Denver, CO — In case you missed it, political outsider, successful business leader, and Republican nominee for US Senate Joe O'Dea spoke with Meet the Press' Chuck Todd and America Reports' John Roberts to discuss the crises at our southern border.
On Border Security
"I think the Democrats have lost touch with this issue, just like they've lost touch with thousands of IRS agents, like they've lost touch with this debt transfer for tuition, working Americans don't want to pay for that. And they've also lost touch with our border. Our border needs to be secure. Colorado is number two in fentanyl overdoses right now and that fentanyl is coming straight up I-25. We lost 1800 Coloradans last year to drug overdose and I think Democrats have lost touch. Kamala Harris saying that the border is secure, we had two million people cross the border this last year. It's not secure and they're killing our kids, that's what's going on, cartels coming right into our towns."
On Border Crisis
"I think Ron DeSantis and Governor Abbott were right to bring some visibility to this issue. We've got fentanyl killing our kids. People call what he did cruel, you know what's cruel? Is ignoring this issue. Democrats are ignoring it, doing nothing, while our kids are dying.
"That's why I'm running. I need to get in there [the Senate] so we can get a bipartisan bill together that solves this issue. We need to get the Dreamers citizenship, we need to fix our immigration system, and we dang sure need to close this border down and make sure that it's secure. It's a national security issue.
"The answer's in the numbers. The numbers are up to 200-250,000 crossing our border each and every month, that didn't happen under Donald Trump's watch. It's happened under Joe Biden's watch."
On Fentanyl Crisis:
"When you talk to Chief of Police Paul Pazen from Denver, Denver Police, he'll tell you straight up that the cartels are shipping that straight up I-25. It's killing our kids. It's a deeply personal issue for me, my wife and I have close friends that lost a 25-year old, beautiful daughter here a year and a half ago, really tragic. And so we've gotta get our arms around this issue. We've gotta end this issue."
On Fentanyl Impact on Colorado:
"It's unacceptable. We've gotta get our arms around it. It starts at the border. We've gotta close this border down it's a national security issue. Colorado is number two in fentanyl overdoses last year. As a state, we lost 1800 adults, kids, to fentanyl death in Colorado last year and that's just unacceptable."
On Biden Administration Gaslighting:
"Two million people came across the border here this year... We've gotta do better than that. And people are calling for it. Colorado is upset about it. Democrats don't seem to care. And this is an issue I'm running on. We need to close this border down. We need to get control of our cities. I'd like to see us start to re-invest some of the money from the thousands of IRS agents. Instead of growing a bureaucracy lets put that money into our communities. We need more cops and we need to close this border down."
Newly released Customs and Border Protection data shows 203,597 illegal immigrants were apprehended attempting to cross the U.S.-Mexico border in August.
That is a 329% increase from the average number of August apprehensions during the Trump administration.
The total number of illegal border crossings during the Biden administration is now over 4.4 million.
More than 2.1 million illegal immigrants have crossed the border this fiscal year alone, a new record.
Border Patrol is now encountering as many as 8,000 illegal immigrants crossing the border each day, the highest number of daily encounters in DHS history.
Original source can be found here
