Congressman henry cuellar. It is from laredo. He has been serving in congress is 2004. One of the reasons im excited to have him here today is that he is an appropriate her. Which is inside washington jargon for he helps decide how we spend our money. If there was anything that i was told in the aftermath of hurricane harvey, the five most important members of congress are john cornyn, listener majority whip and the bright appropriators. This is a bipartisan effort. He is a democrat so he will lead the efforts by the state of texas to get as much money for harvey as possible. And to my left is a man from louisville elected 2002. He is the most important texan from congress on healthcare issue. I was asked if he was the quarterback of the effort for healthcare reform and he said im the water boy. He is very important in this issue. I can tell you both, follow these guys around the capital, annoy them, i asked them questions and i very much believe in their issues. They work hard and im honored to have them here talking to us about their life and congress. [applause] im going to start this off with a very sad anecdote about my life as a reporter in washington. The flow, the energy, everything in washington changed at 12 pm january 20, 2017 when donald trump was elected or inaugurated as president. From then on, weekends, nights, early mornings, you never knew what ms. Was going to come and that kept me on my toes. And at the peak of the healthcare debate in february, i ended up resorting to using my wineglasses to drink coffee because i didnt even have time to wash my dishes. And that is sort of the emblematic thing i washington. So i wanted each member to kind of, starting to talk about things change how you addressed it, are you tired . Are you excited . How do you feel about this numerically. Thank you so much abby. To my good friend michael, we call him the dr. Because he is an md that is very good at healthcare. Every time there is a new president , theres always a new rhythm. You have a new congress, a new president and it sets a rhythm and how we do our work. You have president george bush that was a certain rhythm, you have president obama, a certain rhythm. But then when President Trump got elected, it was very different. Definitely very different. Simply because a lot of the traditional norms that we had were just changed. I mean how may presidency have that are tweeting, able to send out a tweet and basically have the media, members of congress and other folks follow what he does . So it changes at a faster pace because it is not the same type of city work under what i call a traditional republican administration. The democratic administration. It is very different. In many ways it is faster and ive talked to reporters and members of congress, it is a faster pace because what he does with his thumbs. But nevertheless, in congress in many ways, most of the issues that we are working on, let, i said in the appropriations is very bipartisan committee. In fact, if we had our way, if all the decisions were made by the appropriators i think we wouldnt go into a lot of the drama that week currently see right now that we have a budget, we have a continuing resolution and a shutdown. A lot of what happened on one level, you have the president ial current. Congress in many ways, in many ways, not all. But in the committee it is the same type of work we are doing but unfortunately, certain items come in. The president wants a wall, the republican majority is in many ways following him on that or certain things but in many ways, it is a rhythm that we had not seen before. Doctor Michael Burgess what do you think . When i came in, it was right after the Midterm Election in 2002. The Bush Administration was already there and established. They had gone through their transition. I did see when president obama came in, the transition meant things were different for us. But henry is correct. There is a certain rhythm to the congressional year and after you pick up on it some things become traditional. You will have swearing in or if it is not an election year, First Congress of the year that convenes, the state of the union is given and the president lays out the priorities shortly after that and the president budget is produced. The house produces a budget and it produces a budget allegedly these guys get to work on appropriations which we do through the summer months. Then by september 30 it is all wrapped up and the balance of the year we clean up on items that did not get done. Now, that is in theory. It has really been several years that we have talked about President Trump being a destructor but for the first time in the first year of the new administration of President Trump, the congress, the house have passed all 12 Appropriations Bills since before the end of the fiscal year. Has that happens is 2006 or 2007. So it has been, even though he is a disruptor and things are different under his watch, actually the house got us worked on. The senate is still lagging behind as they typically do. It is hard to vote for an appropriations bill because it usually spends too much money are not enough. So there usually tends to be a no vote but i am hopeful with the house setting the standard or resetting the standard in the age of donald trump, the senate is now going to understand that if we are going to do peoples business we are to correctly spend the peoples money that allows the appropriators to go through their, you went through how many subcommittee hearings . And then we did it, the rules committee, the house floor, we went late through the night. That is what it is supposed to be and that is how the thomas spent. A lot of criticism. I have been in authorizing henry is an appropriate her. The difference between the two just so you know, i tried to take at least one trip every term to the National Institute of health. It is a big beautiful building and they are all named for appropriators. I have never