What border Democrats are saying about Biden’s border
Conn Carroll
The Washington Post’s Greg Sargent is frustrated with the current state of the immigration debate in Washington. “When Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis sent planeloads of immigrants to Massachusetts in the fall, it received an extraordinary amount of coverage,” Sargent writes.
“DeSantis and other Republicans often set the frame of our national argument over immigration,” Sargent continued. “Democrats badly need to seize control of it on their own terms. Here’s one idea: Democrats should find ways to elevate the voices of lawmakers from Southwestern and border states on this issue.”
THE BIDEN BORDER CRISIS EXPLAINED
I couldn’t agree more. Sargent mentions Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ) as one lawmaker Democrats should elevate. Again, I couldn’t agree more. Here is what Kelly said about President Joe Biden’s immigration policies this fall on the campaign trail.
“When Democrats are wrong, like on the border, I call them out on it,” Kelly said in a debate with his Republican opponent Blake Masters. “I’ve spent a lot of time on our southern border, and let me just say it’s a mess. It’s chaos. It’s crisis after crisis.”
Sargent is right. Democrats should elevate and spread Kelly’s message that Biden’s border is nothing but “chaos” and “crisis.”
What about Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-TX), who was also locked in a close campaign in a border district? Here is what he has to say about the issue. “If you don’t deport people, they will see the border as a speed bump,” Cuellar told Fox News. “We have to deport people. We have to deport people who aren’t supposed to be here.”
Biden has deported record-low numbers of people since he became president. In fiscal 2022 alone, Biden let in 1.3 million immigrants arrested for crossing the southern border illegally and deported just 28,000 for immigration violations. Cuellar is dead right: The biggest reason immigrants are flooding the southern border is because Biden isn’t deporting people who have no right to enter our country.
Let’s try the Democratic former mayor of the border town of Del Rio, Texas, Bruno Lozano. “I’m right here, at the bridge, watching this thing spiral out of control. And Democrats in Washington are like, ‘Nothing to see here,’” Lozano told the Atlantic.
“It’s easy for [Democrats] to romanticize this whole situation. ‘They’re struggling! They need help! They’re coming here for a better life!’” Lozano continued. “It’s harder for them to come look at bodies of people who died in 107-degree heat. Kids who drowned. Border Patrol agents — who they’re so opposed to — trying to help pregnant mothers. None of this fits their narrative.”
“Democrats refuse to even call it a crisis,” Lozano said. “They’re gaslighting me.”
Democrats on the border know the truth about immigration. Immigrants are not flooding the border because they are suddenly being persecuted back home. There is a reason the immigrant surge began immediately after Biden became president. Immigrants know there are U.S. employers willing to pay immigrants less than they would native workers and that once they do cross the border, Biden will never deport them.
That is what is driving the crush of humanity at the southern border.
Until Democrats are ready to admit that truth, namely that it is Biden’s failure to turn away economic immigrants at the border that is the sole cause of this crisis, the border crisis will only get worse.
And Democrats such as Sargent will keep insisting there is no crisis at all.
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