On Monday, Rep. Nicole Malliotakis (R-NY) slammed President Joe Biden’s handling of the ongoing crisis at the U.S.-Mexico border.

Citing the rise in fentanyl deaths, Malliotakis lamented that Biden is “taking the side of the drug cartels and not the American people” with his border policy. She described the situation at the border as “a humanitarian crisis of epic proportions.”

“This is a humanitarian crisis of epic proportions. A lot of these children are being abused on their journey here to the United States,” Malliotakis warned on FNC’s “Fox & Friends.” “But it is having an impact on the resources that we have in our city or our state. The classrooms are overcrowded, and if you looked during the height of COVID to see the impact that illegal immigration had on our hospital system, that is also something that is affecting the citizens here in our city. But I think what’s most concerning to me is the rise in fentanyl deaths that we see from individuals who are smuggling fentanyl over the border. The DEA said that’s where it’s coming from — 80% of the fentanyl is coming that way, and that is why it is so critical that we secure this border now.”

“In addition to that, we saw 52 individuals with al-Qaeda ties that were stopped in Panama that were headed to the United States,” she continued. “There have been multiple people stopped at our border that are on the terrorist watch list. This is a grave concern of mine and should be of every single American. What the president is doing on purpose is taking the side of the drug cartels and not the American people. And we are extraordinarily concerned about this, and we continue to urge this president to secure our borders, particularly the Remain in Mexico policy of President Trump. He said he was going to do it in November. Let’s see if he does it because we will be holding him accountable every single day until he does do that because it did work. It was effective, and he should complete the barrier as well that we are paying for but he canceled the contract, and it’s just not being built.”

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