been in a building that is named for an authorizer. So i kept the difference. We do the work, we do the tough stuff, we do the hearing and decide what needs to be done and that henry comes in and writes a check at the last minute and gets all of the credit. [laughter] on the appropriators this is sort of the topic. I used to cover West Virginia politics for the senate is now deceased from there he was like the most powerful appropriate ever. Robert byrd. Everywhere you go theres a robert byrd bridge, tunnel, building. There is no underestimation of that power. Doctor Michael Burgess, at the beginning of this administration and continuing on, a lot of particularly republicans have avoided town hall. You did it off the bat. You go on msnbc and you do not back down from a conservative principles. By using three fearless when is facing dumb people challenging and there are not very many members of congress that are comfortable doing that. Give me your mindset of that. It is part of our obligation to our constituents and town halls are just one of the ways that we have of communicating with constituents. It is one ive always found interesting and, not always helpful, certainly educational. The year that i voted for the debt limit in 2011 it was really hard doing town halls that august. People were very angry, people on the right were very angry, you give president obama everything he wanted and you didnt get anything for it. It turns out we got the sequester and now we actually were able to bend the spending curve or hold the line on spending a little bit. I look back at that boat and say maybe it wasnt all that bad. But it doesnt matter what the issue is. If you put and knows that youre doing a general town hall and people get it and they say, look, the congressman is doing a ton multibut what do you say we go down there . And you say no i dont need to go. But if you are mad then you are there and you line up at the microphone early. So that is typically what i hear. Whether it be on the right or the left. And it is just the time that i have been in office, it has been something that it is part of the congressional year. We do have an obligation i think to hear from our folks. I will say this, this august the town halls i dont ever require that there be Police Department there. But we always tell the communities what we are doing. We will be in your community or high school this weekend. We are doing a town hall. Maybe it is because of the shooting at the baseball practice, the Police Presence of the left to town halls i did, i have never seen anything quite like it. Normally you have maybe one or two uniformed officers standing at the back of the room and that is enough and sufficient for people to be polite. Right after Gabriel Giffords was injured in front of a lowpower congressional event in a parking lot. I had one of the Police Department asked if they could set a magnetometer up as people came in. And i said no, you really cant ask people to go through that. And they were good. They backed off. But this summer, the number of Law Enforcement there, the it has become hard for me to go on interactive constituents. That is something about that about. But in midjune i was reporting on the senate as i could i turned to a reporter friend and i said, something is in the air and its bad. I dont feel good being here. Two days later, i play on a woman Softball Team and his reporters versus female members of congress. The day before i sent to the fema practice to scout them. And i am at my own practice the next day and carl holds famous congressional reporter says that practice is over there has been a shooting. And i going to the dugout and when my friend says thats aeschylus has been shot, its Steve Scalise had been shot and it was bad. So all i could think about was what if they had gone for the women yesterday . There is no dugout in the female practice facility to dive into like at the mens. Kevin brady who was at the practice pointed out to me that if the pictures that they had not been given the day off to rest before the game, they would have been trapped in the bullpen right by the shooter. This is an unreal story. I did not into politics to cover this kind of thing. Im supposed to cover the best of america. Are yall afraid for your safety . Certainly there is a new sense of lack of stability out there. No ifs and no butts. In so many ways, people and im talking about not only constituents but even members the way they talk to certain folks. There is just no sense of stability anymore. I grew up you know from my parents, you treat everybody the way you want to be treated. There is no sense of stability out there anymore. I see it, i mean sometimes even a congress. I certainly see it out there and communities. It is one of those things that would go around and with security like the administration does answer and cabinet members. We dont do that. We are out there and, but you know they are is a very different environment out there today. No ifs and no butts about it. And your thoughts . Is this why youre always on our side . I go in the republican side to see how the lions are working. [laughter] again, every situation is it very different. I cannot say that from a security standpoint is something i spend a lot of time worrying about. As henry knows, every member of congress does not have a security detail. And it was only because Steve Scalise was at the practice but there was actually someone who is there to return fire. And had he not been there that morning and what a tragedy, he was the one that got very severely injured. But without him being there it would have been much or significantly worse. If i want to get to couple of issues, most on the radar right now in this moment. If i do not get to an issue that you care about understand it is my life every day. There is an issue that i think im going to write about and then the world changes one hour later. Doctor Michael Burgess, had to be getting