On Tuesday, 25 Republican Governors sent a letter to President Joe Biden requesting information on how the crisis at the southern border is impacting every state.
Read MoreTag: Border Crisis
Biden’s Border Crisis Is Helping Fuel a Surge in Mexico’s Economy, New Data Shows
The border crisis under President Joe Biden has fueled Mexico’s economy through an increase in Mexican migrants in the U.S. sending money back home, according to multiple reports.
Remittances, the money sent by Mexicans working abroad sent back home, increased from $33.5 billion in 2018 to $60 billion in 2023 after a record number of migrants crossed the southern border, according to The Associated Press. From 2018 to 2022, Mexico’s poverty rate declined from 49.9% of the population to 43.5%, declining by 5.7 million, according to a study conducted by Coneval, an autonomous organization coordinated by the Secretariat of Welfare in Mexico.
Read MoreNew National Coalition of Sheriffs Forms to Address Border Crisis
Following through on a pledge he made during his first border security summit in Arizona and ahead of his next border trip to Texas on Monday, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis on Thursday announced the creation of a new national coalition of sheriffs committed to working together to combat crime stemming from the border crisis.
More than 90 sheriffs from 24 states are part of the coalition. Notably absent from the list are Texas border sheriffs who’ve been combating border-related crime for years.
Read MoreNearly 9 in 10 in New Poll Hold Feds Responsible for Border Crisis, Most Expect States to Fix
Almost 87 percent of Americans blame the federal government for the border crisis, according to a new poll conducted by the Trafalgar Group for Convention of States Action.
“With local and state government law enforcement resources overwhelmed by the large increase in illegal immigrants and asylum seekers needing assistance and increased drug cartel activity,” respondents were prompted, “do you believe it is the responsibility of states or the Federal government to handle these increased costs at the southern border?”
Read MoreCommentary: Biden’s Border Crisis Is About to Get Even Worse
All hell is about to break loose.
The crisis at the southern border is bad enough already. But what happens next month when Title 42, a Trump-era border enforcement measure, ends?
Read MoreCommentary: The Border Crisis and Violent Crime
When Joe Biden chose to revoke the Trump Administration’s border rules, he sparked an unprecedented crisis at the southern border. The illegal immigrant population has already risen by 2 million since Biden’s inauguration, and the flow has not stopped. Some of the consequences of this crisis are indisputable—a strain on border communities, a fiscal burden for taxpayers, and a weakening of the rule of law.
Read MoreMore than 200,000 Migrants Came to U.S. in December amid Mounting Border Crisis: CBP
Authorities encountered 216,162 migrants at the southwest land border in December of last year, according to data from U.S. Customs and Border Protection. That figures marks an 11 percent increase in unique encounters from November of the same year. The federal agency attributed the surge to influx of Cuban and Nicaraguan individuals fleeing authoritarian regimes in those countries.
Read MoreCommentary: America’s Border Crisis Is Biden-Made
The Biden administration’s open border policies and its refusal to fully enforce federal immigration laws have imposed huge costs on local communities across the country. Border states are groaning under the enormous cost of sheltering, feeding, educating, policing and providing medical care for tens of thousands of illegal aliens.
There are humanitarian costs, as well, paid by those who are assaulted and killed by the human traffickers, those who die from the fentanyl flooding across the border and those victimized by vicious criminals who have entered illegally.
Read MoreCommentary: Biden-Created Border Crisis About to Get Whole Lot Worse
One of the last serious border enforcement policies left under the Biden administration is just days away from being removed.
If it can be believed, things look to become much worse at the southern border, where tens of thousands of illegal immigrants and asylum-seekers are currently gathering.
Read MoreABC, NBC and CBS Criticized GOP Governors 13 Times More than Biden over Border Crisis, Study Shows
ABC, NBC and CBS evening newscasts criticized Republican governors over the migrant crisis 13 times more than President Joe Biden in August and September, according to a study released Tuesday.
At the same time, the news giants dedicated fewer than 12 minutes a month on average to covering the southern border crisis in their evening broadcasts in fiscal 2022 as record numbers of migrants came into the United States, the study from the nonprofit Media Research Center found.
