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This is Later with Lee Matthews the
Lee Matthews Podcast Warm what You Hear weekday

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afternoons on the Drive. That's why
I'm talking to Senator James Langford about this

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controversy that's seemingly bubbled up overnight over
really nothing when it comes to immigration.

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Senator Langford, thanks for joining me. You beg glad to be able to

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do it. So how did this
all start? I know you've been working

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on an immigration deal. I don't
want to call it a bill, Senator,

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because I don't even know if it's
written down yet, because everybody keep

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saying, oh, no, we
haven't seen anything. Well, I didn't

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think there was anything to see at
this point. Keep there's not. There's

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not a bill text that's been released
yet. We're probably a few days away

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from it, but getting really close
at this point, actually getting bill text

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out. But that has not stopped
people from opposing something they've never ever seen,

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and so that's been interesting. You
know, I grew up in a

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nation that talks about your innocent until
proven guilty. Now I'm guilty until I

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can prove myself this on at this
point, on the border patrol or the

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border security bill, let me just
talk to you real quickly what it is,

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sure, and then we talk about
what some of the noise on the

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internet is saying about it. But
what it is is it's a complete change

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in how we do many of the
processes that we have complained about for years

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and the cartels have exploited. For
instance, when President Trump was president,

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we had several months there where we
had four thousand plus that were illegally crossing

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the border and President Trump was throwing
everything he could at it, and he

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was complaining that he needed stronger laws
on asylum, that the law was too

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weak in that area. Well,
this bill fixes that, where we get

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very strong laws on asylum, so
we never have those months like he had

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in twenty nineteen with four thousand plus
people illegally crossing the border during that time

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period. So it strengthens the asylum
laws. It adds a bunch of new

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eligibility bars to people coming through the
process that want to request it, so

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they can't game the system. It
ends catch and release by increasing the number

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of folks that can actually be detained, and then it speeds up to hearings

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by taking away a bunch of the
appeals on this because right now you can

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appeal forever. If you come across
the border right now, you get released

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for ten years into a backlog,
and you can just stay in the country

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for ten years while you await for
your hearing. It does away with that.

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Instead of being a decade before you
get your hearing, you get it

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done in days, weeks, or
at the longest months, and then you

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are deported. It also increases the
number of deportation flights. It's just a

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dramatic shift in what's actually happening at
the border. And if folks would have

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said we could get this a year
ago, they would have never believed it

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because Biden's president. But it is
a dramatic change in increasing the strength of

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our border laws. I will get
to what Biden wants versus what is actually

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in the agreement. And again I'm
not going to call it a bill,

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because that's the thing that I've been
looking for, is some kind of written

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text. And I know this is
how this starts. You start with an

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idea, then you start negotiating,
then you come up with some text for

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a bill, then you write the
bill, then you debate the bill,

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and hopefully it goes on from there. But this it all died down around

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the eleventh of January. It got
kicked up again, I want to say,

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by Mitch McConnell, and then it
died on Martin Luther King Day,

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and then we didn't hear about it
again until a group called Immigration and Accountability

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Project leaked it to real American voices. I think Fox picked it up with

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some numbers that you didn't even you
didn't even quote. No, Nope,

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sure didn't. And what was interesting
is they make lots of accusations. One

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of the accusations they make is this
allows five thousand people a day, every

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day to just come into the country. They and have even had some folks

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that have said on radio even today
on it on some of the national programs,

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this is somebody standing at the border
with a clicker like you're coming into

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a concert, just counting off five
thousand people every day releasing them the border.

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Well, that's ridiculous. That is
apps not what it is. And

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I think everybody knows that, and
anyone who doesn't has never even asked the

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most basic question about the bill.
Let me just give you context on this.

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Every day but seven in the last
four months, we've had more than

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five thousand people crossing the border.
We've just got these epic numbers. That's

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more than our folks can handle.
So what does the Biden administration do when

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they are overwhelmed and they can't process
the people. They just release them into

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the country and say we'll process you
later. So their default is release.

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This switch is that where the default
is deport. That if you get overwhelmed

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and you can't handle that number of
people to be able to process and deport,

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then everyone gets deported in that process. So they're all turned around back

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to Mexico, kind of like title
forty two. So we change it from

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five thousand people crossing the border,
overwhelming the system, so release them all

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to five thousand people crossing the border. We can't process them, so deport

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them all. To give you just
a side by side, we've had almost

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a million people that have come across
the border in the last four months that

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have been released in the country.
If this law, if this bill would

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have passed four months ago, all
million of those would have been deported instead.

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There's also some things going on behind
the scenes in your own party,

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Senator, I know the Biden administration
wants bragging rights here in the election year

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and it seems like a lot of
other people want bragging rights, including Donald

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Trump in this election year. Sure, sure, yep. And note,

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by the way, I don't know
anyone that believes that Joe Biden is the

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pro border security president. Everybody sees
what he has done to the border.

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We've had more illegal crossings in the
last three years in the previous twelve years

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combined. So there is this fear
among some Republicans we can't pass anything on

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border security now Joe Biden will get
credit for it and everyone will think he's

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the border security guy. I think
that's impossible. Quite frankly, everyone's going

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to see that this is a problem
of his own creation. Biden has lots

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of tools in his disposal he chose
not to use. In fact, he

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invited the world to be able to
come across our border in an open border

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policy, and they've come. So
he created this completely. What's really happening

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is Republicans have forced his hand.
We actually held up funding four months ago

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and said we will not do that
funding until we get a change in law.

