On Sunday, after Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas repeatedly claimed that President Donald Trump left a mess for Joe Biden to clean up, even though the opposite is the case. Trump responded to these claims with a blistering statement.
“We proudly handed the Biden Administration the most secure border in history. All they had to do was keep this smooth-running system on autopilot. Instead, in the span of a just few weeks, the Biden Administration has turned a national triumph into a national disaster. They are in way over their heads and taking on water fast,” the former president declared.
“The pathetic, clueless performance of Secretary Mayorkas on the Sunday Shows today was a national disgrace,” Trump argued. “His self-satisfied presentation—in the middle of the massive crisis he helped engineer—is yet more proof he is incapable of leading DHS. Even someone of Mayorkas’ limited abilities should understand that if you provide Catch-and-Release to the world’s illegal aliens then the whole world will come.”
Trump claimed that Mayorkas had issued a “gag order” on America’s “heroic border agents and ICE officers.” He argued that the Biden administration is “engaged in a huge cover-up to hide just how bad things truly are.” He urged Congress to investigate the situation.
The former president lamented that his successor’s policies “are causing death and human tragedy. In addition to the obvious, drugs are pouring into our country at record levels from the Southern Border, not to mention human and sex trafficking. This Administration’s reckless policies are enabling and encouraging crimes against humanity. Our Country is being destroyed!”
Trump urged Biden to “immediately complete the wall, which can be done in a matter of weeks—they should never have stopped it.”
“The only way to end the Biden Border Crisis is for them to admit their total failure and adopt the profoundly effective, proven Trump policies,” the former president argued.
While Trump may have engaged in hyperbole while declaring that America is “being destroyed,” the border crisis has become quite dire. Border crossings are on pace to top the past three years combined, and immigration officials have more than 15,000 minors in U.S. custody.
Biden’s campaign rhetoric — promising a deportation moratorium (that got blocked by court order) and health care for illegal aliens, among other things — arguably encouraged migrants to rush to America. Immigrants have come to the border wearing shirts that read, “Biden please let us in!”
Biden also rushed to reverse the Trump policies that had gotten the border crisis under control. Not only did the president order an end to border wall construction, but he also ended the “Remain in Mexico” policy that required asylum seekers to remain in Mexico until their cases had been adjudicated. Biden also unilaterally dropped Trump’s “safe third country” deals with Latin American countries like Mexico, Guatemala, and El Salvador that enabled the U.S. to direct asylum seekers to settle in countries that were safe for them, rather than allowing them into the U.S.
Ironically, shortly after Biden dropped these Trump agreements, he approached Mexico for help with the border crisis!
Mayorkas has insisted that there is no crisis on the southern border, the administration sent the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to care for migrant children.
Trump is correct. The former president had established important policies stemming the tide of immigration through America’s southern border. Biden, by dismantling much of the previous administration’s hard work, breathed new life into the border crisis. Now, even the legacy media outlets that demonized Trump’s immigration policies and praised the incoming Biden administration have started to turn on the current president.
Biden indeed “turned national triumph into national disaster.” It is high time for him to reverse course.
Tyler O’Neil is the author of Making Hate Pay: The Corruption of the Southern Poverty Law Center. Follow him on Twitter at @Tyler2ONeil.
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