Read MoreTrump Strongly Hints He May Run for President Again at Arizona Rally for MAGA Candidates
Former president Donald Trump held a Save America rally in Mesa, Arizona on Sunday afternoon to support the MAGA slate of candidates he’s endorsed in the state and to talk about the attacks he’s under. He dropped multiple hints at Mesa’s Legacy Sports Park that he may be running for president again in 2024.
Trump said, “We’ll be making a decision soon. I think everyone is going to be really happy.” He added later during the event that he got more votes in 2020 “than any sitting president in history. Now we may just have to do it again. Stay tuned.”
Read MoreThe Border Crisis Is Overwhelming the U.S. Asylum System
The record number of illegal migrants that have entered the United States since President Joe Biden took office are burdening the country’s immigration system, The New York Times reported.
Since the start of the Biden administration, migrants have flowed into the U.S. in record numbers, with 3,463,430 migrants encountered at the southern border between January 2021 and August 2022, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP). The high number of migrants entering the country are taxing the U.S. asylum system by increasing wait times and forcing cities and states to take on the burden of supporting them.
Read MoreBorder Chief in Sworn Testimony: Southern Border ‘Is Currently in a Crisis’
As part of ongoing litigation against the Biden administration, Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody continues to uncover what she calls “damning evidence” about the consequences stemming from Biden administration policies changing federal immigration laws.
Moody’s chief deputy on July 28 deposed U.S. Border Patrol Chief Raul Ortiz, who testified under oath that the Biden administration purposely reduced U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s detention capacity and changed the removal process of people illegally in the U.S.
Read MoreCommentary: The Neglected Victims of the Border Crisis
Given the destruction illegal immigration has been causing our country over the last several decades, it is fair to ask how we got here. How have a significant portion of citizens come to embrace policies that result in lawlessness, violence, and financial distress throughout the nation?
Read MoreAbbott Blasts Biden Administration’s Latest Immigration Policy, Saying It Endangers Americans
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott blasted President Joe Biden Friday for making what he called another “reckless” immigration policy decision to terminate the public health rule known as Title 42. By doing so, the number of illegal immigrants expected to enter the country will more than double those who entered illegally last year, law enforcement officials estimate.
“President Biden’s open-border policies are an unmitigated disaster for national security,” Abbott said in a statement. “His recklessness has forced the State of Texas to take unprecedented steps to fill the gaps – including deploying Texas Department of Public Safety troopers and over 10,000 Texas National Guard soldiers, jailing illegal immigrants who are charged with trespassing, and becoming the first state ever to build a wall to secure the border.
“Instead of listening to the millions of Americans that his administration has endangered – and instead of enforcing immigration laws passed by Congress – President Biden has chosen to jeopardize the safety and security of those very Americans he swore to protect and defend by ending Title 42 expulsions.”
Read MoreCommentary: Stimulus Checks Are the Latest Immigration Scam
A great plague of our contemporary political landscape is that one bad policy begets even more bad policies. Such is the case with many of America’s existing immigration laws.
Federal law, for example, calls for specific enforcement protocols. But our elected representatives have decided that some of those protocols simply should be ignored. This mindset led to ideas like catching and then releasing illegal aliens into our communities, preventing local law enforcement from working with federal law enforcement, and “sanctuary” cities where those who have broken our laws can hide from accountability.
From this witches’ brew of bad ideas has come the latest product rollout, one suited for our time: stimulus checks for illegal aliens. Using the economic damage caused by COVID-19 as a pretext, anti-borders activists and their allied politicians have found a way to sustain those here illegally while creating further incentives for even more foreign nationals to move here.
Read MoreSouthern Border Migrant Encounters Increased in February
Border officials encountered 164,973 migrants at the U.S.-Mexico border in February, according to a U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) announcement Tuesday.
The figure represents a 7% increase from January’s encounters, according to CBP.
CBP Commissioner Chris Magnus said in a statement that February’s overall operational numbers result from “the continued economic rebound from the depths of the COVID pandemic, with CBP officers processing more than 2.8 million shipments in legitimate trade valued at more than $236 billion.”
