting the care that they need to stay alive because illegal immigrants are clogging up the hospital.
00:03:14.340These illegals are coming in sick with some diseases that we didn't even know existed in the United States anymore.
00:03:21.560And they're speaking so many different languages.
00:03:26.120It's like the United Nations down there.
00:03:27.920And the hospital has to divert time from patients to go find translators for every language under the sun, from Russian to Cyrillic to Mandarin, you name it.
00:03:40.6201,900 migrants were treated during the last surge.
00:03:46.560And many of them were admitted due to pregnancy.
00:03:51.000These illegals are coming in pregnant, oftentimes so that they can have anchor babies and take advantage of our entitlement systems.
00:03:59.900In fact, the Mexican illegals in particular like to cross the border, have their babies in America, then go back and live in Mexico where it's cheaper, all the while sending their kids to our schools, collecting our welfare, utilizing all of the privileges that we ought to preciously hold for Americans.
00:04:27.820They actually go have their mamacitas, have the next generation of cartel talent born in our country.
00:04:34.120And some of these kids, these students, these minors that are going from Mexico to the United States are carrying and smuggling fentanyl because they know if they have not reached the age of majority, there will be a different penalty structure.
00:04:48.840So they bake that into their business plan.
00:05:11.540And we ought to protect and care about our birthright so much that we don't just hand it out willy-nilly.
00:05:18.900Americans continue to see our citizenship that is precious diluted.
00:05:25.820And this happens as our services are strained.
00:05:29.300The hospital beds that these illegals are taking are forcing American mothers to either wait to give birth in cases where you have a scheduled inducement
00:05:52.000Now, the hospital we visited doesn't have enough neonatal intensive care unit beds to support all of the illegal alien babies and the babies who are there as a consequence of the citizens.
00:06:44.720So just imagine the fear and the wave of emotion that parents have to go through when they're traveling 170 miles away to a NICU bed in Phoenix.
00:06:56.340I cannot imagine putting people in such a vulnerable situation in life itself in a worse position.
00:07:04.480So watch this clip from our field hearing where we discuss the NICU situation with the president of the Yuma Regional Medical Center, Dr. Robert Trenchell-Ticolison.
00:07:17.840Now, Dr. Trenchell, about one in four of the migrants who use birthing services at your hospital need neonatal intensive care unit services.
00:09:05.640They're not part of the cost structure or the finance structure.
00:09:08.900They just bring illegal aliens to the hospital, dump them off there.
00:09:13.060The hospital staff told me that they're having to take extra shifts because they are so overwhelmed by this phenomenon.
00:09:19.100And part of the reason they're so overburdened is because they aren't allowed to discharge illegal alien patients when there's follow-up care or outpatient care needed.
00:09:30.380That's because we don't know where the migrants will show up next.
00:11:01.100Next, we visited a food bank and we met with the chairwoman of the food bank and local farmers that were generous enough to donate their extra crop to this non-profit out of community service and duty and obligation.
00:11:14.500The chairwoman of this food bank started off telling us how ungrateful so many of the migrants are.
00:11:20.580Apparently, the migrants are picky about the type of food they want to eat and how much they get.
00:11:25.360Unsurprisingly, oftentimes, we were told that it's the Haitians who are the worst offenders again.
00:11:34.240Everywhere they go, we seem to hear similar complaints.
00:11:39.880Meanwhile, as if dealing with this mess wasn't enough for the food bank, they're understaffed.
00:11:44.360And I kept thinking an obvious good solution here would be to have work requirements.
00:11:49.620If people are able to provide something to contribute or help, that they should get the benefit of that holistic engagement with the food bank.
00:12:01.520I think, federally, if you want other people to pay for your Medicaid or your SNAP or your food stamps or whatever, there should be work requirements for able-bodied adults.
00:12:13.680Not the sick, not the infirm, not senior citizens.
00:12:17.120But, like, able-bodied adults who want help from others that are able to volunteer at a food bank, like the one I went to in Yuma, Arizona, should do so.
00:12:37.080The poor farmers we met with, oh, my gosh.
