Photo: U.S. Border Patrol agent apprehend migrants who surrendered to him after crossing the Rio Grand River in El Paso Texas. Photo by Mani Albrecht / Public Domain
The Center Square [By Casey Harper] –
Republicans on the House Oversight Committee launched an inquiry into the Biden administration’s decision to lift an immigration rule that has helped slow the rapid rise of illegal immigration.
The lawmakers sent a letter to Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas requesting documents and communications related to the decision, saying it will “turn the humanitarian and national security crisis on the U.S. southern border into a catastrophe.”
“The Administration’s decision comes at a time when Americans are still forced to comply with COVID-19 mandates in their daily lives,” the letter says. “The Administration has decided to prioritize rescinding this order over rescinding mask and vaccine mandates for the American people. Immigration experts predict that rescinding the CDC’s Title 42 order will even further overwhelm U.S. Border Patrol officers and facilities. DHS must adequately prepare to respond to the impending border surge to prevent exacerbating the ongoing national security and humanitarian catastrophe.”
Former President Donald Trump instituted the policy, Title 42, which allows for the expulsion of illegal immigrants at the border to help prevent the spread of COVID. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Friday it would end the policy, citing the decline in the severity of COVID.
The Republicans’ letter, though, points out that border patrol officials have raised concerns about the policy, saying it will lead to more illegal immigration.
“Border officials have expressed concern that the end of the CDC’s Title 42 order – on top of an already historic level of illegal crossings and facilities over capacity – ’ will precipitate another crisis similar to the mass arrival in Del Rio, Texas, last September of Haitian migrants who waded across the Rio Grande and formed a tent city,’” the letter says. “Reportedly, DHS predicts that as many as 12,000 to 18,000 illegal border crossers per day would attempt to cross once the CDC’s Title 42 order is lifted.”
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The U.S. Customs and Border Protection released a statement Monday saying the policy change will lead to illegal immigration “above the current high levels” which have soared since Biden took office.
“As a result of the CDC’s termination of its Title 42 public health order, we will likely face an increase in encounters above the current high levels,” CBP said. “There are a significant number of individuals who were unable to access the asylum system for the past two years, and who may decide that now is the time to come.”
U.S. Customs and Border Protection recently said that federal agents encountered roughly 2 million illegal immigrants trying to enter the country last year. That number does not include illegal immigrants who entered without authorities noticing.
The lawmakers called the immigration situation a “crisis” that is about to get worse.
“Even former DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson once stated that over 1,000 apprehensions per day ‘was a relatively bad number’ that ‘overwhelms the system,’” the letter says. “He noted, during the surge in crossings in the spring of 2019, that ‘I cannot begin to imagine what 4,000 a day looks like, so we are truly in a crisis.’ We are experiencing that crisis now.”
The investigation follows an announcement that three Republican-led states have filed a lawsuit against the Biden administration in an attempt to prevent it from lifting a rule that allows illegal immigrants at the border to be expelled in the name of preventing the spread of COVID-19.
The lawsuit, filed by Louisiana, Missouri and Arizona, alleges that removing the order is “profoundly illegal.”
“The Title 42 Revocation thus stands as a radical outlier – seemingly the only COVID-19-based restriction the Administration sees fit to end,” the lawsuit reads. “But the CDC’s Termination Order is not merely unfathomably bad public policy. It is also profoundly illegal. That is principally so for two reasons: (1) Defendants unlawfully flouted the notice-and-comment requirements for rule-making under the Administrative Procedure Act (“APA”) and (2) Defendants’ Termination Order is arbitrary and capricious, thus violating the APA, because it has numerous omissions that each independently render it illegal.”
“President Biden’s open-border policies are an unmitigated disaster for national security,” Texas Governor Greg Abbott said in a statement. “His recklessness has forced the State of Texas to take unprecedented steps to fill the gaps – including deploying Texas Department of Public Safety troopers and over 10,000 Texas National Guard soldiers, jailing illegal immigrants who are charged with trespassing, and becoming the first state ever to build a wall to secure the border.”
About the Author: Casey Harper, The Center Square D.C. Bureau Reporter – charper@centersquare.com ~ Harper is a Senior Reporter for the Washington, D.C. Bureau. He previously worked for The Daily Caller, The Hill, and Sinclair Broadcast Group. A graduate of Hillsdale College, Casey’s work has also appeared in Fox News, Fox Business, and USA Today.
