No border deal is possible while President Joe Biden’s decimation of law enforcement at the “radically insecure” border continues, writes Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) in the Miami Herald.
Rubio slammed Biden as “the greatest factor driving the border crisis,” insisting he has shown cannot be trusted to secure the border.
“If President Biden were serious, he would reinstate Trump-era policies, then ask Congress for additional authority. Unfortunately, President Biden gives no indication of being serious, and there is no reason to think that will change if Congress passes another law.”
Sen. James Lankford (R-OK), who was appointed lead negotiator on a border and foreign aid package by Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), defended the deal despite the final details remaining a mystery.
“Right now, there’s Internet rumors. It’s all that people are running,” Lankford said in a Fox News Sunday appearance.
File/Migrants take part in a caravan towards the border with the United States in Arriaga community, Chiapas State, Mexico, on January 8, 2024. (Photo by STRINGER/AFP)
Lankford referred to leaked details of the draft deal – so-called “trigger” authorization that would allow inflows to continue until hitting 8,500 illegal arrivals at the border in one day, or 5,000 arrivals seven days in a row – as the “most misunderstood section of this proposal.”
“This is not about letting 5,000 people in a day… You know, last four months, we’ve had seven days — in four months, we’ve had seven days that we had less than 5,000 people. This is set up if you have a rush of people coming at the border, the border closes down, no one gets in.”
“It would be absolutely absurd for me to agree to 5,000 people a day,” he continued. “This bill focuses on getting us to zero illegal crossings a day. There’s no amnesty.”
Yet Lankford then touted the deal’s funding and policies to intake and house migrants.
“It increases a number of Border Patrol agents and it increases asylum officers,” Lankford boasted. “It increases detention beds so we can quickly detain and then deport individuals.”
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He further boasted of the bill including funding for returning migrants to their country of origin. “It focuses on additional deportation flights out. It changes our asylum process so that people can get a fast asylum screening at a higher standard and then get returned back to their home country.”
Rubio is skeptical that a change in law would spur the migrant-thirsty Biden administration, which has taken steps as radical as cutting razor wire placed to deter migrants and shown no appetite to deport those in the country illegally, to change its approach.
He suggests Democrats’ have fundamentally different aims for an election year border package than reducing the inflow of migrants.
“[Biden] isn’t asking for money to build a wall, enforce existing laws or deport illegal immigrants” he wrote. “Instead, the president’s longstanding plea is for funds to speed up the processing of those immigrants into the U.S.”
Bradley Jaye is a Capitol Hill Correspondent for Breitbart News. Follow him on X/Twitter at @BradleyAJaye.