00:12:40.580They tell me that they have to destroy massive amounts of crop every season because illegal aliens tread through their fields and defecate everywhere.
00:12:51.860When even so much as a human footprint is found, these farmers have to destroy all the crops in a five-foot radius.
00:13:01.200They put up no trespassing signs, but, of course, that doesn't stop illegal immigration.
00:13:06.300The people across the border illegally don't have much respect for private property rights.
00:13:12.600The Biden administration and Secretary Mayorkas need to step up and protect our farmers and our food supply and the safety of what we're eating.
00:13:20.240Chances are, if you're eating a green leafy vegetable that grows during the winter months, you're probably eating something farmed around our southern border.
00:26:46.420We could say, for example, we're going to shut down, you know, traffic coming across I-35 in Texas or the gas lines or whatever you want to do and get Mexico to the table.
00:27:01.140I'm sitting sick and tired of Americans dying from fentanyl and little girls and little kids getting sold into the sex trafficking and human trafficking trade because we refuse to do our job.
00:27:09.820Do you think that the detain or turn away policy gets communicated internally with the cartels and the human trafficking networks?
00:27:19.660Of course, because here's the thing, and the human beings involved, who's going to want to pay $5,000 or $10,000 to a cartel to be transported up to the border to then be told, sorry, you can't come in and claim asylum and get released.
00:27:34.560They're, in fact, going to go through the whole effort of processing it.
00:27:38.060We just got data that for fiscal year 22, when they looked at all the reports, that it was about 10% of the total that had any kind of an asylum claim that would allow them to come in.
00:27:49.380And that's probably a pretty liberal interpretation of it, to be honest.
00:27:53.480But at the end of the day, there are people who deserve it.
00:27:55.860For example, I was in South Florida, and I got picked up in an Uber.
00:29:21.880It doesn't change the existing laws whatsoever with respect to someone being able to come to this country and claim asylum.
00:29:27.960What it does is simply says you cannot be released into the United States until and unless we adjudicate your claim for asylum to make sure it's real.
00:29:37.580So right now, if someone – the people who show up tonight at Eagle Pass and come across,
00:29:43.040they'll all say we're here for our official protection.
00:29:45.560And when you're under the Roy doctrine, we'd say, okay, very well.
00:29:51.020So you go wait to – in Mexico or some other safe third country for that assessment to be made.
00:29:57.320Or until we have the judges lined up, if that's in three months or six months, we'll pull you in and we'll then make your claim and process it.
00:30:04.400But look, what would – here's the truth, though.
00:30:06.760The numbers would drop precipitously so that the people who have legitimate claims would still be able to come here and find a bed.
00:30:14.040Yeah, in a lot of ways, the people with legitimate asylum claims are the victims of an overflooded system where they can never get that adjudication because you've got people who –
00:30:36.140And, by the way, by doing what we're doing, we're weakening our fellow neighbors in Central America and South America and the Western Hemisphere.
00:30:44.220We should be exporting the rule of law, having a strong world in the Western Hemisphere.
00:30:48.360That would push back on China without having to have endless wars abroad in the name of who knows what.
00:30:53.400And we should have a strong border for our betterment and their betterment and migrants' betterment.
00:30:57.960This is – frankly, it's much ado about nothing.
00:31:00.340But people are trying to wrongly claim things about this bill that are scaring people away and it's intentional.
00:31:07.700So let's talk about the Republican strategy on this because I would put up your bill and I would be willing to allow it to fail even if we didn't have the votes.
00:31:17.100Today we probably don't, to be honest.
00:31:18.860We probably do not have the votes to pass your bill.
00:31:20.840But I would like the American people to see who is willing to vote for detain or turn away where the objections are and then let's suss those out.
00:31:28.700And you know what? If we have to come back in a few weeks or a few months and attempt another bill, then we'll have to do that.
00:31:37.240Well, I'm still hopeful that it could happen.
00:31:40.160But I think it's because in this town, everybody's always looking to figure out how they can get the perfect scenario.
00:31:46.240And we only want to put forward things that everybody can vote for because it might hurt them in an election rather than saying, look, we just want to advance good policy.
