No more excuses, Republicans must secure the border: Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX-District 21)
Today, if migrants wants to enter the United States illegally, they pay a cartel to cross through the Rio Grande into the U.S. and then seek out the Border Patrol to claim asylum. Because of the Biden administration’s policies and existing loopholes in our laws, they know they will almost certainly be released and likely never removed.
Allowing “asylum” to be the exception that swallows the rule of border security has caused a catastrophic deluge of our border from around the world. Since President Joe Biden took office, we’ve encountered over 2.7 million illegal migrants at our southern border, over 234,000 in April alone. Ergo, Customs and Border Protection agents are processing migrants, leaving stretches of the southern border wide open for exploitation by cartels and traffickers.
More than 700,000 people have evaded law enforcement at our southern border since the start of FY 2021, and thousands of pounds of lethal fentanyl have evaded capture, while over 100,000 Americans have died from drug poisonings. Hundreds of migrants have died along our border or in the Rio Grande, while thousands more have been put into the human trafficking trade as cartels exploit the entire situation for profit.
It doesn’t have to be this way. The people both need and deserve a secure border, but ending the crisis is going to require Republicans in Washington, D.C., to grow a spine, dig in, and fight to keep their promises for once.
If the people ever again entrust Republicans to lead the House of Representatives or any other part of the federal government, there can be no more excuses. We must secure the border by closing the physical gaps in our border infrastructure and the legal ones on the books. That means requiring the Department of Homeland Security to carry out border enforcement policies, requiring ICE to remove all illegal immigrants through full interior enforcement, completing all physical border infrastructure, and bringing cartels and criminal organizations to their knees.
Republicans should make this clear now, before the elections, and then actually go and do it.
1) Require DHS to carry out border enforcement policies: Several simple policies would secure the border by ending the abuse of asylum and “release” into the country. Similar to the use of the CDC authority, “ Title 42 ,” the DHS must have the authority to turn away illegal migrants. With that authority, we should make clear that if the DHS secretary cannot fully detain asylum-seekers ( per current statute) and these individuals cannot be placed outside the country in a program consistent with the “ Remain in Mexico Policy ,” they will be turned away. The default policy when CBP is overwhelmed should never be “release.”
We must then realign the definition of asylum and the asylum process to the purpose of the policy , which is currently widely abused. Most migrants claiming asylum have no “credible fear” per federal law, yet thousands claim it and are then released into the U.S. “pending adjudication” of their claim. The USCIS website even lays out how to abuse this clear loophole. So we must end it and all of the “catch and release” loopholes that endanger children in the name of protecting them. Families should be detained together, but a 1997 court decision, the Flores settlement, prohibits us from doing so, creating a perverse incentive for adults to bring children, knowing they will all be released.
We also have to crack down on taxpayer funds going to nonprofit groups that facilitate illegal migration, and then immediately audit the activities of nonprofit organizations funded through the United Nations or otherwise . We should defund and prosecute organizations promoting such dangerous and illegal activities. We also need to establish new rules to facilitate returning UACs to their home countries quickly and safely, rather than releasing them to illegal immigrants and ironically increasing their chances of becoming trafficking victims.
2) Complete all physical border infrastructure: Border infrastructure obviously starts with completing the wall, but it does not stop there. Today, more than 600 miles of the border are still unfenced in Texas. Fencing works. The data prove it: Over a 12-year period from 1992 to 2004, apprehensions in the San Diego sector declined by 76% with the building of border fencing. This shouldn’t be political; Biden himself voted for the Secure Fence Act of 2006.
What should be even less political is building navigable roads and clearing the Carrizo cane that inhibits CBP enforcement along the Rio Grande. Carrizo cane is thick and grows as high as two stories, making visibility for law enforcement along the Rio Grande impossibly low. Cartels exploit the cane and make tunnels to move traffic through it. The vast majority of the southern border has no navigable roads, leaving CBP to use 4-wheel drive, go on foot, and navigate a complex web of private gates and city barriers. In Laredo, it’s estimated that agents only have roughly seven miles of improved road. Without better border infrastructure, agents can’t easily get through to the border, and worse, they can’t stop illegal migrants and dangerous cartels from getting through it.
3) Require ICE to remove all illegal immigrants through full interior enforcement: The border crisis isn’t just at the border. We must also strengthen interior enforcement and increase penalties for violations, starting with ending the loopholes that let DHS circumvent current laws requiring them to detain illegal migrants while their applications for asylum are processed. We must end DHS’s abuse of prosecutorial discretion and parole authority to release at least tens of thousands of illegal migrants into the interior, and we must end all other alternative pathways to detention.
We must also identify and remove all illegal migrants who have been released or have “gotten away” counter to our laws, even if they are “just” here undocumented . This means aggressively removing visa overstays and establishing a modern entry-exit system at land ports of entry to align with the progress made at air and seaports. Visa overstays cannot go unaddressed — even folks admitted legally to the U.S. can pose a threat. For example, some of the 19 hijackers carrying out the Sept. 11 attacks were visa overstays.
4) Target cartels and criminal organizations: Finally, we must target and destroy cartels and criminal organizations. That means designating cartels as Foreign Terrorist Organizations , or some equivalent. This designation would open up new sanctions, penalties, and authorities that would allow the government to prosecute or deport all cartel members, associates, and affiliates. At the same time, we must increase criminal penalties for trafficking of both humans and drugs. Human trafficking organizations make over $150 billion per year in profits. Our current punishments and enforcement are clearly not a sufficient deterrent for this despicable business.
Securing our border isn’t complicated, and politics shouldn’t make it so. If Republicans ever regain power in this town, we must immediately act to secure the border, rather than merely discussing it in press conferences, roundtables, or task forces. Too many innocent people have fallen victim on both sides of our open southern border, and we must prevent these atrocities from continuing.
If we fail to do so, we should be firmly held accountable.
Congressman Chip Roy is a Republican representing Texas’s 21st Congressional District.
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