Biden's Border

by Chris Farrell
November 8, 2021 at 5:00 am

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/17911/biden-border

Fiscal year-end figures provided this month by the Department of Homeland Security show that 2021 was the record year for all-time high apprehensions on the southern border. Federal agents apprehended 1,659,206 illegal immigrants at the southwest border in 2021, breaking the previous high of 1,643,679 in 2000.
The Biden administration, despite an August 2021 court ruling by Texas-based US District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, continues to find ways through policy rules and memoranda of instruction, to circumvent the law and permit unlawful entry.
[T]he Biden administration has also decided to skew the numbers more favorably toward their goals for an even more "open borders" unrestricted immigration with a new policy directive from Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas... fencing off a number of new "protected areas" where no immigration law enforcement activities are permitted.
Border communities and states will feel the impact of Biden's policies first and the hardest, but what this administration has unleashed on the nation at-large will have enormous consequences for every facet of our society: housing, healthcare, education, services, public safety, quality of life, employment, economics, the justice system, and – of course – voting rolls. The voting issue is indisputably altered in California under Governor Gavin Newsom, where election officials mailed unsolicited ballots state-wide, reportedly enabling "Cheating in plain sight."

Fiscal year-end figures provided this month by the Department of Homeland Security show that 2021 was the record year for all-time high apprehensions on the southern border. Federal agents apprehended 1,659,206 illegal immigrants at the southwest border in 2021, breaking the previous high of 1,643,679 in 2000. Pictured: U.S. Border Patrol agents watch as illegal immigrants cross the Rio Grande river from Mexico into Del Rio, Texas on September 23, 2021. (Photo by John Moore/Getty Images)

One does not see reporting in the American news media nowadays about the "Biden Caravans," thousands of immigrants making their way north to the border region of the United States. News media reports on the number of illegal immigrants apprehended at the border are also few and far between. The deficit in reporting and public attention does not, however, mean that the border crisis has abated. In fact, the crisis has deepened on all fronts: it is a humanitarian disaster compounded by rampant criminality and grave national security threats.

The "mother of all caravans" (also known as the "march for liberty, dignity and peace") is on the way from the southern Mexican state of Chiapas, which borders Guatemala, to the United States. By the time you read this, they may already have arrived. More than 4,000 illegal immigrants are estimated to be in the caravan. Spanish-language reporting (that includes video) on the caravan claims that the group consists mainly of Haitians and Central Americans. Mexico's Foreign Affairs Secretary, Marcelo Ebrard, is quoted in a Mexican news story as saying that the government will act with prudence and caution in accordance with human rights laws, although he adds that migrants are being fooled because they will not be allowed to enter the United States.

Fiscal year-end figures provided this month by the Department of Homeland Security show that 2021 was the record year for all-time high apprehensions on the southern border. Federal agents apprehended 1,659,206 illegal immigrants at the southwest border in 2021, breaking the previous high of 1,643,679 in 2000. Illegal "got-aways" – migrants who crossed the border without turning themselves in for processing -- is estimated by law enforcement at an additional 250,000 for the year. "On average, noted one report, 1,600 migrants escape capture each day."

The Department of Homeland Security defines "apprehension" as: "The arrest of a removable alien by the Department of Homeland Security. Each apprehension of the same alien in a fiscal year is counted separately." Under the Biden administration, the vast majority of apprehended illegal aliens are processed for identification purposes and then released into the interior of the United States on the condition that the alien promises to appear at an immigration hearing sometime in the future. The date and location of the hearing is not set at the time of release. Border communities have struggled to keep up with the number of released aliens, as have transportation service providers such as bus companies and small regional airports.

