Biden’s Border Crisis Breaks Another Record

Joe Biden And Kamala Harris Keep Insisting ‘The Border Is Secure’ …

NBC’s CRAIG MELVIN: “But in April alone, Mr. President, 170,000 people, migrants apprehended at the border to 20 year record. There are 22,000 unaccompanied children in our country right now. That’s a record. That sounds to most folks like a crisis.”
PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN: “Well, look, it’s way down now. We’ve now gotten control.” (NBC’s “Today,” 4/30/2021)

NBC’S CHUCK TODD: “Final topic here. Since we're here in Texas, I want to ask you about the border. Would you call the border secure?”
VICE PRESIDENT KAMALA HARRIS: “I think that there is no question that we have to do what the president and I asked Congress to do, the first request we made: pass a bill to create a pathway to citizenship. The border is secure, but we also have a broken immigration system, in particular, over the last four years before we came in, and it needs to be fixed.”
TODD: “We're going to have two million people cross this border for the first time ever. You're confident this border's secure?”
HARRIS: “We have a secure border in that that is a priority for any nation, including ours and our administration.” (NBC’s “Meet The Press,” 9/11/2022)

REPORTER: “Over the weekend, the Vice President said that the border is ‘secure,’ but we’re on track to close the fiscal year with 2 million encounters, breaking last year’s record. Last month — in the last month alone, fentanyl seizures were up 200 percent, and we’re on pace to break that record also this year. So how is the border secure?”
WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY KARINE JEAN PIERRE: “… Look, as far as the border, we’re taking unprecedented action. We had to fix something that was broken, especially by the last administration…. We’re certainly doing a lot more to secure the border and could be doing even more if Republicans would stop their obstruction.” (White House Press Briefing, 9/13/2022)

REPORTER: “Is the border secure?”
KARINE JEAN PIERRE: “I’m just going to refer back to the Vice President. We agree with her. She is saying that there’s a lot of work to do.  Right?  She also said that in that very statement. We agree that the border is secure, but there is still more work to be done.” (White House Press Briefing, 9/15/2022)

… Yet Customs And Border Protection Just Announced A Record 2 Million Arrests This Fiscal Year Of People Illegally Crossing The U.S. Southern Border

(“Southwest Land Border Encounters,” U.S. Customs And Border Protection Website, 9/14/2022)

“U.S. authorities made more than 2 million immigration arrests along the southern border during the past 11 months, marking the first time annual enforcement statistics have exceeded that threshold, according to figures provided by senior Biden administration officials Monday. In August, U.S. Customs and Border Protection detained 203,598 migrants crossing from Mexico, the latest figures show, putting authorities on pace to tally more than 2.3 million arrests during the government’s 2022 fiscal year, which ends Sept. 30. The total, which includes some people apprehended more than once, far exceeds last year’s record of more than 1.7 million arrests.” (“U.S. Arrests Along Mexico Border Top 2 Million A Year For First Time,” The Washington Post, 9/19/2022)

• “Biden administration officials also say the high border numbers are distorted by repeat crossing attempts by migrants who have been previously arrested. Last month, 22 percent of those taken into custody had a prior arrest in the previous 12 months, the latest figures show.” (“U.S. Arrests Along Mexico Border Top 2 Million A Year For First Time,” The Washington Post, 9/19/2022)

“Since President Biden’s first days in office, more than one million people have been released by border authorities to face removal proceedings, according to data submitted in monthly status update filings in legal challenges to this administration’s immigration policies.” (“Arrests at Southwestern Border Exceed 2 Million in a Year for the First Time,” The New York Times, 9/19/2022)

Sadly, The Biden Administration’s Failures To Discourage Illegal Immigration Have Also Resulted In A Record Number Of Deaths At The Southern Border This Fiscal Year

“Nearly 750 migrants have died at the southern border this fiscal year, a record that surpasses last year's total by more than 200 people, according to Department of Homeland Security figures shared with CNN. Migrants often face treacherous terrain when crossing the border -- including oppressive desert heat, dangerous waters and falling from the border wall. Since October 1, which marks the start of the fiscal year, there have been 748 deaths, a Homeland Security official told CNN, with a month still left to go in the fiscal year. That's up from 557 southwest border deaths during fiscal year 2021, the previous record.” (“A Record Number Of Migrants Have Died Crossing The US-Mexico Border,” CNN, 9/07/2022)

