Reforming our Immigration System
Immigrants drive Arizona's economy forward. But we need a system that works better for everyone.
That starts with strong border security and passing meaningful immigration reform. As Chair of the New Democrat Coalition Immigration and Border Security Task Force, I released a new commonsense immigration framework to serve as a blueprint for addressing the root causes of migration and clearing our asylum backlog.
I also called on the Administration to take executive action when Arizona’s border communities were overburdened, and we’ve seen a 40% drop in encounters at the border since. To continue supporting law enforcement at the border, I’m leading legislation to improve U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s ability to hire, recruit, and retain agents and requiring the Department of Homeland Security to issue more detailed immigration reports to Congress.
More on Reforming our Immigration System
WASHINGTON – Border construction near Yuma will receive almost $1.3 billion of the $3.6 billion the Defense Department said it will divert from planned military projects under the national border emergency declared in February by President Donald Trump.
Among the 127 Pentagon projects scheduled to lose funding this year for Trump's border construction push is a planned ground transport equipment building at Fort Huachuca. The Army base near Sierra Vista will lose $30 million that was budgeted for that project in fiscal 2019.
U.S. Rep. Greg Stanton was in Yuma Thursday where he toured the Yuma Border Patrol migrant facility and met with area leaders to talk about the economy.
Congressman Stanton, whose district serves Maricopa County, met with U.S. Customs and Border Protection Officials in Yuma where he was given a tour of the temporary soft-sided tent facility housing migrants. It's the latest in several recent visits by elected officials at the local, state and federal levels. Reporters were not allowed to attend the tour.
More than 30 members of Congress on Thursday sent a letter to Acting U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Director Matthew Albence about the treatment of transgender detainees in their custody.
"We are gravely concerned regarding Immigration and Customs Enforcement's (ICE) policies for individuals seeking asylum in the United States," wrote the lawmakers. "Today, we write to express our strong concerns with ICE's treatment of transgender migrants seeking asylum in the United States, especially those coming to the U.S. from El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala."
WASHINGTON – A House panel grilled administration officials Thursday over migrant family separations and conditions at border detention facilities, but the hearing produced more partisan sparks than answers.
Both sides at the House Judiciary Committee hearing said the situation at the border has reached crisis levels – but they agreed on little else.
Republicans accused Democrats of holding just another in a series of hearings aimed at political gain and not at finding solutions.
WASHINGTON - A week ago, Arizona Congressman Greg Stanton toured an emergency child crisis center in Phoenix. It was his first look at a facility where the Border Patrol sends undocumented children five and younger to stay after they have been separated from their families.
PHOENIX - Congressman Greg Stanton spent an hour at an emergency child care facility in Phoenix Friday.
It's where at least a dozen children, ranging in age from infants to five years old, were taken after immigration authorities separated them from their families.
PHOENIX - With no fanfare, the Trump administration is quietly placing very young children with the Arizona Child Crisis Center. U.S. officials maintain the children arrived at the border unaccompanied, but immigration activists accuse immigration authorities of separating the children from family members.
Arizona's U.S. House delegation split along party lines Tuesday on a resolution condemning President Donald Trump for racist tweets Sunday about four minority Democratic congresswomen.
The anti-climactic result only hinted at a day of heightened partisan rancor in which members openly accused their opponents of being anti-American or of supporting racism.
This year there's been an uptick in migration from Central American countries, mostly Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador, to the United States. Processing the influx of people arriving at the U.S.-Mexico border is complicated. So how is Arizona, a border state, managing?