on healthcare and where are we going . All right, next question . [laughter] youre asking me to predict the future the senate is involved and it is hard to do. I would have predicted that we would have been past this point many months ago. I will admit it was harder on the house side than i thought it would be. Remember, the house had passed under Senate Reconciliation rules, had passed the major pieces of a repeal bill in december of 2015. President obama vetoed that repeal bill. Our statement to his veto was okay, if we have the white house that that is what we will do. When i met with my counterparts at the statehouse and state senate in december 2016, i said look at the bill we passed a year ago. That is likely going to be what we will be doing. Now, that did not happen and there were people concerned that if we passed a bill that was basically a repeal bill, remember that . That reconciliation individual mandate employer mandate, got rid of most of the taxes, got rid of the obamacare subsidies and Medicaid Expansion in two years time. So, there were people, moderates and conservatives as well and the president himself tweeted out that you have to do some replays along with repeal. It cannot be a repeal only bill. So that was january. I know we dont get credit for it but we did several hearings in the energy and commerce subcommittee. And health. We would like 18 hours. Those hearings did not because nobody really wanted to i mean they just became slugs best and obamacare was bad and what youre doing is worse. Really what was the sum total of the discussion. The fact that the hearings were continued was because they were productive. We produce a bill that was based on the 2015 reconciliation. So it is not like it had not been through committee on energy and commerce and what it means on the house side. Senate finance on the senate side. It had been through the regular committee process. The changes that were made, were made to add more replace elements to the base of repeal. And we marked that bill up in an open fashion. No amendments, they were not limited in any way. Whats were not limited in any way. We went for 28 hours, i was going to say one night but it was throughout the day and we read the bill during the markup and it was a long bill. People said we did not even read the bill. In fact, we did. We read it in committee because the ruckus objected to the bill being considered as read so the clerks read the bill and off we went. Then to follow that, we had 18 hours also on the rules committee. That bill came to the rules committee. 18 hours of debate, Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and kenny hoyer came and for three hours talked about how great the Affordable Care act was. And what an open process it was when it passed. But im sorry, it was not an open process when it passed but nevertheless, people forget that the time invested in this thing on the house side was significant. We had to go back to rules two additional times to add amendments where people said well, youre not going to vote for it because it did not have this or that. The bill was pulled from the floor one time on house i which i thought was a mistake. The committee had already provided same to authority which meant we could have stayed through the weekend until we got that thing done. We went home instead and i did think that was an error. But, three through four weeks later he came back early may of this year. It did pass. It went over to the senate in plenty of time for them to get it done before the memorial day recess. Which was what they said they wanted to do. Except that they didnt. But they had plenty of time to do it before 4 july recess but they did not. The time before the august recess and it turns out they were not ready then. The bill as it has changed, the socalled Graham Cassidy bill, what i have tried to get my subcommittee staff to do is prepare. We do not know completely what the bill is at this point but tried to prepare a side by side for members of the house. You know what you voted for in may, or these are the things that were the same, these are things that are different. People will be able to in a short period of time, work through the process of is this something that i can support or that i cannot support . The house unfortunately, will not have a great deal of time. The senate, if it does both, it will be midweek or later. The Senate Budget committee or the Senate Parliamentarian has said this must happen by the 30th at midnight. The house strictly speaking could vote on this the following week but i think everyone is anxious to get the senate, if it passes lets get evaluated. It will not take a lot of time. You will have to decide yes or no are you in or out. And it is really where we will be. Congressman henry cuellar, youre pretty much considered one of the democrats most approachable to republicans. And doctor Michael Burgess eluded to that. Did you ever think of supporting the healthcare legislation that came to the house . Had no i am bipartisan but im not going to vote on a piece of legislation that i think does a lot of harm. I wonder for the healthcare. I voted for the healthcare law from years ago. It was not a perfect bill, but i always know that we pass a piece of legislation you always come back and finetune the things that work and dont work. The problem was, to be fair on both sides, the democrats when we were in power, they didnt want to make any changes. They acted like it was a perfect bill. Then the senate or than the republicans wanted this repeal for the whole thing. We had two extremes and nobody wanted to sit down and talk and see what works and what doesnt work. Then you either modify or change it. Then of course, the republicans come in and they control the white house and everything. So they go back and is that of repeal to a replace. But the replacement, and my thing is if youre going to go for one without due respect to the doctor, if youre