WASHINGTON–U.S. Senator Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), Chairman of the U.S Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Homeland Security, on Wednesday held a hearing on President Biden’s Fiscal Year 2025 funding request for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) with Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. In his remarks, Murphy called out Senate Republicans for their role in prolonging the crisis at the southern border and criticized unfounded attempts to place the blame on Secretary Mayorkas.

Murphy highlighted Republicans’ hypocrisy in killing the bipartisan border bill earlier this year: “This budget doesn’t provide enough money, and this budget by definition cannot update the immigration laws of this country, which are outdated and broken. But do you know what did provide enough money? Do you know what did update and fix our broken laws? The bipartisan border bill negotiated by myself, Senator Lankford, Senator Sinema with help from Senator McConnell and Senator Graham. It would have provided $20 billion in extra emergency funding to buy 50,000 detention beds, to hire 4,300 new asylum officers, 100 new immigration judges, 1,500 border patrol agents, 1,000 new deportation officers. The list goes on and on.

He added: “In addition, our bill would have made a massive downpayment on fixing our broken border and immigration authorities. It would have given the power to the president to close portions of the border to ordinary asylum claims during periods of high crossings. It would have elevated the screening standards for asylum claims to make sure that only truly meritorious claimants enter the country. It would have reduced, maybe most importantly, the time to process an asylum application from 10 years, in some cases, to just weeks, or, at worst, months. It would have a eliminated the use of 235(a) parole at the border and greatly narrowed and refined the uses of humanitarian parole. That is just the tip of the iceberg. If passed, this would have been the most significant, most serious reform of immigration law in 40 years. And it would have been effective at slowing the pace of arrivals at the southern border and making sure that our system of legal immigration, a key to American greatness, is not abused. And that’s why it’s not the law. It’s not the law because it would have made a big downpayment on fixing the problem. Republicans rejected this bill because they didn’t want to fix the problem. Donald Trump and Republicans decided they would be better off with the border a mess because it would help them politically “

On Republicans’ baseless attempts to impeach Secretary Mayorkas, Murphy said: “These articles are laughable on their face. One accuses the Secretary of a high crime and misdemeanor for failing to stop millions of noncitizens from being released into the United States. Let's be clear. Despite Congress’ inability to respond to this crisis, the Biden administration and Secretary Mayorkas have removed, returned or expelled more migrants in three years than the Trump administration did in four years. The annual apprehension rate is the exact same between the Trump administration and the Biden administration. Another impeachment article rages about the immigration court backlog—a backlog that has existed in both Republican and Democratic administrations; a backlog that is the consequence of Congress's unwillingness to adequately fund a solution; a backlog that—wait for it—would have been solved by the bipartisan border bill that the House Republicans so honestly concerned about the state of immigration killed.”

Mayorkas explained how the bipartisan border deal would have helped address the challenges at the borders: “This piece of bipartisan legislation would've been the most transformative change to our broken immigration system, not only for the resources it provided but for the changes in the law that it delivered. It would have brought such extraordinary fairness and speed to a system that has suffered backlogs and interminable timelines in the processing of claims. It would have plussed up our personnel in an unprecedented fashion, as you have commented. It would have allowed us to adjudicate asylum claims that now take more than seven years to run through the courts in sometimes less than 90 days. Absolutely transformative, not only from an efficiency perspective, but also fundamentally from a security perspective.”

On the flow of fentanyl into the United States and the flow of guns into Mexico, Murphy said: “The fentanyl trade between the United States and Mexico is a circle. Fentanyl comes into the United States, money and guns leave the United States. That is why on a bipartisan basis we have provided additional money for outbound inspections so that we are catching not all, but an appreciable amount of guns and money as it leaves the United States. This trade can only work if the guns and the money leave and the fentanyl comes back.”

A full transcript of Murphy’s opening remarks can be found below:

“Good afternoon, everyone. Welcome to today's hearing concerning Fiscal Year 2025 and the budget request from the Department of Homeland Security. Calling this hearing to order, and we welcome Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas to testify about the FY25 request. Thank you for being here on a very busy day. Looking forward to a serious and lively discussion about the department's budget priorities for the coming year. Nothing is more important in our federal budget than supporting the 260,000 federal employees who spend every day defending our nation. I’ve reviewed the President's proposed budget. I support lots of it, I have questions about other parts, and I look forward to our subcommittee's bipartisan work. I want to use the rest of my time here today to address two elephants that linger in the room.

