On the Border, Biden’s White House Can’t Wash Its Blood-Soaked Hands

July 21, 2022

By Dale Wilcox

After a tragic human-smuggling fiasco that left dozens of illegal aliens dead, Joe Biden’s White House is offering a lot of excuses, but zero solutions. At least 53 illegal aliens were killed while attempting to make the treacherous journey to the U.S. at the end of last month. The man accused of driving the truck in which they died was allegedly “very high on meth” behind the wheel, and is just one of several to have been arrested so far in connection with this tragedy.

One would think that the discovery of a tractor trailer with 53 dead border-crossers inside it would make the White House rethink its enforcement strategies, but the administration’s response thus far has largely been a mix of deflection and victim-blaming. In his statement, Biden correctly slammed human smuggling operations for their callous attitude towards human life, but offered no indication that he was planning a course correction away from the anti-enforcement policies that have done so much to empower the human smugglers. For his part, when questioned on the Sunday shows, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas appeared to place blame for the tragedy at the feet of the migrants:

“We have said repeatedly and we continue to warn people not to take the dangerous journey,” Mayorkas said. “They put their lives, their life savings, in the hands of these exploitative organizations, these criminal organizations that do not care for their lives and only seek to make a profit.” 

Meanwhile, White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre refused to accept any blame for the tragedy, preposterously claiming that the administration has “closed” the border.

Jean-Pierre’s resort to that boldfaced lie is telling. For it is glaringly obvious to all that this tragedy is an inevitable result of the administration’s drastic and deliberate border stand-down. While administration officials have occasionally told would-be illegal aliens not to make the dangerous and difficult journey to the U.S., their policies have sent exactly the opposite message, and ultimately policies matter more than rhetoric. When the Biden Administration resettles one million illegal aliens into the U.S. in its first year in office, the message sent to would-be migrants is clear: If you survive the treacherous journey to America, the U.S. government will not only allow you to stay in the country, but will actively facilitate your resettlement in the bargain.

The Biden Administration has also worked systematically to dismantle successful Trump-era programs, including the Remain-in-Mexico program and the use of Title 42 at the border, both of which had allowed the Trump Administration to secure the U.S.-Mexico border for the first time in many decades. One of the first actions Biden took after taking office was to place a 100-day moratorium on deportations, signaling to migrants that if they got into the country illegally, they would not be removed. All of these actions led to a predictable and historic crisis at the border, and empowered the drug cartels and human smuggling operations that are getting Americans and migrants killed at record rates. Under Joe Biden’s leadership, business has never been better for drug cartels and human smugglers.

“The one thing I’ve learned is secure borders save lives. Unless people cross less, people die. Vulnerable people are putting themselves in the hands of criminal organizations who don’t give a damn about” them, Immigration Reform Law Institute (IRLI) Senior Fellow Tom Homan said recently.

During his 2020 presidential campaign, Biden claimed that protecting “migrants” would be his top priority when it came to immigration policy, but his anti-border policies have clearly made them less safe. During Biden’s first year in office, a record number of illegal border-crossers either died or went missing. During that same time period, fentanyl, the vast majority of which comes to the country through the border, became the leading cause of death among young Americans. These numbers will almost certainly increase as the Biden Administration continues to wind down successful Trump-era programs. Then, as now, the blood will be all over this White House’s hands.

Even now, it is beyond clear that anti-border policies kill people, lots of them. The most compassionate immigration policy by far is one that secures the border, but that is also the one policy this administration refuses to consider.

Dale L. Wilcox is executive director and general counsel for the Immigration Reform Law Institute, a public interest law firm working to defend the rights and interests of the American people from the negative effects of mass migration

Also published at American Thinker, July 21, 2022