going to knock out the proposals, and we have still not seen this one. But if youre going to knock out dickstein a we are living in different worlds. Or if youre going to focus on premiums but youre not going to find a way to lower the premiums, then you are not doing the job. The piece of legislation in my opinion, but they are trying to do is one that will knock out millions of individuals. Even though we have not seen the numbers. It will knock off millions of individuals from healthcare. And if youre proud about that, vote for that. But i think it is wrong. Second of all, there is some feelgood language that says that preexisting in the bill itself, in the cassidy bill it says, what i call feelgood language. It says preexisting conditions will not be affected. But it is feelgood because they leave it up to the state to decide and with all due respect, you get a state like texas, you know was going to happen. They will get rid of some of those plus, it has mental, look to what they did to mental and maternal care under this piece of legislation. And if you feel that if congress you say we will give a block grant to a state and by the way, they pick winners and losers. By coincidence, the states that were doing the obamacare lose billions of dollars. In the states that were antiobama care had no state exchange assurance are benefited by getting billions of dollars. Now it might be a coincidence. Im not putting a motive but it just happens to be a motive. But basically theyre saying congress cannot do so we will send it off to the state. And it was a short limit where they have to but i think 2020 to set up state of change. So thats that of a Different Things and by the way, and 2027, monies will be gone. Now, will congress go ahead and appropriate that money . We know what happens. So again, my thing has been and i am a democrat. But i believe that we ought to work in a bipartisan way. But i will go back to this point to answer your question. At the beginning of the year, we called we said we are the bulldogs, we want to see if theres anything we can work with. This is what he said to us. Back in february he said, except for healthcare, we can talk about taxes, transportation and other items. Except for healthcare. That was it except for healthcare. Now, a couple of weeks ago and i will finish with this, a couple of weeks ago when the president asked for democrats and republicans to sit down with him, there were blue dogs but a couple of republicans and democrats [inaudible] what is a blue dog . A moderate democrat. [inaudible] let me finish my thought here. What happened was we met with the president and a republican and others they said mr. President we have an idea of bipartisan way to help stabilize the market. The health market. And the president said, is it a repeal . And they said no we are focusing on trying to stabilize the market. In the president can think does it repeal . And they say no, we are trying to have a bipartisan solution to help stabilize the healthcare. And the president asked for the third time, does it repeal . And they said no. And then they said okay we will talk about it later. There are extreme out there that do not want to sit down and work things out. Bottom line. And i you want to respond and it will move on, elizabeth healthcare. First off, if your insurance is so bad that you will not buy it unless you have the threat of the federal government breathing down your neck, is it a good product . Are you being well served by the people that are offering the product for sale and are you getting good value for your dollar when you are buying it . They are in is the problem. My personal feeling is that the individual mandate, the centerpiece of the Affordable Care act fundamentally realters the relationship between the government and the governed. And that is the thing that must when the Congressional Budget Office looks or that they say you repeal the individual mandate, nimble by this unless you force them so they will all be you are not throwing anyone of insurance. They will still be able to buy but it is of no value to them. It is expensive and they cannot use it. Deductibles are so high. They are functionally uninsured. Bear in mind we are talking about people in the individual market. And may i just stay at the state of texas for someone previously, before the Affordable Care act came down the pipe, someone who in the individual market, not the employee sponsored market. Because you are covered with preexisting conditions in the market. That is federal law also. But in the individual market, a state like texas, you pay a little bit of a higher premium but you had insurance available. In fact, the premiums that you paid in the risk full was lower than the premium now in obamacare. So texas did what i thought was a very insightful thing in the last legislative session. The state senator from an area that i represent, reordered the risk pool in the state of texas. So those would be right now of course, no one is enrolled, there is no money available but if they were they could be up and running in no time. Texas could stand to benefit. To the other point, yes, they would be a utilization of the dollars available. Those that expanded medicaid and went full force with the Affordable Care act. Yes, theyre getting more money than a state like texas that did not do those things. There has to be a way to even things out. I thought that is what our bill, the one that we debated for 28 hours in the committee. That was one of the main sticking point. Was, how do you handle a state that expanded medicaid and a state that did not expand medicaid. Because i have members on my subcommittee, members from virginia where they were very hard to not, even though they had a democratic governor that wanted to expand medicaid, the state senate is strong and said we were not do that. Those numbers are going to be reluctant to do anything that crosses their folks who they think did the