Don’t Be Fooled: There’s No ‘Decline’ in Illegal Alien Crossings

I wrote yesterday for PJ Media about how the Biden Homeland Security Department (DHS) was already congratulating itself on huge drops or “plummet[s]” in illegal migrant crossings at the southern border, and lecturing Republican states (which are suing to stop the new program) on how “incomprehensible” it is they are supposedly opposing “effective enforcement measures”. Don’t be fooled—Biden’s “decline” in illegal aliens is nothing but a deception and trick. It’s not an “enforcement” measure, but a word game. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) can give up to 360,000 migrants a year legitimized status through mobile app CBP One, meaning hundreds of thousands of illegals will not be counted as illegals when they pour into the US.

As I previously explained, “A new plan announced Jan. 5 tells the largest migrant groups, “up to 360,000 Haitians, Cubans, Venezuelans, and Nicaraguans each year” (and only those groups), to apply for “humanitarian parole” from outside the United States on CBP One. The United Nations (UN), Mexico, and many non-governmental organizations (NGOs) help the illegal migrants find a U.S. sponsor, create a “plausible” sob story, and collect application documents while they wait. And just like that, there are “big reductions” in those illegal border crossing numbers, while the crossings continue as constant as ever.”

“If anything, [CIS’s Todd] Bensman predicted, the new program will probably tempt even more illegal migrants to America. Henceforth illegals won’t have to spend thousands of dollars being smuggled across the border by criminal cartels, and they will get a coveted U.S. work permit. There are already thousands lining up for the “pre-legalization” CBP One program, Bensman said. Expect that number to increase.”

Now Andrew Arthur from the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) has a few questions the Biden regime should be asked.

“I’ve recently analyzed two proposals in President Biden’s January 5 “New Border Enforcement Actions”: a parole program for Venezuelans, Nicaraguans, Haitians, and Cubans that’s being challenged in federal court; and the scheduling of interviews via the CBP One app, which allows CBP to funnel would-be illegal migrants into the United States through the ports of entry. There are a lot of ‘unknown unknowns’ in those programs, including whether and when aliens in the two programs are given work authorization, how long those who appear for such interviews can remain before being placed into removal proceedings, and whether those aliens count as Southwest border ‘encounters’ in CBP’s monthly statistics. A few congressmen and federal judges may want to know answers to those questions.”

There is a lot of interesting information and legal explanations in Arthur’s piece, including, “81 percent of all aliens who claimed credible fear between FY 2008 and FY 2019 received such a determination from asylum officers” and “The current administration has not even tried to detain the vast majority of the more than 4.5 million aliens CBP encountered at the Southwest border since” Feb. 2021. Arthur explained just how out of hand the new CBP One program could get, how it could strain resources and cause a surge of applicants.

The Biden border crisis has not improved. It’s only likely to get worse.

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This article was published by Pro Deo et Libertate and is reproduced with permission.