Lee Ann Moulder: Hassan has failed in her duties of keeping border secure

To The Daily Sun,

Sen. Maggie Hassan’s key assignment in the Senate is her position as a member of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, and she is also the chair of the Subcommittee on Emerging Threats and Spending Oversight.

Her website states that “she works to oversee the Department of Homeland Security and other critical Homeland Security priorities to keep America safe and secure — including cybersecurity and drug interdiction efforts.” The facts over the past two years demonstrate that Sen. Hassan is an abysmal failure in her assigned committees. The figure just released on illegal immigrant encounters at the border for the fiscal year 2022 was 2.38 million, which is a new record. For fiscal year 2021, the previous high record, there were 1.73 million encounters, both years being in stark contrast to fiscal year 2020 when there were 458,088 encounters. Additionally, 98 suspected terrorists were apprehended at the border during fiscal year 2022 in contrast to a total of 26 encounters for the past five years. Moreover, for the fiscal year 2022, 14,104 pounds of fentanyl was seized at the Southwest border, or enough to kill every American eight times over.

However, none of the above statistics include how many “gotaways” made it over the border undetected or how many pounds of fentanyl was secreted into the United States and not seized. Sen. Hassan votes lockstep with President Joe Biden’s open-border policy. She votes 96% of the time with her progressive leader, New York Sen. Chuck Schumer, and she is in agreement with Socialist Democrat Bernie Sanders 92% of the time. If Sen. Hassan was given a grade on her performance on the all-important assignment of keeping America safe, she would be given an “F.” It’s time for change. Please consider voting for Don Bolduc.

Lee Ann Moulder

Center Harbor