WASHINGTON – Today, U.S. Senator Tom Udall voted for two border assistance packages to provide urgent funding to reimburse local communities and address the humanitarian emergency at the border, where overcrowded and unsanitary facilities and shelters for minors are running out of money and cutting services. One measure passed the Senate by a vote of 84-8. Another House-backed measure failed to pass the Senate by a vote of 37-55. Udall issued the following statement:
“The images and reports we have heard and seen at the border are heartbreaking and appalling. In the United States of America, children and families seeking asylum at our borders deserve to be treated humanely – with basic human needs, such as food, clean water, and hygiene, met – and they deserve to be treated with dignity and care for their health and safety. The Trump administration’s degrading and reckless immigration agenda is making the humanitarian crisis at our border worse, and it is straining New Mexico communities and endangering innocent children and families.
“I voted for both border assistance packages, including the one that ultimately passed the Senate today, because I believe it will on balance benefit New Mexico communities and provide important resources to improve humanitarian conditions at the border. It includes $30 million in funding I fought for, with the New Mexico delegation, to reimburse local communities and organizations in New Mexico and elsewhere that have stepped up to assist asylum seekers families, and even more may be needed. It includes new transparency and oversight provisions for children in U.S. custody. And it includes no money for the president’s border wall. It is a bipartisan, compromise package, and I hope that further improvements, such as increasing funding for local communities, can be made by reconciling it with the House version before it is signed into law. But action is urgently needed.
“I will continue to fight for dignity, accountability, and humanity in our immigration policies, and to fight back against the Trump administration’s dangerous and hostile policies toward immigrants and immigrant communities. And I will keep working to support aid to Central America and to enact comprehensive immigration reform that honors our values as New Mexicans, to address the root causes of this crisis, and meet our needs – and values – as a nation.”
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