Biden has encouraged illegal immigration by decreasing the likelihood of deportation
Hamas’ recent terror attack on innocent Israeli civilians is a reminder that Joe Biden’s immigration policies are putting America’s security at risk.
The entire world, including nations and groups that want to kill Americans, know that there is no better time to enter the United States illegally.
It's thus unsurprising that a record number of migrants on the terror watch list are being arrested at the southern border. Our Border Patrol agents are highly skilled, but with a focus on in-processing and policies that undercut their core mission, dangerous people are bound to slip through the cracks.
Migrants who crossed the Rio Grande are lined up for processing by U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Sept. 23, 2023, in Eagle Pass, Texas. (AP Photo/Eric Gay, File)
A July Inspector General report revealed that in April 2022, Border Patrol arrested an illegal alien in Yuma, Arizona. They released him two days later after information they obtained indicated that he was "an inconclusive Terrorist Watchlist match."
ICE DEPORTS ILLEGAL IMMIGRANT WANTED FOR MURDER, HAD BEEN DETAINED SEVEN TIMES AT BORDER
Later, after checking in for a flight, it was discovered that this illegal alien was in fact a "positive Terrorist Watchlist match." After more than two weeks after release, he was thankfully arrested – more than enough time to carry out an attack.
President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris like to talk about the "root causes" of illegal immigration, in other words the "push" factors. But it’s the "pull" factors of their governance that are at the core of a self-inflicted crisis that continues to put Americans in danger.
We’ve all seen the images of migrant caravans and illegal aliens surging across the border with Mexico.
Border security does not end at the border. We must remain just as focused on interior enforcement efforts and Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) mission.
Since his first day in office, Biden has worked to incentivize illegal aliens to make the dangerous journey to America’s southern border by decreasing the likelihood that illegal aliens will be deported.
THOUSANDS OF CHINESE NATIONALS, GOTAWAYS AT THE SOUTHERN BORDER SINCE OCT. 1: SOURCES
One of his first actions, for example, was a moratorium on deportations that was thankfully blocked by a federal judge.
Then, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas issued a detailed memo that established a list of factors that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers must consider before investigating, questioning, arresting, detaining, prosecuting or removing illegal aliens in the United States.
This radical memo was expanded with another policy that prohibited ICE from initiating immigration enforcement actions in a broad list of locations, calling them "protected areas."
As the border crisis rages on with national security threats increasing, Biden and Mayorkas remain determined to quietly continue their concerted effort to undermine immigration enforcement.
A troubling new proposal from ICE called Release and Reporting Management (RRM) would increase illegal immigration if implemented, as it both rewards lawbreakers and highly reduces the chances of any deportation.
RRM is a program for the entire non-detained docket population, which is nearing 6 million illegal aliens – including criminals. It calls for "therapeutic services," "housing," "psychosocial services" and "food and clothing banks" to those on ICE’s non-detained docket.
This would be on the American taxpayer dime, costing well into the billions of dollars.
Not only does ICE plan to reward those who ignored our immigration laws, but it also wants virtually no proper monitoring as they await deportation proceedings.
A recent report exposed that RRM "would ensure that millions of illegal aliens released into the U.S. interior would only have to make annual check-ins with ICE. Most of those check-ins would not be in-person but rather done electronically."
This would complete Biden’s gutting of the ICE. The "Abolish ICE" movement didn’t go away, they just all got jobs in the Biden administration.
For example, Shoba Wadhia, who is the chief of the DHS Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties (CRCL), believes that simply being in the United States illegally and convicted of rape isn’t grounds for being a priority for deportation. Seriously.
Wadhia said in 2020, "I don’t know that any element of criminality should suffice to being a priority for enforcement, or even any felony for that matter, and I think that part of that has to do with how I view the role of prosecutorial discretion and the importance of looking at the whole person and equities."
How can someone like this be in a senior role at the agency in charge of keeping our nation secure?
Likewise, Claire-Trickler McNulty is reportedly leading the charge to implement RRM. This is unsurprising considering that Trickler-McNulty is behind ICE's shift to embrace social services over immigration enforcement. During her tenure, ICE put a group that supports abolishing the agency in charge of a pilot program.
The fact is, ICE is being abolished from within.
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It’s not just the ideological Left that "wins" from open borders, but America’s enemies like Hamas.
The continued dismantlement of immigration enforcement means a nonstop flow of illegal aliens at the border that we can’t possibly vet. It’s putting American lives in danger, and it must be stopped.
Joe Edlow recently served as acting director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS).