In a recent television ad, Congressman Ben Cline asked that we support him because he is “hard at work” in Washington. Unfortunately, his labor is not serving the Sixth District.
Consider illegal immigration. Last summer he voted against a bipartisan bill to strengthen border security. This bill would have significantly increased the number of border patrol agents and was backed by the Border Patrol union. It would also have provided high-tech scanners to detect fentanyl coming in through ports of entry and asylum officers to make sure invalid asylum claims are denied promptly.
Why did Cline vote “no”? Cline will claim the bill authorized the entry of thousands of illegal immigrants per week; however, nothing in the bill authorized a single immigrant to come in who wasn’t authorized before. It wasn’t because he backed a more conservative bill: this bill was backed by Republican Sen. James Lankford, one of the most strident conservatives on immigration. And nothing in this law would keep a future government from passing even more conservative legislation.
It seems that Ben Cline voted against more Border Patrol agents and tighter border security to keep immigration alive as a hot political issue. In other words, he voted against our interests for the sake of political gain.
We desperately need a functional Congress where lawmakers work to solve problems – not create them for a political talking point.
Happily, we do have a candidate dedicated to working across the aisle to create solutions, and who would have supported these border policy solutions. His name is Ken Mitchell. He deserves our support. Check him out at: kenmitchellforvirginia.com.
Daniel Stuhlsatz resides in Staunton.
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