right thing in rejecting that. [inaudible][inaudible] on. [inaudible] [inaudible] texas does have some battles if we dont get something done. That is why a felt such intense pressure to get this thing resolved, to get assaults. But your democratic members and those two on medicaid then to our commercial insurance, i got we want to hear the stock and we want to follow resolution of inquiry. With all due respect i filed the resolution of inquiry when henry was chairman. But not trying to blindside some of the committee. I went to the floor of the house made the announcement. It was fruitless when you can block anything we try to do by saying its not bipartisan. Your side has held firm that no one is going to support a republican. Dont let the president. Blame your leadership. They carried the share of this responsibility. First of all, 18 hours of hearings with no witnesses, no hospital association, no Nurses Association or doctors association, no advocates no cancer association. Thats not true. I let you speak, he supposed to be a nice guy, right . So, no hearing and no testimony from anybody. The ones who do the work every single day. Eighteen hours they had to deal with one fifth of the u. S. Gdp. Do you think thats appropriate . Where theres no testimony never thing done in 18 hours. The problem is simple. If you are going to knock out millions of individuals, set something we should get up there and say we did a good job as member of congress . I think thats wrong. If you take with a preexisting condition i think its wrong. The bottom line is how soon we forget the individual mandate is a republican idea. Talk to mitt romney when he was governor. Doctor president president nixon. Talk to the harris foundation. One of the most republican groups. They were pushing individual responsibility and now theyre running away and finding a solution. The bottom line is this, why can we not sit down and allow witnesses and advocates and doctors to give their input . Theres not one legitimate group out there that supports this piece of legislation, none. Ask your doctors, ask your hospital and nurses, ask anybody who supports this. What happened to bipartisanship when we can sit down and talk. Thats a problem in washington. People are talking at each other not to each other. If her able to do that and he said my bipartisan, yes, but you still need to people to talk to each other. Were going to move on t from healthcare. As contentious as this has been in the green room there were joking and hugged when they came in i take that back. I take that back. My point is, the have a very collegial relationship is still very passionate about your issues. One of the most interesting things about our delegation is that every thursday the republicans meet their 25 or 26. Is a powerful voting block. The texans so largest republican state voting block in the house. Things can die over that lunch based on how if they want to go as a block. Something interesting happened after harvey. The congressmans got together and said were going to have lunch next week together. Then democrats and republicans in the same room it sounded like nobody could remember the last time it happened. Sis something that might become a habit . I called joe and i said i think this issue we need to sit down at the delegation of the last 12 years ive been, dont think weve had a sitdown everybody together. This is my first time in ten years, so joe and i got together and i hope we do more. Were leading a task force on harvey so we can work with john sharp whos been appointed the recovery chairman of the commission that Governor Abbott put together and ive been in contact with him and Billy Hamilton so we can coordinate. We might disagree on certain things, but the Texas Democrats and republicans will stick together on the things important. Harvey is definitely one of those. The startling thing to me was that joe invited all the democrats to the launch on the weeks i was by. So your tablet up a little bit. Do not still have a wednesday new lunch . That was the one that was started by a speaker braeburn when he was speaker. s far as i know may have happened before, i dont know the answer to that. Those when republicans started to be elected to the congressional delegation. I dont remember quite, you can find this hard to believe but there is a disagreement monday and the republicans were banned from the speakers lunch. One more republicans were elected they began to meet on thursdays. Now in the senate appropriate or they had to have both republicans and democrats over to her office once a month and we talk about things pertinent to the senate appropriate her. Those were generally well attended but they were early. Some folks dont like to get up that early. We have done bipartisan things. When i first got there there is a big effort made in the got redistricting that came took the call. There been efforts over the years texas is a big state and it has a significant number of representatives in washington. When we Work Together we can get things done. What would you say to the houston homeowner who wasnt allowed to buy Flood Insurance in his home one underwater another mortgage might be underwater. What would you say is the conversation happening in washington . Theres Different Things were looking at. There is an initial 15. 