Scott, Colleagues Introduce Legislation to Bolster Border Security

WASHINGTON – Today, U.S. Senator Tim Scott (R-S.C.), along with Senators Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), Bill Cassidy (R-La.), Steve Daines (R-Mont.), Joni Ernst (R-Iowa), James Lankford (R-Okla.), Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyo.), and Mike Rounds (R-S.D.) introduced the Securing Our Border Act, which redirects $15 billion of funding passed by Democrats to hire 87,000 Internal Revenue Service (IRS) agents and utilizes it to bolster security measures along our southern border.

“We have a crisis on our southern border. Rather than putting resources in place to address this major national security and humanitarian catastrophe, the Biden administration and congressional Democrats chose instead to spend $45 billion of taxpayer money to hire an army of IRS agents to audit the middle class,” said Senator Scott. “While President Biden continues to drop the ball, I’m introducing legislation to fund border infrastructure and give our Border Patrol agents the tools they need to help stop the unaddressed flows of illicit goods and persons into this country. Americans need more border agents keeping them safe – not thousands more IRS agents looking over their shoulder.”

“We still have a crisis at the border, and the Biden administration has refused to take it seriously for over two years,” said Dr. Cassidy. “Congress should not have to twist President Biden’s arm into caring about the fentanyl and other drugs pouring across the border, but we will.”

“Since President Biden stopped enforcement at the southern border there have been more than 5 million illegal border crossings, the most in U.S. history. Yet, instead of addressing this crisis, Biden and the Democrats are spending billions of dollars on more IRS agents. The last thing Montanans want or need is an army of IRS agents coming after them. These taxpayer dollars need to be redirected to address a real crisis like our open border, not weaponized against hardworking Montanans,” said Senator Daines. 

“The Biden administration would rather spend millions to go after hardworking Americans’ tax dollars than stop the flow of more than five million illegal immigrants and deadly fentanyl into this country. It’s long past time we force the Biden administration to put the safety and security of the American people first,” said Senator Ernst. 

“The Biden administration continues to ignore the crisis at the border, causing deadly fentanyl to infiltrate communities throughout Wyoming. Instead of targeting the hardworking people of Wyoming with an overzealous, weaponized IRS, this administration should be addressing real problems and that starts with the border. I am proud to introduce this legislation with Senator Tim Scott that would make our communities safer and prevent unnecessary audits on the hardworking middle class,” said Senator Lummis.

“President Biden’s priorities are out of whack,” said Senator Rounds. “More than five million illegal immigrants have entered the country through our southern border during his presidency. Instead of finding solutions to this national security threat, the Biden administration has hired 87,000 new IRS agents who will conduct an additional 1.2 million audits per year. The majority of these audits will be on hardworking Americans making less than $75,000 per year. Our priority should be solving an out-of-control problem at the southern border, not creating a new one with the IRS. Combatting drug and human trafficking is more important than monitoring the finances of law-abiding Americans. This commonsense legislation would redirect taxpayers’ hard-earned dollars to keep American communities safe and help eliminate the ongoing border crisis.”

The Securing Our Border Act:

• Funds nonintrusive border inspections to better equip our law enforcement’s capability to track drugs and other illicit contraband before it enters the United States;
• Funds border wall construction and other technologies to bolster tracking and enforcement efforts along the southwestern border;
• Provides retention bonuses for Border Patrol agents to help mitigate morale issues; and
• Ends the “Catch and Release” policy established by the Biden administration.

The National Border Patrol Council, which represents approximately 18,000 Border Patrol agents, endorses this legislation.

“I thank Senator Tim Scott for his leadership in moving forward a common-ground solution to fix our border crisis. Under the current policy, our border agents are understaffed and overwhelmed. Senator Scott understands the dire situation and the imperative support our agents need so that they can get to keep our country and our people safe. The National Border Patrol Council is proud to endorse Senator Scott’s Securing our Border Act,” said Brandon Judd, President of the National Border Patrol Council.

The bipartisan Joint Committee on Taxation estimates that low- and middle-income taxpayers will face a significant increase in taxes due to Democrats’ $45 billion in additional IRS enforcement funding.

Yesterday, Senator Scott, Ranking Member of the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs, introduced another bill aimed at cutting off deadly narcotics coming across our border: the Fentanyl Eradication and Narcotics Deterrence (FEND) Off Fentanyl Act.  This sanctions and anti-money laundering bill aims to combat the country’s fentanyl crisis by targeting the illicit fentanyl supply chain, from the chemical suppliers in China to the cartels that traffic the drugs in from Mexico.