In fiscal year 2020, federal agents apprehended only 400,651 on the southern border. The Trump administration's policy was (generally) not to release aliens into the American interior. Unlawfully present aliens were processed for removal from the United States. Many intending to enter the United States were held in Mexico by the Trump-era Migrant Protection Protocols (commonly referred to as the "remain in Mexico" policy) that required aliens to apply for entry before crossing the border. The Biden administration, despite an August 2021 court ruling by Texas-based US District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, continues to find ways through policy rules and memoranda of instruction, to circumvent the law and permit unlawful entry.

Other-than-Mexican ("OTM") numbers have increased over the last FY also – by large percentages: Haiti (132%), Turkey (89%), India (82%), Ukraine (81%) and China (75%) all have citizens seeking unlawful entry to the United States. Eight of the nine Border Patrol sectors saw triple-digit percentage increases in illegal immigrants over last year and one, Yuma in Arizona, reported an eye-popping 1,200% hike in apprehensions.

In 2021, most of the illegal aliens, 608,000, originated in Mexico, followed by Honduras (309,000), Guatemala (279,000) and El Salvador (96,000). In the last month of the fiscal year, migrants from those four Latin American countries accounted for well over half (63.7%) of apprehensions along the Mexican border. The records show that 367,000 arrests involved Haitians, Cubans, Brazilians, Venezuelans, and Ecuadorans. To top the year, Border Patrol encounters with Haitians rose from 7,590 in August to a startling 17,639 in September. The final month also saw big increases in migrants from other countries as well, including Venezuelans (71%), Romanians (49%) and Colombians (44%).

The Biden administration is getting exactly what its policies promote and subsidize. The numbers are irrefutable. That being said, the Biden administration has also decided to skew the numbers more favorably toward their goals for an even more "open borders" unrestricted immigration with a new policy directive from Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas (published on October 27, 2021) fencing off a number of new "protected areas" where no immigration law enforcement activities are permitted. The new protected areas include:

Schools, including pre-schools, primary and secondary schools, vocational or trade schools, and colleges and universities.
Medical or mental healthcare facilities, like hospitals, doctors' offices, health clinics, vaccination or testing sites, urgent care centers, sites that serve pregnant women, or community health centers.
Houses of worship or religious studies and places where children gather, like playgrounds, recreation centers, childcare centers, before- or after-school care centers, foster care facilities, group homes for children, or school bus stops.
Social services establishments, like crisis centers, domestic violence shelters, victims' services centers, child advocacy centers, supervised visitation centers, family justice centers, community-based organizations, facilities that serve the disabled, homeless shelters, drug or alcohol counseling and treatment facilities, or food banks or other establishments that distribute food or other essentials of life to people in need.
Places where disaster or emergency response and relief are provided, including along evacuation routes, where shelter or emergency supplies, food, or water are being distributed, or registration for disaster-related assistance or family reunification is underway.
Places where funerals or other religious or civil ceremonies or observances occur, as well as ongoing parades, demonstrations, or rallies.

Following the law of economics that states "You get more of what you subsidize" -- it should come as no surprise that the most recent caravan is just the next evolutionary wave headed our way. A few weeks ago, Panama's foreign minister, Erika Mouynes, warned that there are more than 65,000 mostly Haitian illegal aliens ready to head north through Latin America. Since January, more than 86,000 migrants who arrived at the U.S.-Mexico border went through Panama, according to Mouynes. "We have been sounding the alarm for months about this," the Panamanian official said in a Spanish news article published on September 29, adding that the numbers indicate migration will increase.

Border communities and states will feel the impact of Biden's policies first and the hardest, but what this administration has unleashed on the nation at-large will have enormous consequences for every facet of our society: housing, healthcare, education, services, public safety, quality of life, employment, economics, the justice system, and – of course – voting rolls. The voting issue is indisputably altered in California under Governor Gavin Newsom, where election officials mailed unsolicited ballots state-wide, reportedly enabling "Cheating in plain sight."

There will come a point when the consequences and costs of the Biden administration's reckless abandonment of law and order will come into focus for all Americans. That may happen in time to make changes and restore our borders and security -- but it may come on the heels of some yet unrealized national disaster at the hands of criminals or terrorists.

