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A Humane Approach?

“We are a nation of immigrants, but we are also a nation of laws.” – Elton Gallegly.

Since July of 2015, when former President Trump announced his run for office and revealed his plans for building a wall on the southern border, immigration has become one of the most hotly debated subjects in the American political sphere. During his presidency, Trump faced heavy criticism due to his strict border security policies. However, as a result of Trump’s policies, illegal immigration hit an all-time low in March, April, and May of 2017. 

Today, under President Joe Biden, the story is much different. In an interview by The Daily Signal, Mark Morgan, the former border patrol chief under president Obama, said the border situation beginning with a spike in 2019, is “absolutely a National Emergency… A dual crisis too. It’s both a humanitarian and National Security threat at the [border].” He explains that during previous spikes in the ’90s and early 2000s, the recorded number of detained migrants hit a comparable number of roughly 1.5 million per year. According to Mr. Morgan, however, the current number of 1.7 million detainees at the southern border per year is a much bigger problem than just the number shows. This is due to two things: for one, the same immigrant was attempting to cross the border multiple times after being deported multiple times, so the actual numbers were lower than even a million, and then, the majority of them were Mexican males, 90% of which would be promptly deported. In the past year, the increasing number at the border has been above 1.5 million; additionally, 65-70% are unaccompanied minors from family units, and because of current laws, are permitted entry. 

The New York Post discovered in August of 2021 that “the Biden administration has been quietly flying underage illegal immigrants from Texas to New York late at night for more than two months in an effort to resettle tens of thousands of migrants.” As weeks go on, this results in hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants entering the country. According to Mr. Morgan, the best thing to do is change the “Catch and Release Policy,” which former President Trump signed; however, President Biden reinstated it as of February of 2021. This is not the first of the Trump era policies that President Biden has undone. 

 In January of 2021, Biden directed the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to halt all deportations for 100 days in an inauguration memo. According to a DHS press release, this act was implemented “to ensure we have a fair and effective immigration enforcement system focused on protecting national security, border security, and public safety.” The mandate excluded migrants “suspected of terrorism or espionage, those whose deportation is needed to protect national security, those who have crossed the border after Nov. 1, 2020, and those who have been convicted of an aggravated felony and pose a threat to public safety.”

On the same day, President Biden, through one of his many executive orders, ended the declaration of emergency at the Southern Border, halting wall construction. Biden claimed, “[t]he declaration of a national emergency at our southern border… was unwarranted” and “building a massive wall that spans the entire southern border… is a waste of money… My Administration is committed to… a humane immigration system.”

Not a week later, the Biden administration did away with former President Trump’s “zero tolerance policy.” The zero-tolerance policy enacted by Trump required prosecution of all adults crossing the southern border illegally, often resulting in children being held separately from their parents. This was enacted because many drug traffickers were using unrelated children too often to evade criminal prosecution. January 26th, 2020, Attorney General of the Department of Justice Monty Wilkinson stated the Trump policy “was inconsistent with the Department’s principles.”

Policies like those most recently employed by the Biden administration have resulted in the humanitarian disaster at the Del Rio Bridge, where approximately 15,000 illegal aliens from the regions of Haiti and Panama camped for weeks on end. Images only surfaced due to Fox News investigative reporter Bill Melugin and his team gathered and aired footage of the amassing group using a drone over the bridge before drones were quickly banned by the Biden Administration through the Federal Aviation Administration due to “security reasons.” According to a recent Heritage Foundation synopsis, “Approximately 3,000 to 5,000 of the 15,000 have been deported… but the remaining 10,000 to 12,000 illegal aliens, made up of families, unaccompanied children, and any woman claiming to be pregnant will be released into the U.S.” Americans must keep in mind that according to the Department of Homeland Security, the current administration is releasing thousands of illegal aliens into the interior of the country every week. Clearly, this was not an isolated event.

