Support for America First border policy
Recently, Border Patrol agents apprehended three men attempting to enter New Mexico unlawfully wearing camouflage “ghillie” suits designed to make them blend into the brush. It’s clear that Mexican cartels and traffickers feel emboldened to undertake such measures — moves they wouldn’t have considered 18 months ago. The Biden Administration inherited one of the most secure borders but have thrown it into total chaos.
In July, the Biden administration picked up another 10 known or suspected terrorists (KSTs) at the border. That now makes 66 KSTs apprehended this fiscal year alone and 81 total during the Biden Administration. For comparison, 14 total KSTs were captured between fiscal years 2017 and 2020 combined during the Trump Administration. These individuals are choosing to illegally cross the border now because they know that lax border policies increase the likelihood of not being identified or being released into the country anyway.
There is no telling how many KSTs and other bad actors made it across the border undetected in the past 18 months. U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) continue to be overwhelmed with no end in sight for the border crisis. Through July, with two months left in the current fiscal year, CBP apprehended 1.94 million people attempting to cross the southern border illegally, already surpassing fiscal year 2021’s record total of 1.73 million apprehensions.
Nearly 50% of border apprehensions in July were of non-Mexican, non-Northern Triangle migrants. The federal government would like us to believe that “root causes” in Central America are driving this blatant abuse of the asylum system, but in reality, it is the Biden Administration’s “America Last” policies.
It’s not just the human smuggling and trafficking — it’s also the criminal cartels bringing in deadly drugs, all but unimpeded. The Biden Administration declared Sunday, Aug. 21, as “National Fentanyl Prevention and Awareness Day,” but that’s a hollow effort when it does little to stop the flood of deadly drugs that regularly pours into the country.
“According to the CDC, 107,375 people in the United States died of drug overdoses and drug poisonings in the 12-month period ending in January 2022,” the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration said in a press release. “A staggering 67% of those deaths involved synthetic opioids like fentanyl.”
In July, there was enough fentanyl seized in the country to kill every man, woman, and child in America. And we’re seizing only a fraction of what makes it into the country. That’s why every state is a border state. The border crossers and drugs don’t just stay at the border. They are dispersed throughout the country.
What’s clear is that the Biden Administration’s record at the border is one of absolute failure. And they have no new ideas or strategies to solve the crisis.
How do we respond? We encourage leaders in Congress next year to enact strong oversight in this area — an oversight severely lacking under a unified Congress controlled by the Left and a complicit media. Congress can also use the power of the purse to deny taxpayer dollars being used to fund the continuation of these failed border policies.
It’s time to enact the America First Agenda. This requires enforcement of the law, finishing the wall, and ending human trafficking. There is an opportunity to address these critical issues and place the safety and well-being of American citizens first. After all, America’s future is America First.
U.S. Rep. Yvette Herrell, R-N.M., and Chad Wolf, former acting Homeland Security secretary and director of the America First Policy Institute
This article originally appeared on Las Cruces Sun-News: Herrell and Wolf: Support America First border policy
