Friday, September 30, 2022

Billy Long: Republicans have a plan to deal with all of Biden's crises

(From Seventh District Congressman Billy Long)

Since President Biden came into office only a year and eight months ago, it has been a revolving door of crises. 

Inflation has ravaged what should be a great economic recovery, crime has plagued our streets and our national security has been weakened by poor border policies.

Republicans have a plan to fight all of these issues and get America back on track. Last week, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy released his Commitment to America, detailing how Republicans plan to make our economy stronger and our streets safer.






 

Inflation remains unacceptably high. The August Consumer Price Index was at 8.3%. That means that overall, things cost 8.3% more than they did last August. And it is everything. Food is up 11.4%, electricity 15.8% and gas a whopping 25.6%. President Biden has tried to blame everything he can, except himself, for this crisis. 

His latest trick is to try blaming Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, but there’s one small problem with this. Inflation was already incredibly high before the war started. While the war certainly did not help the situation, it was not the cause. 

The reason for this inflation boils down to two of President Biden’s policies, excessive spending, and overregulation of the energy sector. Republicans want to stop the wasteful spending and implement pro-growth tax and deregulatory policies that will reduce prices and increase wages. 

And how do we plan to lower gas prices? We need to produce more oil here at home, and to do that we must end President Biden’s assault on the oil industry. Republicans want to cut the time it takes to get a drilling permit in half, so that we can get our energy sector back on track. And when America is producing more oil at home, we are less reliant on foreign oil, which drops the gas prices.

Crime has also been a major issue since President Biden came into office. So far this year, homicides are up about 50% from this point in 2019 according to the Major Cities Chiefs Association. 

Violent crime is rising all over the country, and it’s largely due to the Democrat party’s embrace of the Defund the Police movement in 2020. President Biden can try to walk this back all he wants, but he cannot erase all of the interviews where prominent Democrats backed this radical policy. 

Taking funds away from police makes it harder for them to do their jobs. And when police are working longer hours with less pay, morale suffers greatly. We should be fighting crime by giving our police the resources that they need to do their jobs well. 

Part of the Commitment to America is hiring 200,000 new police officers through recruiting and retention bonuses. More funding for police will increase officer morale, which in turn makes our streets safer.

Our Southern Border is another area where safety and security has become a concern. Since President Biden came into office, there have been more than 3.5 million illegal immigrant encounters by the Border Patrol, and there have been more than 2 million so far this Fiscal Year, a record. And when the Border Patrol apprehends someone, they usually are released into the United States. That’s because President Biden has reimplemented Catch and Release, whereby illegal immigrants caught by Border Patrol agents are released and told to appear in court at a later time. 








This presents a major national security issue, since there have been 78 suspected terrorists encountered at the Southern Border so far this Fiscal Year. That’s just the ones we know about. We have no idea how many have gotten away. The Republican plan to fight the border crisis includes funding border enforcement systems like the border wall, ending Catch and Release and requiring proof of legal status to get a job. These are common sense measures that should be implemented, but sadly President Biden has refused to do just that.

These are just a few examples of President Biden’s failed leadership leading to several crises. Any one of these by itself would be unacceptable, and yet we are dealing with these and so many others simultaneously. It’s time to get serious on fixing these issues if we want to continue as a world superpower.

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