President Biden ending all these policies that stemmed from illegal immigration, including ceasing construction on the border wall, has been viewed as a green light to illegal immigrants. Understandably, people from underdeveloped nations want to come here. However, supposing America intends to remain a nation worth coming to, our borders and the rule of law must be upheld, regardless of who’s in the White House.

 

 

Photo Credits:
Bernstein, David S. “The US Border Crisis Is Just the Tip of an International Problem.” News, GBH, 19 Aug. 2019, www.wgbh.org/news/commentary/2019/08/19/the-us-boarder-crisis-is-the-tip-of-an-international-problem. Accessed 18 Oct. 2021.

‌Sources:
Cuccinelli, Ken. “Biden in Denial as Border Crisis Escalates due to His Rhetoric and Immigration Policies.” The Heritage Foundation, 2019, www.heritage.org/immigration/commentary/biden-denial-border-crisis-escalates-due-his-rhetoric-and-immigration. Accessed 18 Oct. 2021.

‌Biden, Joe. “Joe Biden Spent the Past Year Telling Illegal Immigrants to Come to the US | News/Talk 1130 WISN | Dan O’Donnell.” Dan O’Donnell, News/Talk 1130 WISN, 12 Mar. 2021, newstalk1130.iheart.com/featured/common-sense-central/content/2021-03-12-joe-biden-spent-the-past-year-telling-illegal-immigrants-to-come-to-the-us/. Accessed 18 Oct. 2021.

Barrow, Bill. “Biden: Congress Should Immediately Make ‘Dreamers’ Citizens.” AP NEWS, Associated Press, 20 Apr. 2021, apnews.com/article/campaigns-immigration-donald-trump-joe-biden-politics-2c2876df5db44c8fbdb9c4fb2c8d3d7d. Accessed 18 Oct. 2021.

‌Ries, Lora. “Biden’s Del Rio Bridge Crisis: Far More than Just Optics Problem.” The Heritage Foundation, 2019, www.heritage.org/homeland-security/commentary/bidens-del-rio-bridge-crisis-far-more-just-optics-problem. Accessed 4 Nov. 2021.

Diaz, Jaclyn. “Justice Department Rescinds Trump’s ‘Zero Tolerance’ Immigration Policy.” NPR.org, 27 Jan. 2021, www.npr.org/2021/01/27/961048895/justice-department-rescinds-trumps-zero-tolerance-immigration-policy. Accessed 18 Oct. 2021.

“Proclamation on the Termination of Emergency with Respect to the Southern Border of the United States and Redirection of Funds Diverted to Border Wall Construction | the White House.” The White House, The White House, 21 Jan. 2021, www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/presidential-actions/2021/01/20/proclamation-termination-of-emergency-with-respect-to-southern-border-of-united-states-and-redirection-of-funds-diverted-to-border-wall-construction/. Accessed 18 Oct. 2021.

‌Alvarez, Priscilla. “Biden Administration Braces for New Wave of Migrants as It Rolls out New Immigration Plans.” CNN, 19 Jan. 2021, www.cnn.com/2021/01/18/politics/biden-border-immigration-migrants/index.html. Accessed 18 Oct. 2021.

‌Alvarez, Priscilla. “Hear Joe Biden’s Immigration Plan.” CNN, 21 Jan. 2021, www.cnn.com/2021/01/20/politics/homeland-security-pause-some-deportations/index.html. Accessed 18 Oct. 2021.

Eustachewich, Lia. “Biden Reinstates ‘Catch and Release’ Policy at the Southern Border.” New York Post, New York Post, 5 Feb. 2021, nypost.com/2021/02/05/biden-reinstates-catch-and-release-policy-at-southern-border/. Accessed 1 Nov. 2021.

Devine, Miranda, et al. “Biden Secretly Flying Underage Migrants into NY in Dead of Night.” New York Post, New York Post, 19 Oct. 2021, nypost.com/2021/10/18/biden-secretly-flying-underage-migrants-into-ny-in-dead-of-night/. Accessed 16 Nov. 2021.

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