The Afghanistan fiasco and then the vaccination mandates took center stage and steered attention away from the crisis at the border – but not for long, not when more than 4,000 illegal immigrants flooded Del Rio, TX in just 24 hours. Has President Joe Biden lost all semblance of control of America’s borders?
Fox News drone footage shows just how serious the issue is as the number of migrants under a bridge in Del Rio went from about 4,000 on Wednesday, Sept. 15 to approximately 8,200 on Thursday. A source told Fox that the situation is “out of control.” While Biden has blamed former President Donald Trump for the problem, saying Trump sealed off pathways to asylum, the commander-in-chief continues to press his strategy of fixing “root causes.” Republicans, on the other hand, point to the overwhelming numbers of illegal immigrants as proof positive Biden’s plans are not working and are only making things worse.
Law enforcement source on the ground at the bridge this morning just sent me this video showing the situation there. I’m told a large majority of the migrants are Haitians and more are crossing into the US and arriving at the bridge by the minute. BP w/ limited manpower @FoxNews pic.twitter.com/dHWCrhFikq
— Bill Melugin (@BillMelugin_) September 16, 2021
IN response, the Federal Aviation Authority banned the use of drones over the area for the next two weeks. Rather than allowing Americans to see what dire straits face Texas, the administration appears more willing to opt for censorship over solutions. Fox News reporter Bill Melugin tweeted “We’ve learned that the FAA just implemented a two week TFR (Temporary Flight Restrictions) over the international bridge in Del Rio, TX, meaning we can no longer fly our FOX drone over it to show images of the thousands of migrants. FAA says ‘special security reason.’”
The numbers for August have been released by Customs and Border Protection (CBP), and they are staggering. In August 2020, during the Trump administration, the CBP saw 50,014 encounters with migrants. In August 2021, the number was 208,887 – a whopping 317% increase. Going back even further during Trump’s presidency, August 2019 saw 62,707 encounters with illegals trying to get into the U.S., making this year a 233% increase under Biden’s administration. This is the second month in a row during which migrant encounters reached more than 200,000.
Brandon Judd, the National Border Patrol Council president, told Fox News in an interview that agents and personnel were being pulled from all the other borders – northern, southern, and coastal – to handle the huge numbers of illegals crossing at that point and that it is “destabilizing those borders as well.” He continued:
“So instead of the Biden administration looking at this problem and saying ‘there have been solutions in the past. This isn’t rocket science. We can come up with a solution immediately.’ They continue to pretend like it’s not happening. It’s like they’re putting their head in the sand and they’re not protecting the innocent. They’re not protecting United States citizens. And of course, those small children, that if we wouldn’t have found them, they would have died.”
The children he referred to are a two-year-old girl and a three-month-old baby abandoned along the Rio Grande river with just a note on the infant’s carrier saying they were from Honduras and that they were siblings.
COVID Fears
In March 2020, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) issued an emergency order to turn people away at the border, as authorized by 42 U.S.C. § 265, which allows the Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to “prohibit … the introduction” into the U.S. of people where “there is serious danger of the introduction of disease into the United States.” This allows Border Patrol and other personnel to reject a person if there is fear of communicable disease, such as – you guessed it – COVID. Of the 208,887 encounters in August, 44% were sent back to their countries, according to Fox News, but of the more than 86,000 family units, only 19% were expelled via Title 42.
As American citizens are at risk of losing their jobs if they don’t comply and get vaccinated, concerns about what is being done at the border to decrease the risk of the disease are mounting. Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas has consistently told Congress that the administration had a handle on the risks associated with the migrant surge. Judd, however, has a different story:
“I can personally tell you again that when they come into our custody, we don’t test them for COVID, we don’t vaccinate them, we just release them into the United States. He’s [Biden] requiring United States citizens to get vaccinated, but those people who enter our country illegally, they don’t have to get vaccinated. They’re able to spread that disease throughout the United States. Again, the hypocrisy knows no end with this administration.”
The news continues to get worse for the Biden administration and those leftists who cry out for open borders while Americans are shackled and restricted. Joseph V. Cuffari, the Department of Homeland Security’s inspector general, released an audit on Sept. 15 saying CBP’s policies are “not effective” because the agency must rely on communities to test and vaccinate migrants. He also explained that the CBP has neither the resources to handle this surge nor the power to quarantine those who do test positive. The audit also stated that Biden is not making use of Title 42 enough, which has led to “increased risk for CBP personnel, migrants in custody and local communities” from COVID. Even that limited usage is set to stop, however, with a federal judge in Washington, D.C. ordering the administration to cease using Title 42 altogether.
During the Trump administration, fewer illegals were coming into the country due to the strict policies in place, and those who did make it were tested. If they were contagious, Title 42 was used to send them packing. Now, the influx of illegals has swelled over 200% just since Biden took office, during a pandemic when we should have stricter border guidelines and policies.
From one crisis to another, the president is leading America down a potentially dangerous path. His approach to undoing Trump’s secure border legacy with one executive order after another has led to an unprecedented influx of illegal migrants hoping to enter the country. Has Biden lost complete control over the border? We might ask instead if he ever had it – or even wanted it.
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Read more from Kelli Ballard.
