Border enforcement expert: Biden sees 'future political benefit' to an open border

Border enforcement experts are warning that President Biden is harming America's national security with lax border security policies in pursuit of a perceived "future political benefit" for his party.

On Cinco de Mayo, Biden renewed his call for immigration reform that offers a pathway to citizenship for illegal immigrants residing in the U.S. 

According to the latest figures, DHS has "released more than 756,000 aliens encountered by CBP at the Southwest border into the United States since Joe Biden became president, not counting 146,000-plus unaccompanied children released by HHS to sponsors and 620,000 aliens who evaded apprehension."

Former acting Director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Tom Homan sees a connection between Biden's call for immigration reform and his administration's release of thousands of illegal immigrants into the U.S.

"Why I say it's intentional is because they came into office, the president wrote over 92 executive orders to kill everything the Trump administration, we worked on, and the data is clear — walls work," Homan said after a news conference on Capitol Hill with the House Republican Conference on border security. "The policies work. So they came in and intentionally did it. Why? I think, one, they want to radically transform this nation. Two, they see a perceived future political benefit.

"They think they will be future Democratic voters, and they don't have to vote. They've just got to be counted in the census because remember, they overturned Trump's census rule too, which is going to result in more seats in the House for Dems."

Attorney General Merrick Garland recently announced that the Department of Justice would allow asylum seekers to cite mental health as a way to qualify for legal status in the U.S. even if they have an "aggravated felony" on their record —a policy change from the past.

Mark Morgan served as chief of the U.S. Border Patrol under former President Barack Obama, acting commissioner of U.S. Border Patrol and acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement under former President Trump. He blasted DOJ's rule change for asylum seekers with criminal records.

"Every single day this administration does something that acts as yet another incentive for illegal immigration," Morgan said. "And again, why this is so important is as illegal immigration continues to increase, our ability to effectively secure our border decreases. That's why we keep saying illegal immigration is synonymous with border security, which is synonymous with national security. But yet this is just another example of probably hundreds that we could cite where they're just doing one policy after another to actually encourage and incentivize more illegal immigration."

Morgan said he thinks most Americans would support turning away illegal immigrants with criminal records seeking asylum in the U.S. Instead, Morgan said they are often released into the U.S. 

"Under this administration, ICE enforcement, they actually had illegal aliens in custody that had already either been convicted of another crime or charged with a crime that they have actually released back in the United States," he said.

Morgan said ICE often does not take illegal immigrants into custody after they are arrested by police for crimes committed inside the U.S.

"They have ended what we call 287(g) programs where local sheriffs, they'll arrest an illegal alien that's also been charged with a crime," he said. "Now they're going to call ICE, and ICE is saying 'Nope, no thanks, it's not a priority, go ahead and release them back into the country.' That's why this is about national security, that's why this is about public safety."

Brandon Judd, head of the U.S. Border Patrol Union, also slammed the Biden DOJ's decision to adjudicate asylum claims from illegal immigrants with criminal records.

"If people know that they're going to be able to come across our borders and be able to stay and claim a mental health issue, and even get a doctor's notice, then that's just going to encourage more people, and it's going to make the American public less safe," he said. "I don't understand how this can possibly be considered legal, and I think there are going to be ... court challenges to this, and I think it's going to be overturned."

Judd said there are large stretches of the 2,000-mile U.S.-Mexico border that are wide open and drug trafficking is at record levels.

"The most dire situation right now is the amount of drugs that are coming across our border," he said, noting that in 2021 "we had a record number of overdose deaths because of drugs, those drugs are coming across our southwest border." 

The large gaps border in border security allow the cartels to dictate events, according to Judd. "They're able to cross large numbers of illegal aliens, which then pulls resources out of the field, because Border Patrol then has to respond to those people, [has] to take them into custody," he explained.

"When you take them into custody, then you have to go back to the stations and you have to process those individuals," he continued. "When you do that, you leave large stretches of the border completely open, and when the cartels create those opportunities, then they're able to cross our higher-value products — whether that's drugs, criminal aliens, aliens from special interest countries. In other words, they're able to dictate to us what our operations are." 

Homan noted that there has been a record number of overdose deaths in the U.S. involving fentanyl and a record number of migrants who died attempting to cross the border.

Biden's border policies are "far from humane because people are dying," he said.