Reps. Dina Titus (D-NV), Sheila Jackson Lee (D-TX) and Steven Horsford (D-NV) joined other congressional Democrats on Monday, June 14, to block a bill that would defund Vice President Kamala Harris’ overseas travel budget until she visits the U.S.-Mexico border and provides a report to Congress.
Harris was designated by the Biden administration to lead the response to the border crisis over two months ago and has not visited since she took office, The Federalist recently reported.
The “See the Crisis Act” was introduced by Iowa Congresswoman Ashley Hinson (R-IA) in May.
According to the most recent report, U.S. Customs and Border Protection apprehended over 180,000 people at the southern border in May 2021 alone, which is 14,000 more captures than the last record-high number of May border crossings in 2000.
Drug seizures at the southern border increased by over 18% from April to May 2021, with seizures of methamphetamine increasing by 53%, heroin by 7% and fentanyl by 95, The Federalist reported.
Immigration expert Mark Krikorian pointed out in an interview with FOX News that one in six children born in Nevada in 2020 was born to an illegal immigrant mother.
Carson City Sheriff Ken Furlong and eight other Nevada sheriffs signed a letter to President Biden saying, “You must act now before our nation’s public safety resources are overwhelmed with the criminal side effects of unchecked illegal immigration.”
A study published in December 2020 used Texas Department of Public Safety data to compare felony crime rates between undocumented immigrants, legal immigrants and native-born citizens. The study contradicted Furlong’s statement, showing that undocumented immigrants commit substantially fewer acts of felony crimes than their documented and native-born counterparts.
“U.S.-born citizens are over 2 times more likely to be arrested for violent crimes, 2.5 times more likely to be arrested for drug crimes and over 4 times more likely to be arrested for property crimes,” the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences study said.
Although the crime statistics from the study can bring many U.S. citizens comfort, there is still a crisis at the border for Harris to tend to. The Biden administration can take several important steps to combat the border crisis including ramping up partnerships with humanitarian organizations on each side of the border to meet the increased number of asylum seekers, sending more humanitarian aid to Central America to meet the needs of asylum seekers in dangerous circumstances and lifting Title 42 as COVID-19 conditions improve, according to Human Rights Watch.
These steps would allow the border to see a substantially lower number of immigrants seeking refuge which would allow officials to focus on the drugs being unchecked across the border.
Implemented in March 2020, Title 42 allows the expulsion of noncitizens arriving at the border without documentation. Before Title 42 was implemented due to COVID-19, U.S. law traditionally allows asylum seekers to seek refuge upon arrival at the border even if they don’t show up with documentation or a screening from beforehand. Research has shown that expelling those who need refuge puts them at serious risk for sexual assault, torture and death, Human Rights Watch reported. Taking drastic measures to illegally immigrate is their only option left for survival.
