Former Acting ICE Director Tom Homan reacts to reports of a terror suspect allowed to stay in the U.S. for two weeks before being arrested and discusses the ongoing national security threat posed by the border crisis. As another caravan consisting of thousands of migrants makes its way to the U.S.-Mexico border, Republicans in the House and Senate are renewing their calls for additional border security, calling on the Biden administration and Congress to change U.S. policies to stop more entries.
Organizers have told media outlets that there are an estimated 7,000 people in the caravan moving from southern Mexico to the United States, up from 5,000 earlier this week. One of the organizers had estimated that they were mostly from Cuba, El Salvador, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, and Venezuela. The Associated Press reported that migrants have complaints that processing for refugee and exit visas in Mexico had taken too long.
Caravans have been a regular feature at the border in recent years, heading to the border in both the Trump and Biden administrations. They often break up on their way to the border, with migrants either seeking relief in Mexico or moving to the U.S. border to seek entry in smaller groups. But the images of the enormous numbers of people heading to the border offer a snapshot of how many have surged into the U.S. under the Biden administration.
Republicans, who have accused the Biden administration of fueling the crisis with its rollback of Trump-era border policies and releases of migrants into the U.S. interior, blamed the latest caravan on the Biden administration. Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kansas, told Digital that what he said was a failure to secure the border “has signaled to bad actors across the globe that exploiting our borders comes without consequence.”
“The Biden administration has said it is restoring asylum pathways that were dismantled during the Trump administration and that it is dealing with a historic Hemisphere-wide crisis while expanding lawful pathways and implementing ‘consequences for illegal entry.’ It has called on Congress to pass immigration reform legislation to fix a ‘broken’ system, and for additional border funding — including a recent $14 billion request. The funding would also allow for the increased use of expedited removal of those in the country illegally and would hire additional staff including Border Patrol agents, attorneys, and processing coordinators.
Republicans have been skeptical of the calls from the Biden administration and pushed their own package, which would increase Border Patrol agents while limiting the ability of the administration to release migrants into the interior and increasing enforcement. House Homeland Security Counterterrorism Subcommittee Chairman August Pfluger told Digital that the caravans know that there are “no consequences for illegal entry into the U.S.”
“The President’s policies have incentivized millions of illegal crossings, and I am extremely concerned about the heightened risk of terrorism due to the wide-open southern border. President Biden must enforce our existing laws to secure the border, disincentivize illegal migration flows, and safeguard our national security,” he said.
“Tennessee Republican Senator Marsha Blackburn highlighted recent concerns about terrorism at the border, including record numbers of terror watchlist encounters: ‘This is an unacceptable national security and humanitarian crisis. With a 75% increase in terror watchlist apprehensions, we cannot afford to go another day with a wide-open and out-of-control southern border.'”
Sen. Ted Cruz, who introduced the Senate version of the House-passed border and immigration legislation, said that the response by the upper chamber should be to pass that legislation “to build a wall and protect Americans from the ‘caravan’ of unvetted illegal aliens attempting to flood our border.”
The Biden Border Crisis is threatening Americans, and this caravan is just the latest disaster in the long list of Biden’s failures.
