Title 42 enforcement at the border, which had enabled officials to immediately send back to Mexico any migrant caught crossing the border illegally, ended on May 11. Since then, the surge that the Biden administration had claimed to expect supposedly has not happened. Other than this being just another example of Biden’s can’t-shoot-straight ineptitude, the question is Why?
The answer, from government officials and immigration activists, is that there are a “myriad” of reasons, a “plethora” of causes. Those, of course, are just big words intended to mask the fact that those sources don’t know why or even if.
Various answers have been suggested, including:
- The previous policy, Title 8, which has replaced Title 42, while not enabling immediate removal, does place a black mark on the migrant’s record once he is removed, possibly making re-entry more difficult at a later time.
- Cartels have added another, last-minute obstacle to migrants wishing to be escorted across the border: the “gatekeeper,” or portal. That portal demands an additional payment before all members of a party can be admitted, sometimes holding onto one member until the entire fee has been paid. This might be discouraging migrants from making the attempt.
- The Biden administration is playing a “shell game” with the numbers, offering migrants the use of a special phone app to schedule an appointment at an official border entry point before approaching the border. Migrants who follow that rule and are within the daily limits can be admitted to the U.S. legally. Thus–prest-o, change-o–illegal traffic is reduced, though not the number of admitted migrants. The daily limit is now 1,450, a nearly 50 percent increase since May 12, when the daily limit was 1,000.
As we pointed out here on June 21, the “number of people who were encountered by border officials in May was almost the same as in April, with only a tiny drop of 0.7 percent.” There was no sudden surge, because the illegal border-crossing was already surging, and has been throughout the Biden presidency.
Make no mistake, the surge continues and papering over the numbers with bogus “legality” won’t change it.
For more, see Breitbart News.