The defenders of open US borders like to sell the happy, optimistic narrative that asylum seekers are primarily innocent people looking to build a better life in the United States. The raw data, however, points to a much more complicated story.
It’s the rarest occurrence of all when politicians admit that they were wrong, but that’s what is (almost) happening in Democrat-ruled cities, including New York, Chicago and Los Angeles, which are being forced to absorb a continuous influx of migrants, together with a large slab of humble pie.
“Let me tell you something New Yorkers, never in my life have I had a problem that I did not see an ending to — I don’t see an ending to this,” New York City Mayor Eric Adams told a hushed audience in Manhattan as he called for federal assistance just days before the anniversary of 9/11. “This issue will destroy New York City.”
“We are past our breaking point,” Adams continued with his apocalyptic plot. “New Yorkers’ compassion may be limitless, but our resources are not.”
Back on the campaign trail in 2021, Adams' campaign posted on what was then Twitter: "We should protect our immigrants. Period. Yes, New York City will remain a sanctuary city under an Adams administration."
Much of the Democratic Party’s headache stems from the creation of so-called ‘sanctuary cities,’ defined as a municipality that limits or rejects cooperation with the federal government in enforcing immigration law. In other words, the sort of neighborhood Antifa would fully endorse. Sanctuary policies have been around since the late 1970s, but they were practically unheard-of until quite recently. The Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) estimated that 564 US jurisdictions had adopted sanctuary policies in 2018. To put that into perspective, there were just 40 such protected zones when Barack Obama was sworn into the White House in 2009. Not surprisingly, many illegal migrants, without any means of supporting themselves, flock to these ‘arrest-free’ zones where they can take advantage of social services such as housing, health care and public education without any fear of deportation. But it goes beyond just free handouts.
Here is how FAIR describes sanctuary cities, and the obstacles they place in front of law enforcement and border patrol: “In their various forms, [sanctuary policies] forbid state and local officials (including law enforcement officers) from asking people about their immigration status; reporting suspected illegal aliens to the federal government; holding criminal aliens for arrest by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE); or otherwise cooperating with or assisting federal immigration enforcement agents. These policies endanger public safety and enjoy very little public support. Rather, they are the product of intense pressure from well-funded groups that oppose nearly all forms of immigration enforcement, or due to the capitulation by local officials in the face of threatened lawsuits by self-anointed ‘civil liberties’ organizations.”
The ACLU, for example, is of the opinion that the actions of sanctuary cities “represent basic American values: a spirit of inclusiveness and respect for individual rights.”
In other words, entering the US illegally now ranks up there with “basic American values.”
Without any feasible barrier to prevent them from entering the US, nor a legal basis to apprehend them, it’s no surprise that there are an estimated 16.8 million illegal aliens residing in the USA – a whopping 16% surge since the start of Biden’s presidency. This massive influx has forced New York City to declare a humanitarian crisis that will cost taxpayers about $12 billion over three years – unless financial aid is forthcoming from the US government (Trump’s much bewailed wall would have only cost $21.6 billion, a one-time bill that would have relieved Democrats of their unaffordable virtue-signaling that is only getting them angry voters). Bailout funds from Uncle Sam seem unlikely, however, as Washington is too preoccupied with pumping weapons into Ukraine to bother itself with more pressing domestic issues.
Incidentally, the Republicans are manipulating the Democratic Party’s sanctuary policies to great effect. Texas Governor Greg Abbott, for example, whose border state has been inundated with more than a million illegals in the past 11 months, has bussed more than 13,500 migrants to the Big Apple since last spring. Meanwhile, exactly one year ago, Florida’s Republican governor Ron DeSantis triggered a “humanitarian situation” in Massachusetts, authorities said, by deporting about 50 illegals to the island of Martha’s Vineyard – a getaway primarily populated by the wealthy elite, like the Obamas and the Clintons – without notice. Needless to say, the Democrats were not amused and the illegals were quickly sent packing, thereby betraying the hypocrisy of the establishment.
However, there are other issues connected to an open border that are more pressing, like national security. On September 14, the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration Integrity, Security, and Enforcement held a hearing entitled "Terrorist Entry through the Southwest Border" and focused on how the Biden Administration's open-border agenda has led to record-high encounters of aliens on the Terrorist Watchlist, as well as the mass release of unvetted aliens into American communities.
One of the speakers, Rodney Scott, who served as Chief of the US Border Patrol for 29 years, expressed his frustration with the significant setbacks his department experienced ever since US President Joe Biden’s executive orders on immigration went into effect.
“[S]tarting on January 21, 2021, I watched the border security gains that were made over three decades vanish and the safety of border communities spiral backwards,” Scott told the assembled lawmakers. “With each border security and immigration related executive action that the Biden Administration took, the volume of illegal immigration rapidly increased, overwhelmed Border Patrol and effectively transferred control of our southwest border to the Mexican drug cartels.”
The problem goes much deeper than drug-trafficking, however, as bad as that activity is. The open border is opening up America to the very real threat of terrorist activity.
Between October 2022 and August 2023, Customs and Border Protection (CBP) documented 74,904 illegal migrants nationwide for potentially posing threats to national security, according to CBP data obtained exclusively by the Daily Caller. Border Patrol guards encountered 25,627 “special interest” illegal migrants in fiscal year 2022, compared to 3,675 such encounters in fiscal year 2021.
‘Special interest aliens’ are individuals with suspicious travel patterns who may pose a national security risk but who are not necessarily terrorists, according to the Department of Homeland Security.
According to a report by the DHS, US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) “must be able to locate migrants to enforce immigration laws, including to arrest or remove individuals who are considered potential threats.” Now brace yourself for something straight out of the Keystone Cops. DHS admits, without any good explanation, that it has “limited ability to track migrants’ post-release addresses accurately and effectively.” Ditto for US Border Patrol, which “cannot always obtain and does not always record migrant addresses.” ICE is also left out in the cold as it “does not always validate migrant addresses prior to migrant release into the United States.” So what exactly do these entities do besides drafting reports detailing what they cannot do?
This brings us to the meat of the matter of the DHS report: “Based on our review of 981,671 migrant records documented by USBP from March 2021 through August 2022, addresses for more than 177,000 migrant records were either missing, invalid for delivery, or not legitimate residential locations.” It would be interesting to know how much “more than” 177,000 they are talking about, but it’s probably better we didn’t know.
So who are these 177,000 individuals that have disappeared from the Biden administration’s radar? Who are their friends? What are their interests? Hobbies? Do they love the freedom ostensibly enjoyed by everyone the United States of America, or do they hate the country because of it, the way the king of terror, Osama bin Laden, did, according to George W. Bush? The Democrats should be very worried about the answers to these disturbing questions, and not just because an election year is fast approaching.
The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.