Read MoreBiden’s Border Recipe: Let Illegals Flood the Country and Drastically Reduce Deportations
After an historic year of illegal migrants entering the United States, the Biden administration has belatedly revealed the impact of another leg of its border strategy: a sharp reduction in arrests and deportations.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement reported Friday interior immigration arrests fell to 74,082 in fiscal 2021, down from 103,000 in 2020 and 143,000 two years ago.
Likewise, deportations fell a stunning 70% to 59,011 last year, the lowest number in 26 years. The lack of deportations marked a precipitous drop from the Obama and Trump years, when expulsions often topped 300,000 or more annually.
Read More‘Tragic’: Border Officers Catch Several Female American Citizens Storing Nearly a Pound of Fentanyl in Their Bodies
U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers in El Paso, Texas, in the last two weeks have intercepted multiple American women carrying fentanyl concealed in their private areas.
“It is tragic that people are willing to put themselves in these dangerous situations,” CBP El Paso Director of Field Operations Hector A. Mancha said in a statement. “This synthetic opioid is so powerful that if a package were to rupture inside the body, the consequences could be life threatening.”
On Feb. 24 a 31-year-old woman, who is a U.S. citizen, was carrying .394 pounds of fentanyl that she removed from her inside private parts after a pat down, where CBP officers at the Port of Ysleta felt something foreign in her private area during a secondary search, according to CBP.
Read MoreDemocrats ‘Aiding and Abetting’ Border Humanitarian Crisis, Says Arizona Sheriff
Democrats are “aiding and abetting” the humanitarian crisis along the southern border, as “women are being raped on a daily basis,” Arizona’s Pinal County Sheriff Mark Lamb said on Thursday.
“It shouldn’t matter whether you’re a Republican, Democrat or Independent,” Lamb told “Just the News, Not Noise” TV show cohosts John Solomon and Amanda Head. “If you care about human beings, you should absolutely care about border security. Why? Women are being raped on a daily basis … kids are being used as pawns, men are being extorted.”
Read MoreCommentary: By Design, Biden’s Border Crisis is Actually His Biggest Success
President Joe Biden’s no-border policy has detonated an explosion of illegal-alien apprehensions and got-aways at the southern “frontier.”
Millions of Americans consider this one of Biden’s biggest failures, surpassed only by his utterly calamitous withdrawal from Afghanistan. However, this fiasco is Biden’s finest hour.
After 11 months, Biden’s “border” remains wide open, if not functionally erased. Illegal aliens cascade across. Between Feb. 1 and Dec. 31, 2021, on Biden’s watch, Customs and Border Protection apprehended a record 1,956,596 illegal aliens on the southern “frontier,” versus 511,192 one year earlier, under then-President Donald Trump—up 283%.
Read MoreMexican Border Arrests Hit Record High in 2021, Data Show
Arrests at the U.S./Mexican border reached a new high last year, driven by a surge in attempted crossings into the United States in the first year of the Biden administration.
Border agents recorded just under 2 million arrests in 2021, data released from a lawsuit against the Biden administration showed this week.
Read MoreTrump Raises Possibility of Pardons for January 6 Defendants, Slams Biden on Border
Former President Donald Trump vowed Saturday night to ensure fairness for the Jan. 6 defendants if he is voted back into office, including possible pardons for some.
“If I run, and if I win, we will treat those people from Jan. 6 fairly,” Trump told a raucous rally in Conroe, Tex.
“And if it requires pardons, we will give them pardons,” he added. “Because they are being treated so unfairly.”
Trump also dismissed Democrats in Washington as “raving lunatics” who put “America last” and suggested President Biden was more concerned about protecting Ukraine’s border from Russia than America’s border from illegal migrants.
Read MoreBorder Crisis 2022: Federal Agents Arrest More Than 30 Fugitives Wanted on Sex Crimes, Murder, Other Charges
In the first few weeks of 2022, U.S. Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) agents in the El Paso Sector of New Mexico and West Texas arrested at least 34 known fugitives wanted on charges such as aggravated sexual assault of a child, second degree murder, sexual exploitation of a minor, kidnapping of a minor, and indecency with a child and lewd acts upon a child.
“Homeland security is our primary mission and every time a CBP officer identifies and arrests someone who is being sought by law enforcement, that makes our communities a little safer,” Hector Mancha, El Paso Director of Field Operations, said in a statement. “The vast majority of travelers CBP officers encounter pose no risk, but it is important that we identity and stop those who do.”