“First, this budget, even with this proposed increase, is not enough to secure our border and manage the unusually high levels of immigration to the United States that started not in 2021 or 2022 but in 2019; not when President Biden took office but when President Trump was president. This budget doesn’t provide enough money, and this budget by definition cannot update the immigration laws of this country, which are outdated and broken. But do you know what did provide enough money? Do you know what did update and fix our broken laws? The bipartisan border bill negotiated by myself, Senator Lankford, Senator Sinema with help from Senator McConnell and Senator Graham. It would have provided $20 billion in extra emergency funding to buy 50,000 detention beds, to hire 4,300 new asylum officers, 100 new immigration judges, 1,500 border patrol agents, 1,000 new deportation officers. The list goes on and on.

“In addition, our bill would have made a massive downpayment on fixing our broken border and immigration authorities. It would have given the power to the president to close portions of the border to ordinary asylum claims during periods of high crossings. It would have elevated the screening standards for asylum claims to make sure that only truly meritorious claimants enter the country. It would have reduced, maybe most importantly, the time to process an asylum application from 10 years, in some cases, to just weeks, or, at worst, months. It would have a eliminated the use of 235(a) parole at the border and greatly narrowed and refined the uses of humanitarian parole.

“That is just the tip of the iceberg. If passed, this would have been the most significant, most serious reform of immigration law in 40 years. And it would have been effective at slowing the pace of arrivals at the southern border and making sure that our system of legal immigration, a key to American greatness, is not abused. And that’s why it’s not the law. It’s not the law because it would have made a big downpayment on fixing the problem.

“Republicans rejected this bill because they didn’t want to fix the problem. Donald Trump and Republicans decided they would be better off with the border a mess because it would help them politically. That's not me saying that. Here's what one honest Republican senator said: ‘The border is a very important issue for Donald Trump, and the fact that he would communicate to Republican senators and congresspeople that he doesn’t want us to solve the border problem because he wants to blame Biden for it is really appalling.’ Now I'm eager to hear about the President's budget request. But we could have done something together in a bipartisan way to give the real levels of adequate funding, real changes in law to protect our nation.

“The second thing that hangs over this hearing is the political impeachment articles that are about to be sent to the Senate. There's not a single act of impeachable misconduct alleged by these articles. The process was an embarrassment to the House of Representatives. These articles are laughable on their face. One accuses the Secretary of a high crime and misdemeanor for failing to stop millions of noncitizens from being released into the United States.

“Let's be clear. Despite Congress’ inability to respond to this crisis, the Biden administration and Secretary Mayorkas have removed, returned or expelled more migrants in three years than the Trump administration did in four years. The annual apprehension rate is the exact same between the Trump administration and the Biden administration. Another impeachment article rages about the immigration court backlog—a backlog that has existed in Republican and Democratic administrations; a backlog that is the consequence of Congress's unwillingness to adequately fund a solution; a backlog that—wait for it—would have been solved by the bipartisan border bill that the House Republicans, so honestly concerned about the state of immigration, killed.

“But what makes me most angry about this impeachment is its attempts to personally impugn Secretary Mayorkas. His life is one of public service: the youngest U.S. Attorney confirmed by the Senate; the former director of USCIS; the former Deputy Director of DHS. He has sought out the toughest, most controversy-laden jobs in government. He was in the room personally for nearly all of our four months of torturous negotiations. Why? Because Republicans and Democrats trusted him. Because Republicans asked for him to be in that room because they knew that he would be an honest broker. So we are very lucky, in my mind, to have Secretary Mayorkas protecting our nation. He shouldn’t have to endure this process, but we are glad that he is here today.”

A full transcript of Murphy’s exchange with Secretary Mayorkas can be found below:

MURPHY: “I have first a personnel question for you. Jeff Rezmovic was nominated to be the Chief Financial Officer of DHS last year. His nomination has been pending for some time before the Senate. Of course, his nomination is especially important to the Appropriations Committee. It doesn’t make a lot of sense to have an agency this large without a CFO for this long. I assume you would agree with me that his confirmation, the ability to get a CFO working with you at the Department, is of the utmost importance.”

