18 House members, including Congressmen Boustany and Abraham of Louisiana, have signed a letter of support to the Speaker of the House, John Boehner, regarding H.R. 399, the Secure Our Borders First Act, introduced by House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Michael McCaul (R-TX). The bill will beef up security on the southern border, and provide the opportunity for states to be reimbursed when utilizing the National Guard to conduct border security missions.
The letter states:
We write to request that you bring legislation to the House floor to enhance our nation’s border security. One of our primary responsibilities as Members of Congress is ensuring that our country is protected. Alarmingly, our southern border continues to be exploited for myriad illegal activities.
The southern border continues to be used by transnational criminal organizations to smuggle drugs, money, and weapons into our country increasing violence on both sides of the border. Additionally, we are concerned that without proper security, human trafficking along the border and the victimization of vulnerable individuals will continue unabated.
We applaud Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officers and agents for taking on the often dangerous work of defending our nation’s border. But we must continue to support their efforts by ensuring that CBP has access to the resources, infrastructure and technology agents and officers need as well as clear, constitutionally sound policies to follow while performing their jobs.
We believe Americans deserve to hear a full and vigorous debate on how best to achieve border security and ultimately to see Congress act on the issue to demonstrate our commitment to the CBP officers and agents working to secure our border every day.
Our national security and public safety is at stake, and we cannot afford to continue ignoring these issues. We urge you to work with the committees of relevant jurisdiction to allow the House of Representatives to vote on a bill that will take immediate steps toward achieving operational security of our southern border.
A signed copy of the letter is attached.
