Crenshaw to lead House task force combatting drug cartels
Reese Gorman
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House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) has tapped Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-TX) to lead a task force combatting and investigating drug cartels after he expressed concerns that the House Republican’s marquee border bill did nothing to address them.
Crenshaw was originally going to be a “no” on House Resolution 2, a sweeping border proposal that re-implemented former President Donald Trump’s ‘Remain in Mexico” policy and restarted construction on the border wall because it didn’t address drug cartels, he told the Washington Examiner. But, the Texas Republican ultimately voted for the legislation on Thursday.
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He was able to get to a “yes” vote after talking with McCarthy about how House Republicans could address drug cartels, and from those conversations, this task force came about, according to a source familiar.
“I am proud to be leading this Congressional task force specifically focused on neutralizing the Mexican drug cartels,” Crenshaw said in a statement. “The cartels have operational control over our southern border, facilitate and take advantage of our immigration crisis, and are killing tens of thousands of Americans every year with fentanyl.”
Crenshaw said until this task force, Congress “has not taken this threat seriously,” and now, with that changing, he looks forward to investigating the issue of drug cartels and their activity on the border and bringing legislation to the floor to combat the threat they pose.
The task force will be made up of members from the House committees on Foreign Affairs, Homeland Security, Judiciary, Intelligence, and Financial Services. McCarthy will appoint the remaining members of the task force.
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The House passed their border security bill off the floor Thursday 219-213. McCarthy had to spend days leading up to the vote, meeting with lawmakers and snuffing out opposition and concerns surrounding the bill. Ultimately only two Republicans voted for it, but at one point, its future was looking shaky, with rural members having real problems with the E-Verify provisions in the bill. But, it ultimately passed and now heads to the Democrat-controlled Senate, where it will likely die.
“By passing H.R. 2, House Republicans have shown our focus on addressing our nation’s biggest challenges,” McCarthy said following the vote.