Speech #1100056973

I believe it is critical that. No. 1. we enforce and secure our borders. Second. that we make sure those folks who are knowingly hiring illegal aliens. that we prosecute them with every ounce of energy we have under the law. With respect to the enforcement of our borders and the securing of our borders. let me just mention a couple of things that this legislation requires us to do and to question whether that makes sense. whether that is sufficient. We have thousands of Border Patrol personnel arrayed on the Nations borders. from the Pacific coast. west coast. San Diego. all the way across to the gulf coast. a couplethousandmile border. The legislation that is before us today basically says we are going to double the number of Border Patrol personnel. They have to be better trained and better equipped. Today we are supplementing their numbers with the National Guard. And as an old Governor who once was commander in chief of our National Guard in Delaware. I am all for continuing to deploy those assets as well to secure our borders. to supplement our Border Patrol personnel. However. those Border Patrol personnel have to be better trained. They have to be better equipped. We have technology today that. frankly. we did not have 2. 3. 4. 5 years ago to deploy along the borders.