Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has expressed gratitude to President Joe Biden for acknowledging the department's significant role in maintaining national security during his State of the Union speech.
"Tonight, President Biden recognized the incredible work the men and women of the Department of Homeland Security do every day, often at great personal risk, to help keep the American people safe and secure," Mayorkas said. "We have made historic efforts to seize more fentanyl and bring more smugglers to justice than ever before. To further those efforts and save more lives, this administration worked across party lines to negotiate the strongest border security bill in decades."
In a DHS news release, Mayorkas urged Congress to act on a bipartisan bill aimed at strengthening the southwest border with Mexico.
"I join President Biden and urge Congress to bring this bill to a vote," he stated. "Only Congress can address our desperate need to hire more Border Patrol agents and officers and equip them with state-of-the-art security technology. Only Congress can provide the funds necessary to hire more asylum officers and immigration judges, charter more removal flights and build more facilities."
During his address to Congress and the American people, President Biden discussed a range of topics including abortion, Jan. 6, Russian President Vladimir Putin, NATO, Ukraine, the Israel-Hamas conflict, and securing America’s borders.
Addressing the stalled progress on a bill intended to enhance border security, Biden stated: "That bipartisan deal would hire 1,500 more border security agents and officers, 100 more immigration judges to help tackle a backlog of 2 million cases. More asylum officers and new policies so they can resolve cases in six months instead of six years and 100 more high-tech drug detection machines to significantly increase the ability to screen and stop vehicles from smuggling fentanyl into America. This bill would save lives and bring order to the border. It would also give me as President new emergency authority to temporarily shut down the border when the number of migrants at the border is overwhelming. The Border Patrol Union endorsed the bill. The Chamber of Commerce endorsed the bill. I believe that given the opportunity a majority of the House and Senate would endorse it as well. But unfortunately, politics have derailed it so far."
