McCain, Flake to introduce bill to address crisis at border

PHOENIX — U.S. Sens. John McCain and Jeff Flake announced Thursday they will introduce a bill to address the humanitarian crisis at the U.S.-Mexico border, where tens of thousands of unaccompanied children are detained as they attempt to cross into the U.S.

McCain urged Congress to act and amend immigration laws and give law enforcement the ability to return children home as safely as possible.

“This crisis will continue until the parents who paid thousands of dollars to smuggle their children north to the United States see plane-loads of them landing back at home – their money wasted,” he said in a release.

The provisions of the bill include increasing the number of immigration judges to hear cases, and the number of refugee visas by 5,000 for each of El Salvador, Honduras and Ecuador.

Furthermore, the bill would also allow law enforcement to return undocumented immigrants that are stopped at the border to their home countries in a matter of hours or days as opposed to the months or years it currently takes in most cases.