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But now that we're getting right to
the edge of actually dropping the bill

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and working to be able to pass
it, there are a group of Republicans

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that are like, oh, wait, I hadn't thought about that this may

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actually fix the border issues and Biden
would get credit for it. And my

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response to that has been, Okay, he's not going to get credit for

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what we made him do. Number
one. Number two on this, you

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have an oath to the United States
in the United States Constitution to protect this

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nation. We have a massive national
security risk of thousands of people acrossing our

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border that are unvetted. We have
people in the Tarror watch list. We

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literally have people now coming across that
have Hesbelot connections and ISIS connections right in

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the middle of the terminal in the
Middle East. If we don't take seriously

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our national security and do whatever we
can to be able to protect our border,

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that is our own mistake. I
will never put politics above our national

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security. And for folks that are
saying I don't want to have this vote

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because it may affect a presidential election, I don't agree it will, by

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the way, but I also cannot
put an election ahead of national security the

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American people. Well, let's also
back up a little bit Senator James Langford

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talking about this immigration controversy because it's
not really a bill yet, it's not

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an agreement yet. But you've been
working on this since what did you why?

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October? Okay, October. And
so the stipulation that the Democrats are

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putting on it for funding for Israel
and Ukraine, that only creeped up lately,

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right, Actually, that was actually
from the very beginning. Okay,

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what Biden had asked. What Biden
had asked for at the beginning in October

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was funding for Israel, Ukraine,
for the Indo Pacific, for Taiwan,

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and then also money for the border. And we said, I understand money

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in the other areas, money doesn't
fix the border issue. If we give

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Biden more money, he'll just use
it to bring more people across the border.

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We're not going to do that.
And so we actually dug in as

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Senate Republicans and blocked that bill in
October and said we will not do national

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security funding without changes in border law. We've got to have a change in

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law instead. And for two months
Biden administration refused to be able to talk

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to us about that, and then
they finally came to the table right before

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Christmas and said, okay, we'll
actually start talking about changes in law on

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this. But yeah, that's the
process that we've actually gone through on this,

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that we forced their hand to do
it. So what is your hope

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about the House. Let's say you
get this whole tip wrapped up and passed

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in the Senate. I heard Mike
Johnson was grumbling about it. It's been

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very mixed on this. So I'll
tell you that the House a year ago

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passed the border security law they call
House Resolution to HR two is the term

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of here a lot. It's a
great bill. They unfortunately didn't even get

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all Republicans on the bill. They
were able to pass it. They had

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more people at that time. They'd
got no Democrats and most every Republican that

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was on it. They passed the
bill. It's a very good bill.

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It's one I would support. We
brought to the Senate. We didn't get

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a single Democrat on that one either
on it. So here's the challenge we

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have now. It's the House says
we want our bill, it's perfect,

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but in the Senate that's never going
to pass. We're not going to be

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able to make law. So we're
trying to figure out what can we do

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to make law. So interestingly enough, in the House. I've had a

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lot of House members that have said, we know the Senate it has to

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be bipartisan to come out of the
Senate. That's the nature of this.

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It has to be bipartisan. So
get just the best bill you can send

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us, will work to amend it
on the House side and see if we

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can't make it better and send it
back. That said, great with me.

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Then let's actually just keep moving on
it from here. But the goal

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is what can we do to be
able to secure our border rather than just

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leaving it open like it is.
So is that where things are now now

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that the fire drill seems to be
dying down. The hope is now that

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we can actually bring it up.
People can read it, review it.

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They'll like parts of it, they
won't like parts of it. They'll have

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some sections say I wish that part
wasn't there, and they'll have other sections

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going, man, I wish that
was a long long time ago. And

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we'll have all that back and forth
and people can evaluate it. Understanding this

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is a bipartisan proposal that we've got
to figure out how we can actually move.

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If we can move it in the
Senate, we'll send it into the

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House. And the House will do
their work and you'll give everybody plenty of

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time to read the bell. That's
correct, yep, yep. The House

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rule of seventy two hours. We've
had at least that in the Senate as

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well to be able to go through
that. Sometimes we have longer, but

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yeah, they'll have time to be
able to go through. And it won't

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be a matter of dropping it at
three o'clock in the afternoon and voting on

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it at five. People need time
to be able to look at it.

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I don't remember who it was who
said, if you can keep your head

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when all about you are losing theirs, you'll be a man. My son

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was that Kipling? I don't remember. But that's what you have to do,

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Senator. This is what This has
been a hair on fire moment for

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absolutely no reason. Yep, it
has been. And it's one of those

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things that I look at and think
everyone knows there's a problem on the border.

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Now we got to figure out if
we're going to solve it or if

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we're going to just ignore it.
And to me, it's we have an

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obligation to be able to solve it. And if we don't get every single

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element that we wanted. Can we
get the big items? Can we make

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a difference in asylum? Can we
make a difference in deportations? Can we

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get rid of all these appeals that
actually take years and years and years and

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or just dilatory, just slowing everything
down on it. Can we do those

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things? If we can, great, let's solve those and then let's keep

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moving. And quite frankly, when
we have a Republican president, they'll enforce

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the border a whole lot better than
the Democrat president will, but they'll have

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a lot more tools in their hands
to do it, no matter if it's

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Trump or not. Senator James Langford, thank you for clearing the air and

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for calling us today and stating your
case. I'm glad to be able to

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do it and look forward to everything, a chance to be able to read

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and review the bill. We'll put
it out on our website and get it

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available all over the place. Thanks
for listening to Later with Lee Matthews,

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the Lee Matthews Podcast, and remember
to listen to The Drive Live weekday afternoons

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