During a recent news conference, in defending the potential elimination of Title 42, White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre insisted the border is not “open” and that spreading misinformation about the border could aid smugglers who ferry migrants into the U.S.
Say what? During her tenure as Press Secretary, Jean-Pierre has developed a reputation for profoundly dopey utterances. However, this one may take the cake. Jean-Pierre didn’t explain how frank discussions about the situation at the border might aid criminal entities engaged in human trafficking. But she seemed to be asserting – absurdly and ridiculously – that alien smugglers are getting their information about the situation at the southern border from Fox News and other outlets willing to discuss the ongoing border crisis.
Of course, anybody with any understanding of immigration issues knows that the U.S./Mexico border is currently controlled by immigration smugglers and the cartels that employ them. And even if that weren’t the case, only an incompetent buffoon would believe that transnational criminal organizations are hanging out at their headquarters waiting for Peter Doocy to tell them that the Department of Homeland Security is completely overwhelmed and the border is open. Those facts are patently obvious to anyone who has seen the crowds massing along the banks of the Rio Grande.
The reason Team Biden doesn’t want to talk about the border is because it manufactured the current crisis. Claims that the White House is taking border enforcement seriously are farcical. The Biden Administration has deliberately deconstructed America’s immigration enforcement and border control mechanisms and it did so in order to attract large numbers of migrants to the U.S.
The simple fact of the matter is that the Biden Administration favors an America without borders. And, like the Obama Administration before it, will attempt to force the policy upon the American public, whether Americans want to live in a borderless world or not. One need only look at Biden’s campaign website and his administration’s early statements on immigration to figure this out. Those documents criticize the Trump Administration’s lawful adherence to the provisions of the Immigration and Nationality Act, as drafted by Congress. And one early White House release actually claimed that the Biden White House had a “plan for safe, lawful, and orderly migration” that would replace Trump’s “inhumane” policies.
In reality, Biden promptly repealed as many of Trump’s policies as possible and immediately provoked the largest, most devastating border crisis in our nation’s history. There is absolutely nothing safe, orderly or lawful about anything currently going on at our southern border. A record number of migrants have died along the border with Mexico on Joe Biden’s watch – by some estimates, as many as 853 – and those are just the untimely demises we actually know about. That is not evidence of a humane immigration policy. And disorderly mobs of illegal aliens have been rushing the U.S. border, in blatant violation of U.S. immigration laws. This looks and smells like an invasion rather than the lawful, orderly migration fantasy peddled by Biden’s minions.
The primary boon to the coyotes has been the current administration’s complete failure to enforce the provisions of the Immigration and Nationality Act, not any “misinformation” that smugglers have received from other parties. All along, it has been the Biden Administration sending a clear message to anyone who wants to enter the United States, “Get here. Say the magic word ‘asylum.’ We’ll let you in. And you’ll be allowed to stay until we figure out a way around the laws that say you have no path to any valid, lawful immigration status.” In effect, it’s open borders by executive fiat – if you will, DACA without even the fig leaf of an unlawful Executive Order.
So, what is the endgame: 1) Allow a massive number of illegal aliens into the United States. 2) Follow up with claims that we lack the resources and the political will to deport them all; and, in any case, it would be inhumane to do so. 3) Insist that the only way to proceed is to declare an amnesty and start over. Sooner or later, enough legislators who are squishy on immigration enforcement will cave and those in favor of mass migration will get the mass amnesty they have been angling for but haven’t had the votes to secure. The assumption is that once they have followed their newly created “path to citizenship,” the amnestied will vote for politicians who favor a big-government, globalist agenda, ensuring a progressive, anti-constitutionalist lock on America’s political leadership well into the future.
Accordingly, somebody should tell Ms. Jean-Pierre that it doesn’t matter what alien smugglers hear about the border, because as former acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement Tom Homan and I have already pointed out, the U.S. government via its deliberate failure to enforce America’s immigration laws is currently running the world’s most sophisticated human trafficking operation, and encouraging even more criminal behavior in the process.
Matt O’Brien is the director of investigations at the Immigration Reform Law Institute. Immediately prior to working for IRLI he served as an Immigration Judge. He has nearly 30 years of experience in immigration law and policy, having held numerous positions within the Department of Homeland Security.