MAYORKAS: “It most certainly is, Mr. Chair. I have worked very closely with Jeff Rezmovic for about seven years now, previously when I was a Deputy Secretary, and let me say unequivocally that he is pure gold as a public servant. I should also note that the woman over my left shoulder, Anne Tipton, who is serving as our Chief Financial Officer, is also pure gold. We need a Senate confirmed CFO for the stabilization that it provides our department.”

MURPHY: “You heard me testify to the amount of resources that would've been allocated in the emergency supplemental that included $20 billion to surge to 50,000 detention beds, to hire over 4,000 new asylum officers to attack the backlog, 1,500 new border patrol agents and officers. Can you talk for a moment about what those kind of resources would have allowed you to do had both Republicans and Democrats come together and supported that bipartisan supplemental package?”

MAYORKAS: “Chair Murphy, my first encounter with the immigration system, the broken immigration system, was in the 1990s when I served as a federal prosecutor in California. And I learned then that the system was fundamentally broken, and it remains so. This piece of bipartisan legislation would've been the most transformative change to our broken immigration system, not only for the resources it provided but for the changes in the law that it delivered. It would have brought such extraordinary fairness and speed to a system that has suffered backlogs and interminable timelines in the processing of claims. It would have plussed up our personnel in an unprecedented fashion, as you have commented. It would have allowed us to adjudicate asylum claims that now take more than seven years to run through the courts in sometimes less than 90 days. Absolutely transformative, not only from an efficiency perspective, but also fundamentally from a security perspective.”

MURPHY: “Let me ask you specifically about how you achieve an increased deterrence. I think there's a perception here that by just loading up on detention beds, you can have an appreciable impact on deterrence. But what the bipartisan bill tried to do at your and others' urging was to provide more immediate certainty on asylum claims, to adjudicate those claims in a handful of days or weeks instead of what happens today, five years or ten years. Now that is just the right thing to do for the country. It’s just fair to have that outcome at the border rather than 10 years later. But tell us a little bit about the elements of this bill, including that element, that would've had an impact on deterrence, that would've stopped people from ever contemplating the journey to the border, and how that can only be achieved by changes in law, not just changes in funding levels.”

MAYORKAS: “Absolutely, Mr. Chair. So fundamentally, the risk calculus of intending migrants would have changed dramatically, because right now, what they see is a broken asylum system, and they understand that when they are encountered at the border and make a claim for asylum, their claim is ultimately adjudicated sometimes in more than seven years. Our backlog is immense, and it's been growing year over year for well more than a decade. And what happens is, in those seven years, they work. Sometimes they have United States citizen children. And they gain a sense of footing in the United States before their claim to stay here has even been adjudicated. Under the bipartisan legislation, that multi-year process would have been transformed to as little as 90 days and sometimes even quicker, and given the denial rate for most asylum claims, an intending migrant would have the calculus of deciding: should I take that dangerous journey, should I place my life savings in the hands of smugglers, only to be turned around upon arrival in the United States within 90 days? An absolute game changer.”

MURPHY: “Finally, let me ask you about a topic that we’ve spent a lot of time talking about relative to the fentanyl trade. The fentanyl trade between the United States and Mexico is a circle. Fentanyl comes into the United States, money and guns leave the United States. That is why on a bipartisan basis we have provided additional money for outbound inspections so that we are catching not all, but an appreciable amount of guns and money as it leaves the United States. This trade can only work if the guns and the money leave and the fentanyl comes back. What percentage of traffic today is subject to outbound inspection, and what's a realistic projection for how we’re gonna expand outbound inspections in this fiscal year?”

MAYORKAS: “Chair Murphy, I’ll have to get the precise numbers to you subsequent to this hearing, but let me say that CBP, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, and Homeland Security Investigations, the investigative arm of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, are working in tandem to address the outbound flow of both money and guns. In fact, Operation Without a Trace—we’ll provide the data to you—has been an extraordinarily effective operation to curtail the movement of guns and money. We also have deployed transnational criminal investigative units to Mexico to work with our law enforcement partners in Mexico to address this issue and we are of course very well and closely aligned with our U.S. Department of Justice.”

MURPHY: “Great, look forward to that update.”

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