UPDATE: The House Oversight Committee hearing is underway, but a couple of hours before Chairman Cummings kicked it off, he published a "cherry picked" 31-page report about the humanitarian crisis at the border, Republicans on the panel said.
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— Oversight Committee Republicans (@GOPoversight) July 12, 2019
This report cherry-picked info to create a misleading narrative. Of data received on 1,575 children, 96% were reunified with a sponsor or parent.
Democrats "are looking to blame others for their crisis at the border," the Republicans concluded.
ORIGINAL POST
House Committee on Oversight and Reform Chairman Elijah Cummings invited four Democrats to come and testify during a hearing on the crisis at the U.S.-Mexico border on Friday, including freshman firebrand Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY). As you can see, she kicked off her remarks by referring to the situation on the border as "manufactured."
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez testifies at House Oversight hearing on Trump administration's border policies: "This is a manufactured crisis, because the cruelty is manufactured. This is a manufactured crisis because there's no need for us to do this." https://t.co/4PDB3Aj8Kb pic.twitter.com/74YFvBXQ8D
— World News Tonight (@ABCWorldNews) July 12, 2019
What about the Republicans, ranking member Jim Jordan (R-OH) asked Cummings in a letter on Thursday. At the very least, the chairman should have invited four Republicans from border states to share their perspectives on the crisis.
Jordan suggested that Cummings invite Arizona Reps. Andy Biggs and Debbie Lesko, and Texas Reps. Michael Cloud (TX), and Chip Roy.
"For fairness and to ensure a balanced presentation tomorrow, we respectfully request that you invite the following Republican Members to testify about the unprecedented humanitarian and security crisis at the southern border,” Jordan wrote in the letter, which was obtained by the Daily Caller.
If Cummings doesn’t allow Republican members to testify, "it will just show that he is more focused on scoring political points than solving the humanitarian crisis at the southern border," Jordan alleged.
On Fox News, Jordan also urged his Democratic colleagues to "stop playing politics" with the border.
It only seems fair right?
But fairness doesn't seem to be in the vocabulary of Democratic chairmen these days. Republicans are also fuming over Jerry Nadler's handling of the upcoming Robert Mueller hearings before the House Judiciary Committee. He has limited the Q&A to 22 members of the committee, meaning that the Republicans on the panel got "rolled," in the words of ranking member Doug Collins (R-GA).
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