Jarrett Stepman, The Daily Signal
The President Joe Biden will soon open floodgates at the border to illegal immigration, while the Governor of Texas has vowed to fight back.
“To help local officials whose communities are being overwhelmed by hordes of illegal immigrants who are being dropped off by the administration, Texas is providing charter buses to send these illegal immigrants who have been dropped off by the Biden administration to Washington, D.C.,” Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said at a Wednesday press conference.
That may not resolve the issue, but at least it sends a message to Washington that this is a Washington-caused crisis that’s becoming intolerable for beleaguered border states.
In response to the Texas governor, a White House spokesman said that “enforcement of our country’s immigration laws lies with the federal government, not a state.”
RELATED: NC Congressman Introduces Bill To Restart Building Border Wall
At this point, however, “enforcement” seems like a poor choice of a word for describing what the Biden administration is doing at the border.
Recently, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced that Title 42 would be rescinded. This is a policy in public health that was one of few tools that could control illegal immigration and began after Biden took office on January 20, 2021.
The administrative rule, set for revocation May 23, was created by President Donald Trump’s administration and allowed for the rapid deportation of illegal immigrants coming from countries with an active COVID-19 pandemic.
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Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said in a statement that the administration plans to deport illegal immigrants regardless of the rule change, but given what’s happened in the past year, it’s hard to take that promise seriously.
As I wrote just before the Biden administration announced its intention to drop the rule, we are already looking at a huge, protracted problem at the border, a problem that the federal government has greatly exacerbated.
RELATED : GOP States Sue As Biden ADM. Lifts Title42 Order, Which Is Expected To Cause Surge Of Illegal Immigrationts At Border
Since Biden became president, there’s been an explosion of crossings at the southern border, the likes of which we haven’t seen in decades. Title 42 is ending one of the last stumbling blocks to what has been a torrent of illegal migrants flooding into the United States.
It is possible it will get worse. It’s hard to say precisely, but given that we are already sustaining record numbers of border crossings, the next wave could be historic.
In the past year alone, the Border Patrol has logged more than 2 million encounters with illegal immigrants at the border. Since its inception, February has seen the Department of Homeland Security record 164,973 illegal immigrants at the border. This is the largest February total since that time.
Currently, more than half of all illegal border crossing encounters end up as Title 42 expulsions, according to the Border Patrol. In addition, more immigrants will be encouraged and supported to cross the border, now that Title 42 has been repealed.
The Department of Homeland Security has said that it is planning to process about 18,000 migrants a day, double the current number. Jen Psaki from the White House was asked about this number. She appeared completely clueless and said that she didn’t think that would happen.
👀Peter Doocy, What are your plans for the 18,000 illegal aliens who cross the border every day?
Psaki: Where are you getting this number?
Doocy: Create your own Department of Homeland Security #BidenBorderCrisis pic.twitter.com/AV0xPMb2XU
— John Cooper (@thejcoop) April 7, 2022
These numbers could mean that approximately half a million people might be crossing the border monthly if they are accurate. This would break all records and would even shatter existing ones.
While the White House may be in denial, it’s clear that Texas and other border states are on high alert.
Texas National Guard soldiers in riot gear running drills in the RGV on how to respond to a “mass migration” event when Title 42 drops next month.
DHS projects up to 18,000 illegal crossings per *day* when that time comes. That’s more than double the current volume. @FoxNews pic.twitter.com/8Or3KCEUP0— Bill Melugin (@BillFOXLA) April 7, 2022
The Border Patrol is stretched to its limits, and border states are swamped with the responsibility of handling a humanitarian crisis that’s apparently about to get much worse.
Some Democrats worry about the effects of policy changes.
Arizona’s two Democratic senators, Kyrsten Sinema and Mark Kelly, already have expressed their opposition, and others are now joining in.
Sen. Raphael Warnock, D-Ga., hardly a moderate, released a statement saying that he’s also against ending Title 42 at this time. Both Kelly and Warnock are running for reelection next November.
NEW from Sen. Raphael Warnock’s office,
Georgia pastor doubles down his opposition to Trump-era public health reforms #immigrationPolitique Title 42
“Senator Warnock does not support lifting Title 42 at this time.”
A spokesperson completes the statement👇🏾#GASEN pic.twitter.com/QkRKKfzMru
— Eva McKend (@evamckend) April 7, 2022
Biden appears to be caving to the Democratic Party’s extreme left flank on illegal immigration. This has been his policy since taking office. As the crisis intensified, his administration has eliminated one after another border enforcement policy.
Talk-radio host Buck Sexton highlighted this reality in a piece for Fox News, writing:
Biden called for a 100-day moratorium to all deportations when he was inaugurated. Over the past year, interior enforcement of immigration laws has been almost entirely turned off, part of the systematic abuse of executive branch “prosecutorial discretion.”
President Biden chose to end the “Remain in Mexico” policy of his predecessor, President Trump, which had proven effective in re-establishing control of the border from illegal migrants’ rampant abuse of American asylum laws.
The administration now plans to repeal Title 42.
If the Biden administration was just dropping the policy because it was acknowledging that the COVID-19 pandemic was over, then why continue the student loan repayment moratorium, which will now extend to the end of August? Why keep a whole host of other COVID-19 policies in place?
Just weeks ago, Biden announced that the pandemic wasn’t over and launched a new government website on COVID-19.
Let’s just say that the Biden administration has been selective in its approach to the matter.
RELATED: Report: Border Agents Are Bracing For ‘Disaster,’ Expect 170,000 Illegal Immigrants In Just One Month
Three states have joined in a lawsuit to halt the administration’s order on Title 42. In addition, a bipartisan group of senators reportedly will back legislation that would block discontinuation of the policy.
Unfortunately, due to the Biden administration’s decisions, it’s almost certain that in the very near term, we will likely see the most acute border crisis in our lifetimes take a turn for the (even) worse.
The Daily Signal granted permission to syndicate this article.