00:31:53.820You're going to have to either decide if you're with it or not.
00:31:56.200And sometimes you've got to take tough votes.
00:31:58.060I voted against a measure today on the floor that I generally supported the structure for, but I didn't think it went far enough.
00:32:05.060It exempted the ability for us to get reports about how inflation is caused by national security or emergency-related spending.
00:32:13.240I don't like our defense guys and others to be able to hide behind those important things to spend money we don't have.
00:32:19.900Sometimes you've got to take tough votes in order to get change.
00:32:22.280Yeah, I even think the money we're sending to Ukraine is inflationary because that cash makes its way back into U.S. real estate markets through corrupt bank accounts in Switzerland and Dubai.
00:32:33.620It's also like our friend Thomas Massey would say.
00:32:35.480It's like every time you're printing money, which is where that money is coming from, we're printing it.
00:32:40.040Then you're actually diluting the value of our dollars, which is effectively a tax.
00:32:43.160You can buy fewer goods and services because of it.
00:32:45.080What border bill do you think this Republican team could pass?
00:32:49.060Because I'm starting to worry that the only border security bill that would have 218 votes today would just be legislation to increase the efficiency of processing people into our country.
00:33:01.020Yeah, so that's the real problem, right?
00:33:02.460So we'll watch and see what happens, what comes out of the Homeland Security Committee, even if it's in good faith.
00:33:06.940To say, well, we need some more dollars and some more vehicles and some more technology and more spending for more Border Patrol agents and may be able to give them, you know, retention bonuses.
00:33:15.560I can support some of those policies, but only if it's in conjunction with the policies that you need to provide Border Patrol to actually do their job.
00:33:24.600Because otherwise what you're paying for is more processing.
00:33:50.920And look, it's one of those things where right now people don't understand we're using a power of parole to release people into the United States,
00:33:58.840which literally says in the statute, case-by-case basis for special circumstances, something to those words.
00:34:06.360And this administration is just using parole to bring in blocks of people directly contrary to law.
00:34:12.080And then we're releasing people at the border directly contrary to law.
00:34:16.180Our bill is designed to try to force us to actually adhere to the law.
00:34:23.800Yeah, it takes three options down to two.
00:34:26.160So one of the other arguments Republican colleagues make is we have to take whatever the, you know, border hawk, Chip Roy theory of the case is,
00:34:34.320and we have to lash that to some feature of amnesty.
00:34:37.800Maybe DACA, maybe some work permit pathway to citizenship for people that have been doing that for a while.
00:34:47.380What is your assessment of how much amnesty can be traded for how much border security?
00:34:52.680So remember, and I just think it's important for your listeners to remember, and you were here and I wasn't.
00:34:57.420I was campaigning for my first time to come into office.
00:35:00.960In the summer of 2018, they had the famous debate over the Goodlatte bill in July.
00:35:05.660Most Americans wouldn't know it that way, but we just had a fight over border security and immigration.
00:35:10.300Little known to most people is that almost every Republican, including Freedom Caucus members and conservatives, voted for an amnesty.
00:35:18.080They actually voted for it, 800,000 for DACA recipients, the kids, almost a million, as part of a package to try to improve our immigration system,
00:35:27.440end chain migration, end the diversity visas, fix it so it's skilled labor, and have an actual border security solution,
00:35:33.420which would have prevented a lot of what we're seeing now.
00:35:35.500But it fell short because the Republican leadership at the time, fully in the hip pocket of the Chamber of Commerce, wanted something a lot softer.
00:35:42.720And so the idea that we get attacked often and saying, you guys are just closed-minded, you'll never compromise, not true.
00:35:49.380We literally compromised that summer for an amnesty for a million people.
00:35:54.760Look, this time, we are not going to start with amnesty.
00:35:59.400So DACA is a poison pill to any border security bill.
00:36:02.520We should not go down that road until we secure the border of the United States.
00:36:06.060Ronald Reagan in 1986, he says, one of his biggest mistakes, which was cutting a deal for a future promise of security for an amnesty then.
00:36:13.980We are not going to go down that road.