June 27, 2018
As a result of an inundation of migrants flowing across the borders, combined with dysfunctional immigration laws, our system has become overwhelmed. According to Syracuse University Trac Immigration database, which monitors U.S. federal immigration enforcement, there is a backlog of 714,067 pending immigration cases. A consequence of this backlog has been the necessity of paroling illegal immigrants into the general population pending their immigration hearing. Due to the enormity of cases, it often takes 2-3 years before a hearing is granted. Numerous “good intentioned” laws and policies have led to this dysfunctional immigration system.
How this Happened
In the last 10 years our country has experienced a 1700% increase in asylum claims. Although the mainstream media only cites poverty, drug cartels, and gang violence in many Central American countries as the main reasons for the exponential increase in those seeking asylum in the United States, a change made to immigration guidelines by the Obama administration made applying for asylum significantly easier, exposing our system to migrants fraudulently claiming the need for refuge.
The revised rules, implemented under Obama in December 2009, mandated that all asylum seekers, as long as there are “no additional factors that weigh against them”, who state that they have a “credible fear” of returning to their country, be given a full hearing and released into the population until their case is heard. Prior to this change asylum seekers were detained until their hearing. Not surprisingly, those claiming to need refuge have learned the correct “credible fear” wording to use. In the last few years approximately, 90% of those requesting an asylum hearing were granted one.
Obama also changed the policy for those seeking refuge to include victims of domestic abuse, and gang violence, effectively redefining a refugee as anyone claiming a fear of violence from anyone. As a consequence of dramatically easing the requirements to claim asylum, the number of applicants went from 5,523 in 2009 to 92,071 in 2016.
In an attempt to bring order to a system clearly being abused Attorney General Jeff Sessions has recently mandated that fear of gang violence or domestic abuse are not acceptable reasons to claim asylum. This ruling should help stem some of the fraudulent applications, as these claims are vague, and inherently difficult to verify.
As an aside, the same individuals that were horrified when President Trump made a private statement, (that was subsequently leaked to the press), referencing certain home countries of migrants coming to the United States as sh*thole countries, are the same people that are now advocating for the rights of asylum seekers to come to the United States because of the horrific conditions in their countries.
Further adding to our dysfunctional immigration system is a 2008 federal law intended to prevent victims of human traffickers, the William Wilberforce Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act. This law requires that all minors, entering from countries other than Canada and Mexico, be given a formal immigration hearing. Pending their hearing, they are released into the population to family members, or turned over to the care of the Department of Health and Human Services, which then is required to place them in the “least restrictive setting”.
In effect minors from a noncontiguous country that can make it to the United States, legally or illegally, are allowed to stay. Since 2012, 200,000 migrant children have entered the United States, 96% of them are still here.
In 2014 numerous Republicans recognized that, WWTVP, enacted to protect minors, actually provided an incentive for children to make the extremely dangerous trek across our border. True to form, Democrats spun the intentions of the Republicans as cold heartedly not caring about the trafficking of children. Unfortunately, Democrats’ version of the narrative prevailed and nothing was done to change this law, which has been a significant factor in the surge of immigrants coming across our border.
A direct reason for the current crisis leading to the separation of parents from their children is the Flores Settlement. As a consequence of an American Civil Liberties Union lawsuit brought on behalf of a 15- year- old girl from El Salvador, restrictive standards were set for minors in federal custody. A main stipulation of the 1997 consent decree agreed to by the Clinton administration, restricted the amount of time that a child can be held in immigration detention to 20 days.
To handle the surge of families from Central America arriving at our border, in 2014 Obama disregarded the Flores Settlement and opened family detention centers, which brought on more lawsuits. Subsequent rulings affirmed that the Flores Settlement applied to both unaccompanied children, and those that came with their parents. Because it takes two to three years before a case is heard these rulings made it impossible to detain children with their parents, while waiting for their immigration case to be resolved. Consequently, Obama also separated parents from their children. However, in many cases the Obama administration released both the parents and their children into the U.S. population pending their hearing, otherwise known as “catch and release”.
Many pundits, and Democrat lawmakers, have dishonestly asserted that allowing migrants to enter the population while waiting their hearing is an effective policy. Actual statistics say otherwise. According to the U.S. Department of Justice, in 2015 44% of non-detained aliens failed to appear for their immigration hearings.
Our system as it stands today encourages both children and adults to breach our borders. Further, the reluctance to break up families has created an incentive for adults to use children as pawns to gain entry into our country. This puts the very children our immigration laws are attempting to protect at risk of becoming victims of crimes such as kidnapping, rape and sex trafficking.
Changes Need to be Made
Our laws actually incentivize the illegal immigration that has overwhelmed our system. Currently, those breaching our borders are often processed and released into the United States community while awaiting their hearing. This needs to stop. Our country has 328 legal ports of entry. Only those arriving legally should be processed. If our system can not handle their request because of over demand they should be sent back to their home country.
An immediate band- aid to our broken immigration system is for Congress to pass legislation to override the Flores Settlement, and allow families and children to be detained together. Further, children from Central America should be treated no differently than those from Mexico and Canada, who are deported within days if they do not have a credible claim for the need for asylum. Now, is also a great time for President Trump to further his support for building a much needed wall along our southern border. Lastly, to stem the ever -increasing flow of asylum seekers the policy changes made by the Obama administration should be rolled back.
These changes would greatly unburden our overwhelmed system. “Catch and release”, a policy that Trump inherited, is de facto open borders. We need to put an end to giving illegal immigrants a free pass because they cross our border with a child. A continuation of the current policies not only encourages illegal immigration, but also makes it easier for drug cartels to function, gangs to infiltrate our country, and spawns sex trafficking and other horrific crimes.
The dysfunctional policies, pose not only a security threat, but also impose significant costs. According to a study in 2017 by the Federation for American Immigration Reform, illegal immigration cost the American taxpayer almost 116 billion dollars in 2016. If our laws are not reformed this number, along with the number of those illegally crossing our border will grow exponentially, and the desire of the left will be fulfilled- we will become a nation without borders. As a sovereign country we have the right to decide to whom to grant entry. This decision should be based upon merit, and not left to the discretion of those willing to break our laws. The GOP, who currently controls the government, needs to take action to restore the rule of law, and telegraph to the world that we are a sovereign nation, which will no longer reward the illegal crossing of our border.
