House of Representatives passes President Donald Trump’s “big and beautiful bill”
The House has passed President Donald Trump’s “big, beautiful bill.” He is now moving to the Senate.
The Trump administration’s claims about “the safest border in history” include Senate Republicans asking why the DHS needs billions for border walls.
The Department of Homeland Security has called on Congress for $45.6 billion to pass the House and build hundreds of miles of fencing on the tropical border as part of a drastic tax and expenditure bill debated in the Senate.
“Borders are the safest borders we have in the history of the United States,” DHS Secretary Christa Noem told the Senate Homeland Security Committee on May 20.
President Donald Trump faces challenges as Republicans have a narrow majority and tries to push his policy agenda in the Senate, where GOP Senators work to balance their support for border security with concerns about rising national debt.
The House version of the Funds Bill is projected to add an estimated $3.8 trillion to national debt over the next decade.
Ron Johnson of R-Wisconsin said in the committee that DHS can build more than 3,000 miles of border fences, with an estimated $14 million per mile.
The US-Mexico border runs only 1,950 miles from California to Texas. The approximately 700 miles of border is already surrounded by fences.
“I’m asking you and the department to sharpen your pencils at the wall’s request,” he told Noem. “It’s more than you need.”
Noem proposed to the committee that the cost per mile is low, about $12 million per mile.
R-Kentucky Committee Chairman Rand Paul said that even if DHS wants to run through another 1,000 miles, it is unlikely in some parts due to the extremely steep and mountainous areas.
“We’re three or four times more here,” Paul told Noem, asking for more details. “You can’t throw another $30 billion and say, ‘It costs things.’ ”
During the first four months of the Trump administration, illegal border crossings plummeted, accelerating the decline that began in the final year of the Biden administration.
The US Border Patrol reported about 8,400 immigrant encounters at the Southern border in April, down from almost 129,000 encounters in the same month a year ago.
Noem said the funding is also heading towards border technology. So, one of the three surveillance cameras has stretches that are not currently working and not patrol.
“The truth is, there’s a part of this border and you don’t know what’s going to happen there,” she said.