Chris Farrell is Director of Investigations at Judicial Watch and Distinguished Senior Fellow at Gatestone Institute.

© 2024 Gatestone Institute. All rights reserved. The articles printed here do not necessarily reflect the views of the Editors or of Gatestone Institute. No part of the Gatestone website or any of its contents may be reproduced, copied or modified, without the prior written consent of Gatestone Institute.

Recent Articles by Chris Farrell

Biden's Borders: The Threat to America and the Threat to the Free World, 2022-02-01
Biden's Budget Priorities and the China Threat, 2022-01-12
Biden's Global Challenges, 2021-12-24
Vaccines and Power, 2021-12-02
The Supply Chain and Border Security, 2021-11-25

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Comment on this item

12 Reader Comments

Leslie Fish • Nov 9, 2021 at 03:05

Well, that tears it. The border states will have to set their own borders, build their own Walls, and provide their own border patrols. ... Some of us have started quietly doing this already. The federal govt. no longer uses exile/banishment as a punishment, but the states can -- and do.

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Chris Golden • Nov 8, 2021 at 21:07

The tipping point will occur when one of these caravans attempt to forcibly breach the border. Even CNN would have to cover that story.

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GSR • Nov 8, 2021 at 16:29

Replacing (White) Americans. Period. Full stop. That's the main reason for open borders.

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Hamish MacDonald

GSR • Nov 9, 2021 at 04:14

Diabolical, but true.

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cammo99 • Nov 8, 2021 at 12:54

No one problem the Biden admin has taken the lead in creating is unrelated to other problems. To quite an old SF, "It's as if all their planning is almost like they planned it".

I believe the sense COVID is simply an "opportunity" is matched by nonsensical border policies, and eco-maniacal who are ignoring immediate disasters to focus on the Big Bang decades down the road that seem to be reprieved every decade.

In response to the censor free zone, "Excess Deaths Point to Depopulation Agenda" by Mike Whitney

I have been thinking along the same lines. 100% vaccination of a population suggests that natural immunities will not develop and the population will become ever dependent on new vaccines. An article I read in WSJ some years ago made an impression, I remember it stating that 30% vaccination as a norm, of a population as long as you hit the nodes is enough for the natural immunity of a group to fight back. People will die, even now people are dying in our military at the near same frequency with twice as many soldiers inoculated as before.
The odd manner in which Cuomo was removed from office , for sex crimes in a state that Hillary and Willie lived in and was her first elected Senatorial job? Meanwhile they buried his culpability in increasing elderly COVID deaths, not that sexual molestation isn't worth pursuing in his case and justice for the women but it seems like a distraction from his possibly killing old people in his state and the DNC gave him an award for how he handled the crisis.

I have also to wonder with nearly 160 million forests in the USA western states consumed by wildfires and not much done by the White House even as Biden was apologizing for destroying foreign their rain forests and the cause is most probably over population, and he is asking $450,000 per illegal migrant.
So as the DNC requests more funding for abortions and an expansion of US tax dollars to pay for it, they are importing a unvaccinated, non English speaking or skilled immigrants?
And wildfires out west are most likely the cause of over populating America's most arid regions and the irrigation system necessary to sustain them is collapsing. It is not carbon emissions its over population and then carbon emissions.

What does the DNC price as the value of an American citizen? What do they appraise as a middle class income and standard of living?

COVID may only be the "opportunity" Pelosi once called it that is but the tip of the ice berg.

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Luis A. Recinos • Nov 8, 2021 at 11:25

Interesting column, as usual, by Mr. Farrell, with much impressive data. However, I notice that he continues to refer to the overall situation as a "crisis at the border" when, in fact, it seems as if the border exists no more and the river is just another small obstacle which is not stopping anybody. And the "crisis" exists only in the mind of those opposed to Biden's policies, the aim of which is precisely that of doing away with the border, allowing into the US anybody who so desires, getting "everything for free" as a reward for doing so and, as a result, change forever the ethnic characteristics of the population of the US and, in so doing, change the political allegiance in favor of the Democratic Party. In sum, it is all perfectly planned and expected by the "open border" policy. No crisis.