2 billion, money that went out for the disaster. That was only a partial payment for harvey and also for the force fires on the west coast. Some of the other appropriators from the west coast were saying dont forget about us. While you are flooding were burning. There were probably another, there will be other ones. Were hoping we continue to provide funding not only fema but different agencies. Theres different needs. You have cdbg money and other areas that will be getting funding itself. You have to make sure that we cornet with the states because i used to be in the state legislator when we created the rainy day fund. I might be off for a few dollars but theres almost 10 million in their so i said the state should do the same thing. The state was good at attacking the federal government same were spending so much money another say we need cash over here. And i think the state should use some of that rainy day fund. I understand theres an appropriation meeting at the state level to look at what the states response would be. The third be different issues of funding coming up probably one in october and im sure when we do the bill in december the be a larger amount at that time. We also understand that the chairman will be looking at the Flood Insurance its in the billions of dollars. Theyll be issues that come up, they had to release water into neighborhoods that were not flooded so and i have neighborhoods that got flooded. The question is if youre an Insurance Company that had sure its youre going to say was the flooding man made her nature . If i was an Insurance Company i would say go talk to the people who release the water. I hope a lot of people learned a lesson, we had sandy another once there were a lot of folks that voted against sandy because they said you have to take it somewhere to provide the funding. In other words, pay for it. I hope we dont get into that fight because as we look at what happened to harvey its gonna take a lot of money and there is a big fight less money but the big fight among the conservatives was how are we pay for. Theres 30 billion in sandy that hasnt been spent. Dont get me set our did on sandy. Do not forget there is never a special appropriation in 2008. Lets be careful about that. I know new jersey kicked in their rainy day fund. So here we are saying that new jersey and new york had to take a turn but texas is different. So there has been no argument about this. There is an argument in the other hurricane that we have to pay for. All i said is i hope we dont get in that same argument. When you have a disaster you audie says like a disaster and not take it from healthcare. There was an offset during katrina. One half of 1 of all the nondefense appropriations were reduced in order to offset some of the money necessary to rebuild. Also youll remember that half the money that congress sent cannot be spent there was no reason not to do the same approach was sandy. For whatever reason it wasnt, but you will know this, ike never received a supplemental appropriation with 30 billion in damage. But i will say from an Agency Perspective and i have talked it doctor carson about this. The ability to be flexible at the agency level with grants for people caught in the situation that you have referred to it i think the agency is going to be flexible with that. The governor has been outspoken about some of the needs but no one even knows the price take. Weve had two major storms, it will be weeks before people get the earth back under them. Puerto rico is going to require attention, significant amount of attention. This will not be cheap. We had one individual the reality is Hurricane Season is the same every year the fiscal years always over the 30th of september. Sometimes a storm happens before the end of the fiscal year and sometimes its after. And then i think we did that. But we all know theres going to be subsequent evaluation and subsequent monies that will be necessary. Some of those will be offset. Will take questions from the audience know if there are any. I have more but if you have some come i want to share. Please state a question. I live in austin texas. An army veteran. My question, i wanted to think you for your support of the dream act and for protecting 800,000 dreamers. My question is, what are you planning on doing to reach across the aisle for a longterm permanent legislative solution for dreamers . What are you doing to get the bill on the floor for a vote . When the president asked a Bipartisan Group to sit down, we brought up the dreamers and i told the president , theres a lot of persons who support the dreams but as long as the speaker doesnt put up for vote, we wont have a vote. I think 99 of the democrats will vote yes. We just need a few republicans to vote with us and we can get to 218. But we have to have a vote. Weve seen it twice or theres a dream act and we havent been able to get a vote. If the speaker will put it, well get it done. And the speaker said his for the soda boehner but we never got a vote on it. The president did say youll have a vote and it will be on the floor. Im hoping they put it on the floor. There will be negotiations, and the speaker to get a group of informal republicans to get a grip on it. President trump after the meeting asked to call because hes working on piece of legislation and i asked, can you tell me what you have in mind because dream act and some people want to put voter security. To me thats a nonnegotiable thing. If you equate a wall to a 14th century solution to Border Security, then you dont understand the border. So the president said when we met, he said the dreamer, Strong Border security in the wall we can talk about. The next day they called amnesty a former employee and he said we need a wall. The question is can we get to some part of the treatment to sensible Border Security. One question i asked is what to other countries with their train kids, they dont have it. Because, you cant do this in other countries. In 2005, your first year in office we had a bill on the floor and it dealt with Border Security, some argued it was too harsh but it took the approach that this is a problem we need to deal with, lets stop allowing people to fall into this. So we have 12 years of bringing people into this problem where we havent done anything. We have both been down to this sector in 2014, when president obama said im going to give you a path in or away in, we had 100,000 kids come across the border the next year. Thats the problem we have to be prepared to address. Does the United States is a country have a right to define and defend its borders, i say yes. We can figure out a solution for whatever the number is the lets stop putting people in this position. Dancers know that you dont support the dream act. Issue is, we been to the border. Ive members of congress that go and spend an hour or two and they think they know the border better than some of us who live there and know the border is. We spent 18 billion euro Border Security. 