When President Joe Biden took office, he ordered a halt to construction of the wall on the U.S.-Mexico border. The White House’s budget proposal cut funding for Customs and Border Protection, and the Democrats’ funding bill cut it even more. Yet the Democrats’ military spending bill directs hundreds of billions of dollars to “border security”… in the Middle East.
This comes amid a worsening border crisis. Border agents stopped 180,034 people in May, not including the number of illegal immigrants who got away, at least 40,000 in April. Voters are increasingly recognizing the border crisis, as Democrats all but ignore it.
On Tuesday, the House Appropriations Committee released its fiscal year 2022 Homeland Security funding bill, complete with an accessible summary. That document spells it out in black and white: Democrats want to slash CBP funding by almost $1 billion.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) – The bill provides $14.11 billion in net discretionary appropriations for CBP, $927 million below the fiscal year 2021 enacted level and $456 million below the request [from the White House].
The bill also “rescinds $2.06 billion from prior year appropriations for border barrier construction,” according to the committee.
Meanwhile, the same committee earmarked $870 billion for border security, just not on this continent. The military spending bill reads:
Of the amounts appropriated in this Act under the heading ‘‘Operation and Maintenance, Defense-Wide’’, for the Defense Security Cooperation Agency, $370,000,000, to remain available until September 30, 2023, shall be available to reimburse Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt, Tunisia, and Oman under section 1226 of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2016 (22 U.S.C. 2151 note), for enhanced border security, of which not less than $150,000,000 shall be for Jordan…
Up to $500,000,000 of funds appropriated by this Act for the Defense Security Cooperation Agency in ‘‘Operation and Maintenance, Defense-Wide’’ may be used to provide assistance to the Government of Jordan to support the armed forces of Jordan and to enhance security along its borders.
In the middle of a border crisis, Democrats want to take $927 million away from CBP, while directing more than eight hundred times that much money to border security efforts in Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt, Tunisia, and Oman.
Meanwhile, in a recent Harvard/Harris poll, an overwhelming majority (80 percent) of voters said that illegal immigration is either a very serious (43 percent) or a somewhat serious (37 percent) issue, and most voters (63 percent) correctly said that the number of monthly illegal immigrant border crossings has increased since Biden took office.
Most voters (68 percent) said Biden’s executive orders on immigration encourage illegal immigration, and a majority of them (55 percent) said “the Biden administration [should] have left those Trump policies that made it more difficult to come into the country in place.”
Recommended: Buckle Up, Democrats. The Biden Border Backlash Is Coming, and CRT Will Make It Worse
More voters blame the Biden administration (61 percent) than the Trump administration (39 percent) for “the flood of tens of thousands of unaccompanied minor children” coming to the border. Voters also prefer turning illegal border crossers back to Mexico (67 percent) rather than releasing them into the U.S. with a court date (33 percent). Most voters (64 percent) also said that, given the large influx of illegal immigrants, the Biden administration should “issue new, stricter policies.”
Rather than addressing the border crises in the Middle East, Democrats should tackle the border crisis right here in the good old U.S.A.
