The House Homeland Security Appropriations Subcommittee approved a 2018 spending bill for the Department of Homeland Security that includes funding to increase border security and strengthen interior enforcement. The spending bill would fund many of the top priorities listed in Pres. Trump’s Jan. 25 immigration executive orders.
The bill includes funding for 500 more Border Patrol agents, 1,000 more Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents and officers to handle deportations from the interior, and enough money to maintain an average of 44,000 detention beds to hold detained illegal aliens.
It also allocates enough money to add more than two dozen jurisdictions to the 287(g) program, which pays for local police and sheriff’s deputies in those jurisdictions to be trained to enforce immigration laws.
The bill also allocates $1.6 billion to make improvements to existing border fencing and to build new fencing in areas identified as a priority by the Border Patrol.
“Keeping Americans safe by protecting our homeland is a top priority,” said Subcommittee Chairman John Carter (R-Texas). “This funding bill provides the resources to begin building a wall along our southern border, enhance our existing border security infrastructure, hire more Border Patrol agents and fund detention operations,” he said.
Read more on this story at The Washington Times.