Agents arrested both men and women, U.S. citizens, lawful permanent residents, and illegal immigrants. They were wanted by law enforcement officials in Texas, Louisiana, New Mexico, North Carolina, and California. Once the suspects were processed by border agents, they were turned over to federal and or state authorities to face prosecution, according to CBP.
Read MoreCommentary: Securing America’s Border and Communities Is Our Government’s First Duty
Remember when President George W. Bush said this?
I’ve had a lot of experience with dealing with borders, as the Governor of Texas. I know there’s a compassionate, humane way to deal with this issue. I want to remind people that family values do not stop at the Rio Grande River.
It was January 2005. Bush had just won reelection with a campaign strong on national security. Then after narrowly defeating John Kerry, Bush did what Bushes tend to do when they think they’re secure: He lurched to the Left and betrayed the base of his own party. He cast Americans who want a strong, secure border as racists—just four years after we had been attacked by international terrorists who exploited our weak immigration system to kill thousands of us. Bush behaved as if Americans didn’t know that Mexicans living south of the Rio Grande believe in family. Millions of Americans have Mexican heritage themselves. But they or their ancestors chose to be Americans.
Read MoreIn Shadows of Maxwell Trial, Sex Traffickers Continue to Exploit Porous Southern Border
The trial and conviction of Ghislaine Maxwell handed anti-sex trafficking advocates a big victory this week and focused public attention for a short while on a heinous criminal scourge. But in the case’s shadows, a painful reality plays out at America’s southern border, where U.S. Border Patrol agents almost daily encounter bad actors in the illicit sex trades.
The holidays were no exception.
A few days before Christmas, over a 24-hour period, Laredo Sector Border Patrol agents intercepted three human smuggling attempts which resulted in the apprehension of over 70 foreign nationals illegally in the U.S. They also recovered a stolen vehicle, and a methamphetamine seizure north of Laredo, Texas.
Read MoreCommentary: It Is So Important Not to Offend Those Breaking Our Laws
The adage that “actions speak louder than words” may be true, but the right words applied to the right situation can inspire actions that otherwise would not be taken.
We are seeing this in dramatic fashion in our current border crisis, which now appears to be the realized dream of Barack Obama when he spoke about “fundamentally transforming the United States of America” 13 years ago. We as a nation are undeniably transforming, and most Americans would argue for the worse. The wheels of that transformation have been lubricated by the enabling language of the anti-borders Left.
Read MoreAt Least 54 Dead After Migrant Truck Crashes in Mexico
At least 54 people were killed and more than 100 others were injured when a truck full of migrants crashed in southern Mexico on Thursday, The New York Times reported.
The accident occurred when a truck carrying more than 100 people overturned, the head of the state Civil Protection Service, Luis Manuel García Moreno, told Milenio TV, the NYT reported. It is one of the deadliest accidents involving migrants in decades.
The truck contained passengers who were mostly migrants traveling from Central America, and it was moving at an “excessive” speed when it rounded a sharp curve and flipped, a witness told García, the NYT reported. The truck then crashed into a pedestrian bridge and construction close by.
Read MoreReport: Nearly 10,000 Illegal Immigrants Have Evaded Arrest at the Border Since October
Over 9,500 illegal immigrants have evaded arrest and entered the country in one part of the southern border since Oct. 1, Fox News reported.
The Rio Grande Valley sector of the border in Texas also had 100,000 illegal encounters since the beginning of Oct., a 163% increase since the same time frame in 2020, an anonymous Department of Homeland Security (DHS) source told Fox News.
Migrants continue to cross the border in large numbers. From Oct. 1, 2020 to Sept. 30, 2021, border agents encountered over 1.7 million at the southern border.
The Biden administration reportedly reinstated former President Donald Trump’s “Remain in Mexico” policy that requires asylum seekers to apply and await a court date in Mexico.
Read MoreBiden Administration Refuses to Release Full Number of Illegal Alien Population
In an unprecedented move, the Biden White House still has not yet released an official total of the number of illegal aliens who are currently occupying the United States, the Washington Free Beacon reports.
