WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Claire McCaskill, the top-ranking Democrat on the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, will launch a multi-day visit to the U.S.-Mexico border over the upcoming Congressional recess, ahead of possible Congressional action this year on border security.
McCaskill’s trip will include aerial, nautical, and walking tours of the border in addition to nighttime border observation. Staff of the U.S. Border Patrol and other officials will brief McCaskill on border security and operations.
“Getting border security right is a critical and complex task for keeping our nation secure,” McCaskill said. “I’m looking forward to hearing directly from the folks on the ground who work on this every day, and seeing firsthand the challenges and successes they see during efforts to secure our border.”
McCaskill is a longtime advocate for strengthening border security. Her efforts in 2010 led to the placement of 1,000 new border patrol agents, new unmanned aerial vehicles, improved communication equipment and more to monitor the border without adding to the deficit. In 2012, her bipartisan bill to combat illegal underground border tunnels—cosponsored by Republican Senator John McCain of Arizona—passed unanimously in the Senate and was signed into law.
And bipartisan, comprehensive legislation to address the country’s broken system in 2013 that McCaskill supported passed the Senate with the support of conservative Republican Senators including Marco Rubio of Florida, John McCain and Jeff Flake of Arizona, and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina. The bill was strongly supported by groups including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the Missouri Farm Bureau. The bill’s border security provisions would have added 20,000 enforcement agents to the U.S.-Mexico border, while financing the construction of 700 miles of border fence and aerial drones to monitor the border. Republican Senator Bob Corker of Tennessee, who helped draft the border security provisions and who supported the overall bill, described the measures as “almost overkill.”
Visit mccaskill.senate.gov/immigration to learn more about McCaskill’s views on fixing America’s broken immigration system.
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