1,818,000,000,000 a year. With some of my friends and colleagues they keep moving the goalpost. We have Border Patrol, we vetted technology and 653 miles of border. Dont come up with the excuse that we need more Border Security. The other thing of Border Security is that some people feel if you have a wall that will solve the problems. A wall is the 14th century solution. We have talked about roundtables and town halls. The last few days ive been with the Border Patrol and leaders on the border spending time with them talking to them about the best way to secure the border. The issue is first of all we have to the property rights, most republicans believe in that but i feel if someone owns the wall its a 14th century solution. The latest numbers in part of my country they want to add 32 miles of fencing. Or a wall. Do know much money that is . Someone give a guess. 798 million for 32 miles. Its more than three quarters of a billion dollars. The problem is it so expensive. You have camera sensors that will work to address the issue. If you took the most beautiful wall, 30 of the undocumented persons came in through a legal permit or visa. So someone can fly or drive, its like a stop them. You have to be smart and how we secure the border. I have a problem with people who go in and go out. Ive been around in ive been seeing secretaries, and go and i will probably see you come and go. Two weeks later he was gone. We have to listen to the people who live on the border. People want to look at addressing issues, listen to us instead of coming in thinking you know better. Thats what i have a problem with members of congress. General kelly created a great deal of difference in the short time he was director of homeland security. The station i visited in august of last year looked entirely different in may of this year. The reason was because of the leadership coming out of the agency and the presidency. I hear talk about Border Security we need to secure the border we dont want to do until we secure the border. I dont know what Border Security means explicitly, what conditions would apply at which time youd say now we have Border Security. But with that mean in explicit terms . Not adding 150 border guards, that doesnt tell me anything. What conditions would apply in usa now we can do this because we have a secure border. When asked during a hearing what portion of the u. S. Makes the borders it operational control she said 40 . So sit submit to 40 is a feeling great in that regard. Right now we saw the number of youngsters who had been apprehended is not the right word, but they are being processed in centers and stood up very quickly because there is not a facility to handle them. When the president said it will be okay for you to come in, the next thing that happened was the border was flooded. In spite of the money that was spent in previous years i dont know whether you said supported the secure fence act in 2005, i didnt Hillary Clinton did but the dollars were never spent. So never occurred. I dont disagree that there is a problem with these, the infrastructure that is necessary to begin to curtail that exists requires the courage to use it. The everify program again it will work if it is used but for whatever reason it remains voluntary and not mandatory. Dancers 100 . Again my asking 2005 im going to be asked to do something that provides a path for legalization for kids brought to this country by their parents 2005, my ask was, can we stop doing the . We stop having people fall into that category. The answer is no is i dont know how many of that 800,000 have arrived but i suspect its a significant proportion. The problem with a lot of my colleagues and again i say very respectfully they dont understand the border, how do you secure border . If you spend 18 billion on Border Security if we would go to the 20yard line which is the last time i saw secretary kelly before he was secretary. On the border of guatemala and mexico, mexico we help them secure the border. They literally stopped hundreds of thousands of people coming up to the border itself over here. We just have to be smart working with other countries and security the border and using technology. If summons against the wall they think theyre against Border Security. Lets look at the wall. Right now its estimated 22 or 23, give me hundred dollars and ill the problem is when you do this because of the treaty we have with mexico you cant put it right it the riverbank, there are times you have to go up 1 mile. Imagine like i have a constituent and hes a veteran and his parents served in world war ii. His parents are buried by the river. If you put a fence 1 mile in a means if he goes to visit the cemetery for the burial place of his parents he has to go on the other side of the fence. What happens to wildlife . What happens to the sensitive areas that we have or the wildlife refugee we have question right theres no respect for any of that for you can use technology to address it. Bottom line is, people in washington think that if you put up the fence that will solve the issues. Asked me about the great wall of china and the berlin wall. Asked me about the germans and french in world war i and ill tell you what happened to those barriers. That is all the time we have today. I want everyone to give a round of applause. Want to thank them for having a passionate debate. This may seem rudimentary but there is no namecalling, it was highly respectful and they sincerely believe in their policies so please say thank you with a round of applause