Southern Border

Representative Greg Walden (R-Hood River) recently spoke on KEX's The Mark Mason Show about his recent trip to the southern border. When asked about the humanitarian crisis at the border, Walden spoke about his efforts to combat the problem. I supported the funding to deal with the humanitarian crisis to provide for medical assistance, food, shelter -- especially for these unaccompanied minors and families. We've had an enormous surge. In about 8 years in the early 2000s we'd have between 5,000 and 8,000 unaccompanied minors per year across the border. We're now approaching 60,000 unaccompanied minors this year alone. He went on to discuss his recent trip to the southern border and how he visited one of the newer facilities in Texas that was built to help handle the influx of people. Our facilities were never built to handle this kind of influx. We ramped up with temporary facilities, that's what I visited in Texas. They had 206 kids when I was there. They all had their own bunks, they had a 1 to 12 ratio of staff to kids, they had full medical services, 3 square meals a day, plus access to snacks anytime."