House Democrats proposed a new spending bill that would cut funding to immigration enforcement agencies and rescind funds allocated to the border wall.
The bill, which makes appropriations for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), allocates $14.1 billion in net funding to Customs and Border Protection (CBP), $927 million less than the previous year’s budget, according to a press release from the House Committee on Appropriations. The bill also rescinds $2.1 billion in funds from last year intended to go towards the border wall, and provides Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) with $1.55 million less than the previous fiscal year.
Both CBP and ICE funding totals are below what the Biden administration had requested. The bill also provides no additional funding for Border Patrol agents.
“At a time when there is an out-of-control situation at our border, we need to support our border enforcement officers, not defund them,” House Minority Leader Rep. Kevin McCarthy told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “House Democrats are now applying their socialist ideology to defund the police to the border by advancing legislation to defund our border and immigration enforcement.”
The budget cuts come during an influx of illegal immigration to the U.S., with border encounters reaching a two-decade high in May, according to CBP data.
Young migrants wait for processing inside the Donna Department of Homeland Security holding facility. (Photo by DARIO LOPEZ-MILLS/POOL/AFP via Getty Images)
Republican lawmakers have criticized the Biden administration’s response to the border crisis, pointing to its inaction. (RELATED: ‘Nobody Has Done More To Enrich Organized Crime’: Border Patrol Union President Criticizes Biden On Border Security)
“Despite the urgent need to secure our border, the crisis has been ignored by the Biden administration and Democrats in Congress,” McCarthy said.
The measure includes funding for migrant processing and detention, with $170 million allocated for construction of “integrated migrant processing centers” and $23 million for migrant processing improvements and child care.
“I continue to have serious concerns regarding the physical and mental wellbeing of individuals, particularly children, at border facilities,” Appropriations Committee Chair Rosa DeLauro said in a statement. “We must do more to protect immigrants, especially children and their families.”
The bill also increases funding for the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, adding almost $400 million from the previous year.
“As recent events like the Colonial Pipeline hack have demonstrated, it is obvious that we must do more to secure our nation’s cyber infrastructure,” DeLauro said. “That’s why this bill’s investments in preventing cyber attacks and rooting out cyber intrusions are so critical.”
The bill is set to be debated in the House Appropriations Committee on Wednesday.
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