John,

Good afternoon and welcome to our Weekend Update.

First, I’m continuing to monitor the situation in Russia concerning the uprising and military threat to Vladimir Putin’s tyrannical regime. Former Russian soldiers, mercenaries, and military groups were mounting a potential coup and advancing on Moscow. It is now being reported that a settlement has been negotiated, and the advance on Moscow has ceased. I will continue to monitor the situation as it develops.

I began this week in New Jersey with President Donald J. Trump, where he greeted a group of strong supporters.

It's no secret that I have been a strong proponent of the America First Agenda. President Trump had our country on the right track. The economy was thriving, American families and businesses were prosperous, our borders were more secure than they had been in decades, and the United States was promoting a period of peace worldwide, even helping to bridge divides in the Middle East. Fast forward to today, and American families are being crushed by record inflation, our border is in crisis, the world is more divided, nations are at war, and government spending is out of control.

The 2024 presidential election is too important to sit on the sidelines, and I will not miss an opportunity to get our nation back on the right track. I supported President Trump in 2016 and 2020... and I have joined a group of my fellow Pennsylvania Republican congressmen in endorsing him again for his race in 2024. We need his strong, independent leadership to Make America Great Again. Click here to read more about our endorsements in Politico.

The federal government should promote policies that spur growth and support small businesses, not push burdensome rules and regulations that stifle economic activity and ultimately hurt American consumers. This week the Financial Services Committee conducted hearings with Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell and CFPB Director Rohit Chopra.

I joined “Making Money with Charles Payne” on Fox Business to discuss the hearings. Click here or below to watch.

Small businesses and farms deal with federal regulations such as the EPA’s WOTUS rule every day. Main Street needs to be heard when federal agencies craft rules and regulations. The House Committee on Small Business held hearings to review the U.S. Small Business Administration's Office of Advocacy report on the Regulatory Flexibility Act. Click here or below to watch my comments.

Truth Social has been waiting 401 days for SEC approval to become a publicly traded company – despite the average wait time being 130 days. I’m fighting for answers. The House Financial Services Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations recently conducted a hearing with the SEC to discuss this issue. The SEC has been willing to meet and talk, yet highly troubling inexplicable delays lead to the conclusion this is deliberate and will destroy the investment of over 20 million individual investors. Truth Social will retain its value, but the loss will be to individual American investors. This is wrong, unacceptable and rings of agency weaponization. I will continue to fight it. Click here or below to watch my remarks and questions.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi addressed a joint session of the U.S. Congress. India is a key ally of our nation economically and are an important defense partner.

This week, the U.S. House voted to censure Congressman Adam Schiff. He abused his position as the Chairman of the Intelligence Committee, and he deserved to be censured. He lied to the American people when pushing a fake Russian collusion narrative and sowed division for personal political gain. Our country deserves better.

IN NEWS YOU WON’T HEAR IN THE MAINSTREAM MEDIA: With over 6,500 crossings daily, Biden’s Border Crisis is overwhelming the system.

• New data shows 204,561 illegal immigrants were apprehended attempting to cross the U.S.-Mexico border in May – directly contradicting the Biden White House’s claim that “unlawful border crossing[s] have plummeted.”
  
  
  • That makes last month the second-highest total for May in 22 years.
    
    
• For the first time in history, monthly apprehensions at the southern border have surpassed 150,000 for 27 consecutive months.
  
  
  • Under the previous administration, monthly apprehensions never reached 150,000.
    
    
• May’s 200,000-plus encounters is a 337 percent increase from the average number of May apprehensions from 2017-2020.
  
  
  • 9,943 unaccompanied children were apprehended.
    
    
  • 108,234 illegal immigrants were apprehended from countries outside the Northern Triangle and Mexico, showing that Biden's crisis is global.
    
    
  • At least 125 people on the terror watchlist have been apprehended trying to enter the U.S. between ports of entry so far this fiscal year – breaking the all-time record of 98 set last year.
    
    
• 6.9 million illegal immigrants have crossed the border since Biden took office.
  
  
• Homeland Security Investigations estimates that Mexican cartels are now making $13 billion a year smuggling illegal immigrants into the U.S., 26 times what they made in 2018.
  
  

DRUGS ARE POURING OVER THE BORDER INTO OUR COMMUNITIES

• Illicit drugs are flowing into the country at an alarming rate, with only 5 to 10 percent being intercepted as border officials struggle to contain the smuggling.
  
  
  • 2,626 pounds of deadly fentanyl and 11,882 pounds of methamphetamine were seized at the southern border in May alone, with much more getting through.
    
    
  • Joshua Sharfstein of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health: "If they're seizing a lot, it's because a lot is coming in."
    
    
  • The amount of fentanyl seized in May is the equivalent of more than 595 million lethal doses.
    
    
    • Since Biden took office, more than 20 tons of fentanyl have crossed the southern border, enough to kill 9.1 billion people.
      
      
• Fentanyl is now the leading cause of death for Americans age 18 to 45, with the number killed by the drug up 94 percent since 2019.

On this point, there is no doubt… Biden's failed policies created the crisis at the southern border. In Biden's first 100 days, he took more than 94 executive actions on immigration, including halting the construction of the border wall and ending the successful "Remain in Mexico" policy. Illegal immigrants have confirmed this: "The border is open…everybody believes that the border is open. It's open because we enter. We come in, free, no problem…We came illegally." The Biden administration created this crisis, and he and his Democratic colleagues must be held 100% accountable for allowing this national security and humanitarian crisis to exist. I spoke on the floor of the U.S. House about this continued crisis. Click here or below to watch my remarks.

In much more positive news, I was happy to welcome this year’s Congressional Art Competition winner, Kasie Troch, to Washington. Kasie is a rising senior at Blue Mountain High School, and her artwork, Majestic, pictured below, will be displayed in the Capitol for one year alongside other winners from across the country. Congratulations on this achievement!

I was happy to meet with members of the Pennsylvania Farm Bureau in Washington, including Cliff Miller and Mark Shultz of Columbia County. We discussed ways Congress can support the organization’s mission to ensure that family farms can continue to produce local food, grow their communities, and promote responsible stewardship of the land and natural resources.

As we mentioned last week, a Pennsylvania State Trooper, Jacques F. Rouge Jr., was tragically killed, and Lt. James Wagner was seriously injured when a gunman in Juniata County attacked them. Our brave State Troopers bravely defend our communities every day, and this tragic event is just the latest reminder of the selfless work they do to keep our communities safe. 

We look forward to catching up with you next week. God Bless, and see you soon,

Dan Meuser
http://www.meuserforcongress.com/