U.S. Rep. Jerry Carl (R-Mobile) was among the many Republicans who took offense at some of the statements and accusations during President Joe Biden’s State of the Union address Tuesday night.
What got Carl “emotional,” he said, was when Biden claimed to have a plan to deal with immigration.
“We’ve done everything we can possibly do in our positions, and we’ve gotten zero response from his administration,” Carl said Wednesday on "The Dale Jackson Show." “For [Biden] to stand up there and say that he’s got a plan put together, B.S! Where were you two years ago? Where were you 100,000 lives ago before that fentanyl was brought in across the border? Where are you at, Mr. President?”
Carl said Biden is all talk regarding dealing with the border crisis and has no actual plans to address the ongoing issues. However, part of the GOP's strategy for the border starts with getting the public to "separate in their mind" immigration from citizenship.
"We're talking about two totally different things," he said.
Carl proposed one idea on how to use immigration to bolster America's workforce, which includes selling work visas to immigrants and holding 50% of their salary to give back to them when they leave the country once their visa expires.
"We got a workforce there that we can utilize," he said. "… My idea is not perfect by no means, but when you start talking about the immigration side, we got to have a set path toward citizenship that's simpler, not easier, but simpler."
Carl said he knew a woman who recently received her U.S. citizenship after eight years and nearly $16,000.
"As Republicans, we got to sell the idea of let's separate the two," he said. "We need the workforce. Let's work with that… It just makes good business sense to try to do something like that."
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