The United States should cut off aid to the three Central American countries from which children are flooding into the United States until the bill to pay for their care is paid, says Rep. Marsha Blackburn.
The Tennessee Republican told Fox News Channel's
"Your World with Neil Cavuto" on Tuesday that she has compassion for the children who are victims, but that the United States doesn't have the ability to pay for the tens of thousands who are overtaxing the Border Patrol.
Parents in Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador have been paying drug cartels to take their children through Mexico, usually riding atop freight trains, and deliver them across the U.S. border, where they surrender to Border Patrol agents.
Many have diseases, and their arrivals have been greeted with protests in communities who don't want them housed nearby. The children are fleeing crime and poverty in their home countries, but are often robbed, raped, killed or sold into sex trafficking before they make it to the United States.
Blackburn said President Barack Obama's $3.7 billion proposal doesn't attack the root problems, and she wants to see U.S. aid money used to fight violence in Central America rather than for more children to cross the border.
"I have great compassion for these children," Blackburn said, noting that
she visited some of the children being housed a Fort Sill Army Base in Oklahoma over the weekend.
"It just shows you that this is a situation that has gotten away from this administration — and they need to be diligent about securing the border," she said during her tour of Fort Sill.
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