Although the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has given those numbers to Congress in a report, that report has not yet been made public. Common practice dating back to the Obama Administration has been to release the report publicly shortly after the Congressional briefing, with a focus on the number of possible visa overstays. Congress has warned that “the large number of annual in-country alien overstays threatens national security and the integrity of legal immigration.”
The report in question is formally called the “Entry/Exit Overstay Report,” and documents foreigners who were originally approved to stay in the United States with a visa, but whose visas have since expired. The report is compiled using travel data across multiple agencies, including DHS and the State Department.
Read MoreWith Migrant Caravan en Route to Texas, Border Was ‘Not a Focus’ in Biden Talks with Mexican Leader
As another caravan of Central Americans and Haitians heads north to the U.S. southern border, the Biden administration is making little apparent effort to comply with a federal judge’s order to reinstate the Remain in Mexico Policy, while also claiming to be focusing on border security.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who has repeatedly sued the administration over immigration, says the administration is inviting illegal aliens to the U.S. while also making it harder for Border Patrol agents to do their jobs.
A caravan of roughly 2,000 Central Americans and Haitians left Tapachula, Mexico recently — the same day President Biden met with Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador. Instead of sending a clear message to the caravan to turn around, the leaders sent an implicit message that the border is open and the Remain in Mexico Policy remains inoperative.
Read MoreCommentary: Myths About a Border Crisis by Design and for Destruction
For decades Americans have witnessed the gradual disintegration of our southern border. It has angered a lot of people, but it hasn’t affected most people’s lives directly, so little has been done about it. Apart from a brief four-year law and order hiatus under Donald Trump, the fire has burned steadily and under current leadership is now an uncontrollable inferno. How did we get here?
We got here in part because the government and the corporate media have peddled a number of myths, also known as lies, to fool enough citizens that the border fire was under control. It is time to identify and debunk some of the biggest ones here.
Lie #1: The recent surges at the border are spontaneous events created by root causes in Latin American countries where people are fleeing persecution and violence.
Read MoreTexas’ Effort to Secure the U.S.-Mexico Border Underway
RIO GRANDE VALLEY — A top official within Texas’ effort to secure the U.S.-Mexico border told the Daily Caller News Foundation that his troops are prepared for a worst case scenario situation and that they can be deployed within hours to tackle it.
“We’re prepared to repel and block any sized element coming across,” The Texas National Guard border public affairs officer Major Mike Perry told the DCNF. “That’s what the rehearsals are for. Typically, they’re focused on one area cause it’s your low crossings and your ports. So, we can be anywhere with our ground assets in three hours to get the Steel Curtain up and prepare for it, and, of course, you saw the Contingency Reaction Force fly in with the military police.”
The Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS) and the Texas National Guard are prepared to “surge” resources to any location in Texas to “repel and block” large caravans or other illegal activity crossing the border, Perry explained.
Read MoreOctober Southern Border Encounters See 129 Percent Increase over Last Year
Border Patrol agents encountered 129.7% more people at the southern border this year than last, according to new data published by U.S. Customs and Border Protection.
The greatest number of encounters was in the Rio Grande Valley in Texas and the greatest percentage increase was in Yuma, Arizona.
Illegal border crossings have skyrocketed since President Joe Biden took office in January.
Read MoreKamala Harris Meets with Mexican President to Talk About Everything But the Border
Vice President Kamala Harris met with Mexican President Andres Manuel López Obrador to discuss everything but the border, according to a Thursday press release.
Harris and Obrador didn’t appear to discuss the Biden administration’s pending implementation of former President Donald Trump’s Remain in Mexico program or other issues overwhelming U.S. border officials, such as increased migration to the country, according to the statement.
“Vice President Harris and President López Obrador agreed to continue working together to address the root causes of migration from Central America and the need for a regional approach to migration in the Western Hemisphere,” according to the press release.
Read MoreMigrants Are Setting Up Camps Across Mexico, Hoping to be Allowed into the U.S.
New migrant campsites have sprung up around Mexico throughout 2021 as migrants have grown uncertain of whether they’ll be able to remain in the U.S., the Associated Press reported Thursday.
