Jason Smith: Biden has taken a sledgehammer to Trump's effective border policies

(From Eighth District Congressman Jason Smith)

Pure chaos. That’s the best way to describe the situation on our southern border. President Joe Biden has spent his entire presidency taking a sledgehammer to the Trump administration’s effective border policies. 

Biden inherited a border that was the most secure it had ever been, but within his first 100 days in office, he issued 94 executive actions impacting immigration – including ending construction of President Donald Trump’s border wall – something which had received bipartisan funding approval in Congress. As time would tell, Biden was only getting started – creating a border crisis that was entirely preventable.

From ending Trump’s successful “Remain in Mexico” policy to falsely accusing border patrol agents of whipping migrants, the Biden administration has failed to lead when it comes to the situation on the border. But despite all the damage he’s done, the president is pushing for funding cuts for our border security and policies that will only make the crisis at our southern border that much worse.

In his recently released budget plan, Biden proposed a $600 million funding cut for the Department of Homeland Security, the agency in charge of protecting our borders. You read that right: At a time when our border is absolutely out-of-control, this administration is trying to make it harder for our brave border patrol agents to do their job. That’s not just wrong, it’s flat-out dangerous.

Since October, 69 individuals who are on the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s terror watch list were caught trying to illegally cross our nation’s southern border. That’s more than ALL the encounters from 2016-2022 combined. That’s absolutely unacceptable.

The leading cause of death for Americans 18-45 is drug overdose. And how did the vast majority of these deadly drugs, including fentanyl, make it into our communities? They were smuggled across our border. Despite the fact that our towns are being flooded with deadly drugs, Biden’s budget plan calls for spending three times more on electric vehicles than on combating the fentanyl crisis. This administration couldn’t be more out of touch.

Amid record-level illegal border crossings, Biden wants to spend billions of your hard-earned tax dollars to make it easier to process and release illegal immigrants into our country. Since Biden took office, there have been OVER 4.6 million illegal crossings of our southern border and more than 1.2 million “gotaways.”

If this administration won’t step up to secure our border, our new House Republican majority will take this message directly to the foreign leaders who need to help us stem this border crisis. For example, during a recent meeting with Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, I urged him in the strongest terms possible to end cartel violence and stop the flow of illegal drugs across our border. These need to be shared priorities between our two nations.

While Mexico definitely has a role to play in the effort to end this crisis, we’ll never be able to make real progress until our leaders get serious about the border. You can rest assured that Republicans will continue fighting tooth and nail to build the wall, make our border secure, bring back Trump’s effective immigration policies, and ensure our border patrol agents have the support they need.