primarily because we need to stabilize education across the state. educators need to feel that their funding, a constitutional duty in alaska, is stable, so they can stabilize those tools and for all of us, to educate our students and the best way to do that is a stable school. announcer 1: be sure to join us july 21 and 22nd when we feature our visit to alaska. watch alaska weekend on c-span, c-span.org and listen on the free radio app. in his weekly address, president trump talked about immigration policy. the democratic address was given by hawaii senator mazie hirono who talked about immigration and health care. our country is currently facing a crisis of

illegal immigration on the southern border. democrats supported loopholes in our federal laws and have enabled roughly half a million illegal family members to be released into the united states since 2014 at unbelievably tremendous taxpayer expense while the legal -- illegal aliens can only be held for a. 's ♪ -- of days or weeks, it can take years to send them back. ridiculous process. for example, of the removal orders for issued for unaccompanied alien children over a recent two-year timeframe, 90% were done in absentia. they were not there, and they never showed up for the removal hearing. what else is new? the united states cannot have an open border to every illegal alien on the face of the earth.

we must have rules. we must have laws and we must enforce those laws. the driving factor in the surge thellegal families is belief there will be no consequence for illegal entry and no likelihood of removal or reprisal. unfortunately open border democrats support the loopholes that prevent families from being detained and removed together. they just want everyone to be noeased into our country matter how dangerous they are. they can be killers. they can be thieves. they can be horrible people. the democrats say it is ok for them to be in our country. i don't think so. congress and congress alone can solve the problem and the only one solution that will work is being able to detain, prosecute and probably remove anyone who illegally crosses the border. remember this. we need democrat votes.

without the democrats constantly obstructing, there is no way you can do it. without having democrats voting, there is no way you can get this done. so the democrats are obstructing. the democrats do not want border security. the democrats are ok with crime, but we are not ok with it. we need democrat votes. without it, frankly, nothing can be done. sen. hirono: alone. -- aloha. i have the privilege of representing the people of hawaii in the united states senate. these are not normal times. every day, we face a fresh outrage from donald trump and his administration. on issue after issue, donald trump creates a crisis, blames others for what is happening, and uses the ensuing chaos to demand a legislative solution that often harms even more people.