Camps are full of migrants, including many children and those who can’t apply for asylum in the U.S. because of Title 42 restrictions, who have to wait in Mexico as their cases proceed through U.S. immigration courts, according to the AP. Title 42 is a Trump-era public health order implemented in response to the COVID-19 pandemic that prevents some migrants from remaining in the U.S. while seeking asylum and allows border officials to rapidly expel most migrants from the country.
Hundreds of Mexican law enforcement officials raided an encampment in Tijuana and required migrants to register for credentials or evacuate the area on Oct. 28, the AP reported. The migrants who registered and stayed were soon surrounded by a mile of chain-link fence.
Read MoreCommentary: Illegal Immigrants Would Get $10.5 Billion from Reconciliation Bill
The budget reconciliation package pushed by Democrats creates a new expanded child tax credit (CTC) that would pay illegal immigrants some $10.5 billion next year. All immigrants with children are eligible, regardless of how they got here and whether their children are U.S.-born. This includes the roughly 600,000 unaccompanied minors and persons in family units stopped at the border in FY2021 and released into the country pending a hearing. Cash welfare to illegal immigrants is not just costly; it also encourages more illegal immigration.
Although it is referred to as a “refundable credit,” the new CTC, like the old additional child tax credit (ACTC) it replaces, pays cash to low-income families who do not pay any federal income tax. The new program significantly increases the maximum cash payment from $1,400 per child to $3,600 for children under 6, and to $3,000 for children ages 6 to 17. After 2022, the maximum payment would be $2,000 per child, but advocates hope the much larger payments will be extended.
In an analysis conducted in October, my colleague Karen Zeigler and I estimated that illegal immigrants with U.S.-born children would receive $8.2 billion from the new CTC. However, we had assumed that the new program, like the old ACTC, would require children claimed as dependents to have Social Security numbers (SSNs). But reconciliation (page 1452, line 14) would permanently repeal this requirement.
Read MoreWisconsin Senator Johnson to Mayorkas: Crisis at Border Result of Failed Biden Policies
Wisconsin Senator Ron Johnson (R-WI) wrote a letter to Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Mayorkas demanding answers about Biden’s ‘failed policies’ at the border. Johnson wanted to know when the government was made aware of the surge of Haitian immigrants at the border and why they ignored that intelligence.
Read MoreBorder Patrol: 27 Percent of Migrants Arrested at Border Are Repeat Offenders, Many with Other Criminal Convictions
Federal law enforcement officers arrested more than 17,300 migrants with past convictions of other crimes attempting to cross the border illegally last fiscal year. That’s up from 9,447 in fiscal 2020.
The federal government’s fiscal year runs from Oct. 1 through Sept. 30.
An additional 8,979 in fiscal 2021 were of migrants with outstanding arrest warrants against them from other law enforcement agencies.
Read MoreImmigration Advocates in Biden Administration Were Totally Unprepared for Border Crisis, AP Says
Immigration advocates working as advisers for the Biden administration were completely unprepared for the border crisis rolling back former President Donald Trump’s immigration policies would create, the Associated Press reported on Wednesday.
Supporters of immigration on the Biden administration’s transition team dismissed estimates predicting increased migration to the U.S. if Trump’s policies were repealed and instead tried to see how fast they could get rid of the practices, according to obtained internal documents and interviews conducted by the AP.
Read MoreCommentary: The Migrant Surge at the Southern Border Fuels Massive American Fentanyl Overdoses
On a September afternoon, Allyssia Solorio wondered why her energetic young brother hadn’t emerged from his bedroom in their Sacramento, Calif., home. When she opened his door, she saw 23-year-old Mikael leaning back on his bed with his legs dangling over the side. She rushed to her brother and shook him, but to no avail. He was dead. A counterfeit pharmaceutical pill laced with illicit fentanyl had killed him.
Mikael Tirado was one of an estimated 93,331 overdose fatalities in the United States last year – an all-time high. Nearly five times the murder rate, the deadly overdose toll was primarily caused by fentanyl, a highly lethal synthetic opioid. It’s manufactured mostly by Mexican cartels with ingredients imported from China, and then smuggled over the southwestern U.S. border. Fentanyl has been arriving in larger quantities each year since at least 2016.
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