It's natural for Republicans and Democrats to haggle or argue on a number of issues. It comes with the territory in high-stakes politics.
But as Rep. Matt Rosendale, R-Mont., sees it, the two parties shouldn't have disagreements about the application of the word "compassion."
Take the incident from Tuesday in Texas, where 53 undocumented migrants have reportedly died after being abandoned in a "sweltering" tractor-trailer outside of San Antonio — marking the nation's deadliest smuggling incident along the U.S.-Mexico border.
"It's sad, distressing, just a terrible incident. Myself and many of my colleagues have been screaming about this over the last 20 months," Rosendale said on Newsmax on Tuesday, while appearing on "America Agenda" with guest host Bianca de la Garza.
"Since the Biden administration took over [the country in January 2021], they've basically turned over the border to the [Mexican] cartels. The left seems to want to take this stance of virtue signaling as a form of 'compassion.' But it simply isn't," said Rosendale.
"Incentivizing the cartel to commit murder and crimes to these [migrants] is not compassion. ... Promoting and allowing the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people" — through the potent drug fentanyl pouring into the country and destroying lives in every corner of America — "is also not compassion," said Rosendale.
However, "securing the border, protecting American citizens ... that's compassion," he said.
Rosendale is calling out White House officials who claim there's any semblance of order at the U.S.-Mexico border.
"We're [legally required] to have operational control of our southern border ... but we don't have it," says Rosendale, who's also a member of the House Veteran Affairs Committee.
Rosendale encourages his House Democrat colleagues to visit the border and engage in talks with customs agents or border control personnel.
"They'll say, 'There's no control.' People are flowing into the border, hundreds of thousands each month," says Rosendale, before adding, "Who knows what kind of bad criminals are coming into the country from the undetected? We've got a major problem taking place at the southern border."
Also on Wednesday, Rosendale referenced how the Biden administration allowed more than 240,000 illegal immigrants across the U.S-Mexico border in May — a staggering number compared to previous presidential tenures.
With that many migrants entering the country, virtually unchecked, Rosendale says this invariably leads to a high number of human traffickers and drug pushers running wild.
"The [state] attorney generals aren't doing their job [of penalizing drug cartels]. This fentanyl problem is reaching far into our country," he said.
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