Obama 'Committed to Escallating' Lawlessness at Border
There is now an unprecedented crisis unfolding at the border. The flow of illegal immigrant youth across the southern border is on track to reach 130,000 next year—a projected increase of more than 2,000% from 2011. The White House estimates the cost of “resettling” these illegal immigrants in the United States will reach $2.3 billion in a single year.
By Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL)
Breitbart.com
This crisis is a direct and predictable result of
the President’s sustained and deliberate campaign to
dismantle immigration enforcement. His
administration has announced to the world that our
nation’s immigration laws will not be enforced and
that, in particular, they will not be applied to
foreign youth.
The world has heard and heeded the President’s
message. A wave of illegal immigration has
overwhelmed authorities, producing a completely
preventable humanitarian crisis—and further
diminishing the integrity of our national borders.
And there is but one way for the crisis to end: for
the President of the United States to declare to the
world: "Do not attempt to come here illegally. Our
border is no longer open. Our laws will be
enforced."
A local TV station in Texas recently issued a
telling report. They revealed that information is
being disseminated in Central America urging people
to make the life-threatening trek north in pursuit
of amnesty: "A mother and child told Channel 5 News
that the message being disseminated in their country
is, 'go to America with your child, you won't be
turned away.'"
The New York Times reported last week that an
illegal immigrant youth said: “If you make it, they
take you to a shelter and take care of you and let
you have permission to stay… When you appeal your
case, if you say you want to study, they support
you.”
In response to this emergency, the Administration
has taken steps to incentivize even more illegal
immigration. Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh
Johnson—who swore an oath to uphold the law—just
last week announced that 560,000 illegal immigrants
will be given formal work authorization in the
United States despite average unemployment rates of
20 percent for American teenagers without high
school diplomas. Meanwhile, the President’s Labor
Department has unilaterally authorized the admission
of an additional 100,000 guest workers to compete
against unemployed Americans. Among those who suffer
the most as a result of these policies are
African-American and Hispanic youth.
Secretary Johnson went on to emphasize that the
United States will continue exempting foreign youth
from America’s immigration laws. He explained:
“almost all of us agree that a child who crossed our
border illegally with a parent, or in search of a
parent or a better life, was not making an adult
choice to break our laws and should be treated
differently than adult law-breakers.” In effect, Mr.
Johnson is signaling to everyone in the world: if
you come here by a certain age you will get amnesty
and, ultimately, so will your family. It is a recipe
for permanent lawlessness, open borders, and a
continuing humanitarian catastrophe. (It must also
be noted that many of those crossing illegally do
not have parents, or even relatives, in the United
States. And many of them are not minors at all.)
The nation’s chief law enforcement officer, Eric
Holder, has even described amnesty as a “civil
right.” Of course, if amnesty is a civil right then
immigration laws can never be enforced and amnesty
can never be denied, because such rights are
immutable.
Cecilia Muñoz, who runs immigration policy for the
White House—and who is a former executive for the
open borders group La Raza—also likened amnesty to a
civil right. And only days ago she absurdly argued
that the surge in illegal immigration bears no
relation to the President’s suspension of
immigration laws or campaign for amnesty. As
Breitbart News reported: "Muñoz pushed back against
the idea that the influx could be due to discussions
of [amnesty]… 'Neither the bill which passed the
Senate last year, nor the deferred action program
for childhood arrivals would benefit these kids,'
she continued. 'They both have cutoff dates. You had
to have been in the country by a particular date in
order to qualify for either of those things.’”
Perhaps an earlier report from the New York Times
provides the best rebuttal to Ms. Munoz:
With detention facilities, asylum offices and
immigration courts overwhelmed, enough migrants have
been released temporarily in the United States that
back home in Central America people have heard that
those who make it to American soil have a good
chance of staying. "Word has gotten out that we’re
giving people permission and walking them out the
door," said Chris Cabrera, a Border Patrol agent who
is vice president of the local of the National
Border Patrol Council, the agents’ union. "So
they’re coming across in droves."
For all practical purposes, the Administration’s
policy is that anyone in the world, of any age, is
free to come and stay in the interior of the United
States, to illegally work and receive taxpayer
benefits, so long as they are not caught, tried, and
convicted of a serious crime. And even then,
thousands of criminal aliens are released each and
every year.
Unfortunately, the President remains committed to
escalating—rather than ending—the lawlessness. It
therefore falls on the shoulders of Republicans
alone to make the case for new leadership that will
restore America’s borders. Republicans are the last
line of defense for the American worker. They are
the last bulwark for the rule of law.
That means prominent Republicans must cease issuing
ill-conceived statements that it is somehow morally
or legally improper for the United States to apply
immigration laws to illegal immigrants who arrive by
a certain age. As USCIS Council President Kenneth
Palinkas has warned, these arguments will produce
not merely a one-time amnesty but a “perpetual
amnesty.” Palinkas explained that such promises lead
to “extending birthright citizenship in the future
to include the foreign citizens of other countries”
(as opposed to the children of illegal immigrants
born in the U.S.). It cannot be the policy of the
United States that any of the 2 billion people in
the world who have yet turn to turn 18 have a right
to illegally enter the United States and claim
residency.
For the law enforcement to function, lawmakers and
law officers must encourage—not discourage—the law’s
application.
Imagine, for instance, that the Administration
announced it would no longer enforce any tax fraud
violations in amounts under $1 million, as a matter
of “prosecutorial discretion.” Would we not see a
massive spike in tax fraud in amounts less than a
million dollars? It would be a unilateral repeal of
an entire section of the criminal code by the
Executive Branch. Now further imagine the
Administration expanded the policy to say that tax
fraud—in any amount—will be permitted so long as the
proceeds are transferred to a minor relative. After
all, this minor, the Administration argues, received
the money “through no fault of their own” and so it
would be morally improper to apply the law in such
cases—it would be a violation of their “civil
rights.” Does anyone doubt this would lead to a
total collapse of tax enforcement nationwide?
Of course not. Yet this administration has
effectively adopted the philosophy that immigration
law, on its own, cannot be enforced in the interior
of the United States and that, further, foreign
nationals who arrive by a certain age—and their
relatives—have a “right” to become citizens of the
United States.
It is time for the GOP to look the American people
in the eye and say: We will end the chaos. We will
stop the lawlessness. And we will restore for the
American people the immigration protections that
have been callously stripped away by this
Administration.
Jeff Sessions (R-AL) is the Ranking Member of
the Senate Budget Committee and former Ranking
Member of the Judiciary Committee. He is also
a former U.S. Attorney and Attorney General for the
State of Alabama.