Drug Cartels Are Taking Advantage Of This Border Chaos To Smuggle More And More Deadly Fentanyl Into The United States

(“Drug Seizure Statistics,” U.S. Customs And Border Protection Website, 9/14/2022)

‘The Amount Of Fentanyl We Are Seizing At The Border Is Staggering,’ ‘We Are In The Middle Of A Fentanyl Crisis At The Hands Of Criminal Enterprises, Transcending Our Borders’

DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE: “More deadly fentanyl is being seized by border officials in San Diego and Imperial counties than at any of the nation’s 300-plus ports of entry, making this federal district an epicenter for fentanyl trafficking into the United States…. Mexican cartels are increasingly manufacturing fentanyl for distribution and sale in the United States Precursors are imported from China and other countries and then pressed into pills, powder or mixed into other drugs at massive, industrial-scale labs.” (United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of California, Press Release, 8/11/2022)

• RANDY GROSSMAN, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of California: “A decade ago, we didn’t even know about fentanyl, and now it’s a national crisis. The amount of fentanyl we are seizing at the border is staggering. The number of fentanyl seizures and fentanyl-related deaths in our district are unprecedented.” (United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of California, Press Release, 8/11/2022)

• STACEY MOY, Special Agent in Charge of the FBI’s San Diego Field Office: “There is no doubt we are in the middle of a fentanyl crisis at the hands of criminal enterprises, transcending our borders into the communities where we live, where we work, where we go to school.” (United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of California, Press Release, 8/11/2022)

‘Drugs [Are] Pouring Over The Southern Border From Mexican Drug Cartels’

“The uptick in fake tablets or ‘dupes’ is fueled by drugs pouring over the southern border from Mexican drug cartels, the Wall Street Journal reported recently.” (“America's Fentanyl Problem A Growing Threat For Teens,” Axios, 9/16/2022)

“With business savvy and growing power in Mexico, the Sinaloa and rival Jalisco cartels dominate the market for supplying fentanyl to the U.S. They cornered the market after China cracked down on fentanyl production several years ago and are now churning out bootleg versions of the highly potent synthetic opioid that, in its legal form, is used under prescription to treat severe pain. Fentanyl’s inexpensive, easy-to-replicate formula has boosted its appeal to criminal networks. It is also fueling an overdose crisis that claimed more than 108,000 lives in the U.S. last year, a record.” (“How Two Mexican Drug Cartels Came to Dominate America’s Fentanyl Supply,” The Wall Street Journal, 8/30/2022)

• “The U.S. attorney’s office in San Diego in June said 26 people were indicted following a two-year investigation into what law-enforcement officials described as a sprawling operation extending from Sinaloa. Drugs seized included methamphetamine, cocaine, heroin and nearly 500,000 fake pills laced with fentanyl, investigators said. The DEA identified alleged couriers, stash-house managers and people who smuggled proceeds back to Mexico. A separate DEA operation in 2020 led to the arrest of more than 600 alleged Jalisco cartel members in the U.S. That cartel is Mexico’s fastest-growing and most violent. It is fighting with Sinaloa for control of seaports where fentanyl’s chemical ingredients arrive from China as well as routes through the country and border crossings into the U.S.” (“How Two Mexican Drug Cartels Came to Dominate America’s Fentanyl Supply,” The Wall Street Journal, 8/30/2022)

“In May 2019, under pressure from the U.S., China put fentanyl-related drugs under a controlled regulatory regime. The next year, seizures of fentanyl from China in the U.S. dropped sharply, according to a Government Accountability Office report…. Mexican cartels were primed to take advantage. They already had established trafficking networks built around drugs like cocaine, marijuana and heroin, said Uttam Dhillon, who served as acting DEA administrator under Mr. Trump. And they had relationships with Chinese chemical makers, and expertise running drugmaking labs, through their production of methamphetamine, another synthetic drug they are sending to the U.S., Mr. Dhillon said. The DEA said the cartels are pushing their synthetic wares into more parts of the U.S. Methamphetamine is more present in some eastern states where that drug was once rare. And fentanyl is growing in the West. Its potency and the lack of quality control in the black market make it easy to cause overdoses—including when users don’t know that fentanyl is laced into or simply sold as other drugs.” (“How Two Mexican Drug Cartels Came to Dominate America’s Fentanyl Supply,” The Wall Street Journal, 8/30/2022)