(LibertySociety.com) – The crisis at the southern border has grown increasingly worse with each passing year since President Biden took office in 2021. Illegal crossings have increased at alarming rates, with the highest-ever monthly crossings occurring in December 2023. Customs and Border Protection released December’s data on January 26, reporting 302,034 encounters. Gotaways were not included, but CBP has estimated that over 800,000 made it into the United States without proper processing.
The data also did not include the 30,000 refugees who are allowed to enter the country every month under the Biden administration’s parole migration program. Since last January, the program has accepted refugees for humanitarian purposes from Venezuela, Cuba, Nicaragua, and Haiti. CBP data from December also showed 19 arrests of individuals on the terror watch list, bringing the 2023 fiscal year total to 50. Gotaways evade the screening, which means that terrorists could be residing in the United States undetected.
The border crisis has also been at the center of political debate in recent weeks. Senate Democrats and a small number of their Republican colleagues have worked for the last few months to craft a border bill that includes funding for CBP. However, most Senate Republicans are opposed to the bill, which was shrouded in secrecy for weeks outside of a draft that was leaked to the press. House Speaker Mike Johnson made clear that if passed, the bill would go nowhere in the House if it even remotely resembled the leaked draft.
President Biden and the Democrats are now accusing the Republicans of politicizing the border in an election year, claiming they have no intention of working to fix the problem. Republicans have hit back by pointing out that the Biden administration has spent the last three years allowing unfettered illegal immigration and tweaking policies to usurp federal law. Republicans are also in the process of impeaching Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas for breaking federal law that has exacerbated the border crisis.
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