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Valley congressman discusses migrant surge

3 years 6 days 18 hours ago Monday, March 22 2021 Mar 22, 2021 March 22, 2021 6:10 PM March 22, 2021 in News - Local

During a visit to the Valley earlier this month, Gov. Greg Abbott called the migrant surge on the border a direct result of President Joe Biden’s immigration policies.

One Valley congressman, however, said the surge is nothing new.

"This has been going on for a very long time,” U.S. Rep. Vicente Gonzalez (D-McAllen), said. “It's not new so we can't blame it on this administration or the other administration, but it's something we need to address in a meaningful way. And people coming to our southern border just coming across with the idea that they're going to be processed and released cannot be an acceptable system. It’s not orderly, we're in the middle of a pandemic."

Congressman Gonzalez is calling on law-makers to take a holistic approach to immigration to address several issues. This includes providing answers for DACA recipients, having a "robust" guest-worker program for migrants doing manual labor, and deportations of those who served in the military but were not U.S. citizens.

"It's not a 'one size fits all,' and it's not just one issue,” Gonzalez said. “We seem to be broken at every facet of the issue when we talk about immigration."

Gonzalez said one solution towards gaining better control of the migrant issue is to provide the same processing facilities for asylum-seekers in their home countries.

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