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hunterson7 • Nov 8, 2021 at 10:30

So a lawless President and those involved need to impeached and removed from office. We are a Republic ruled by law and a Constitution. Not a woke kleptocracy. Impeach. Now.

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judith grayson • Nov 8, 2021 at 06:58

There is a madman in the WH. This President finds our national sovereignty an offense. the American people an obstacle to his plan for our own destruction. The bizarro world in which this administration and its media sycophants live imagine that hundreds of millions of Americans will allow themselves to be overrun, overtaxed, and under represented. taxation without representation are the carriage wheels rolling over us.
Americans will fight to secure our freedoms and the judeo-christian civilization that produced a nation of laws and the greatest Constitutional republic in the history of the world, sustained by the consent of the governed. that's how we roll.

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Hamish MacDonald

judith grayson • Nov 8, 2021 at 18:53

Mad is the definitely right word.
Probably even trying to play God.
Judaeo-Christianity has its downside but Islam pales into insignificance beside it.
What cost the lives of innumerable people in World Wars does not seem to rate in the mind of Mr Biden, Ms Pelosi.
Worst of all, attempts by Mr Trump on the issue of abortion which has one important effect: Raising the birthrate; seems to have skipped their minds completely.

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John • Nov 8, 2021 at 06:43

If you don't have a secure border, you don't have a country!

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Hamish MacDonald • Nov 8, 2021 at 06:02

Those who enter, be they from Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador, even from the poorest countries, all have one thing in their favour: They may ultimately assimilate, even with government betrayal. Irish adapt in one generation. Scots a little longer, but they will fit into the system.
But those from Muslim countries will never assimilate unless they convert from Islam to Christianity, and even then they incur the wrath of their fellows- a death wish, so they don't assimilate. France has a real problem with sensitive urban zones, and daily desecration of churches.
The Biden administration does not appreciate this.
Moreover the U.S. fertility rate is 1.7 births per woman, approx, which means in four parenting generations, the U.S. parenting population will be halved. This is not the case in Afghanistan with 4.3 births per woman. So Biden policy is enhancing those who procreate faster, by permitting immigration of these, and at the same time bringing in those who refuse to assimilate as well.
Eventually the lack of cohesion builds to a point where even civil law is unworkable, and the option eventually arises to choose Sharia law. Thus the original culture (which Biden and Pelosi grew up in simply evaporates).
If you think this is overkill, then examine the history of Pakistan+ Malaysia (once Hindu), Afghanistan (once Buddhist), North Africa+ Turkey+ Iraq, once Christian. All now reaching Muslim saturation. Then the real persecution starts. Raymond Ibrahim has written article upon article in Gatestone on this. So far there has been over 40,000 independent terrorist actions since 9/11. And it has not stopped.
Is Joe Biden interested? From the article above it would seem he is busy with other agenda.
" The Biden administration....continues to find ways through policy rules and memoranda of instruction, to circumvent the law and permit unlawful entry."[above]
What hope have Americans got with this kind of government?
Very good article, but many more like this are needed.

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Jeff Page • Nov 8, 2021 at 05:33

The same policy is being embraced by European leaders. It's okay to show humanity to others but it should be in their own countries. Europe and the US infrastructure will eventually be unable to cope with massive numbers of people. There will be inevitable shortages of food and water, power and above all sanitation. To put it bluntly, unless some drastic changes are made, the sewers will overflow and there won't be the facilities to cope with it all. The oceans are already being polluted enough as it is. Mankind by his own stupidity is destroying his environment daily. Our planet has only so much to offer, it needs the help of mankind to ensure it lasts.

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