Every Government Has a Responsibility To Secure Its Borders To Protect Its People From the Very Tragedies We're Experiencing
Every government has a solemn responsibility to secure its borders and monitor who is coming into its country. This is not merely an economic or political matter; it is a national security imperative. An open southern border makes it impossible to identify potential terrorists and criminals entering our nation while at the same time encouraging dangerous individuals to do so. Unfortunately, the Biden Administration has abandoned law and order on our southern border, and in recent days we have seen the terrible, tragic costs of this dereliction of duty.
Last week, a 22-year-old nursing student, Laken Riley, was murdered by an immigrant in the country illegally. The suspected killer allegedly entered the country through the southern border back in 2022. He had already been arrested once in New York City when he was charged with “acting in a manner to injure a child less than 17 and a motor vehicle license violation.” Somehow, this previous arrest did not result in immediate deportation. This crime should have never happened, and this girl should still be alive. Her family should not be grieving right now. This is what happens when multiple authorities – from the Biden Administration to state and local officials – refuse to enforce the law.
This was not the only tragedy connected to illegal immigration to occur in recent weeks, though. In Prince George County, Maryland, it was announced that an illegal Salvadoran immigrant had been arrested in connection to the murder of a toddler in Langley Park, Maryland, earlier this month. A toddler. And the suspect’s history tells a similar story: On November 7, 2022, a Department of Justice immigration judge in Newark, New Jersey, ordered his removal from the U.S. On March 21, 2023, the police department in Montgomery County, Maryland, arrested and charged him with theft. They released him just 6 days later, only to arrest him again for theft on September 26, 2023. He was released again only a few weeks later.
Again, this individual should never have been in the United States in the first place. He should have been found and deported once his removal from the United States was ordered. He should have been deported each time he was arrested for theft. Instead, this order was ignored – twice – and now a family has lost their precious child.
These two terrible, tragic stories only display a small part of the costs illegal immigration brings to our country. Drug overdose deaths hit record highs in 2022, thanks in large part to more fentanyl than ever crossing our open southern border. More than 20,000 Chinese nationals have entered the country illegally on President Biden’s watch. In 2023, a record 169 individuals on the terror watchlist were encountered on the southern border – a number that exceeded not only the prior year’s record-setting total (98) but the last six fiscal years combined.
It’s not as if these threats were not present during the Trump Administration’s tenure. It is simply that President Trump took seriously the threats posed by an open border, and he ensured that the resources necessary to meet those threats were allocated. As a result, we built the border wall. Our Remain in Mexico policy, which I helped negotiate, kept immigrants seeking asylum in Mexico while their claims were processed, instead of allowing them to be booked into our country and given free rein to roam inside our country unfettered. The Biden Administration has abandoned these policies. The American people deserve better – the families of the victims deserve better.
The goal of immigration policy is not to grant unfettered access and asylum to anyone who wants it. First and foremost, its purpose is to maintain America’s national security and the integrity of our borders – while also identifying individuals and families who genuinely desire to become citizens, participate in their new communities, and contribute to their new country’s economic success. Only by enforcing the law and maintaining order in our immigration process can we keep America safe while identifying worthy individuals and giving them the chance they deserve to become citizens.