ORLANDO, Fla. — Citing a lack of representation and a focus on policies that he believed didn’t work, Congressman Maxwell Frost (D- Orlando) said he was opposed to the ongoing negotiations in Washington to relieve the overwhelmed US-Mexico border in exchange for money to send more weapons to Ukraine.
“I don’t care what legislation these archaic border policies – immigration policies -- are attached to,” he declared. “Florida’s 10th Congressional District is hell no.”
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Frost said only a small group of senators and the White House were involved in the discussions, cutting out Central Florida, where immigrants remain a vital part of the economy.
He and area immigration proponents pointed out that immigrants fill low-paying roles like housekeepers, line cooks, landscaping and construction work that keeps the tourism economy alive, while paying taxes and building wealth of their own.
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“That keeps Florida from having an income tax,” Father José Rodriguez explained.
Frost said programs that granted groups like Venezuelans and Ukrainians the ability to stay long-term were beneficial, and called out negotiators for trying to slash the amount of people who could benefit from them.
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He said he wanted to see more resources sent to the border in the form of attorneys, humanitarian workers and judges to process applications faster to clear up the massive backlog in the system.
Additionally, he said the long-term immigration fix was to grant undocumented immigrants a pathway to citizenship, which acknowledged the fact that many people were coming to give themselves a better life than they had in their home nation.
“The solution isn’t completely selling out the promise of this country. It’s resources,” he said. “I agree that we need to fix [the border], but the problem that we see is it’s not a criminal problem, it’s a humanitarian one.”
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