The cuckoo is an interesting bird. For thousands of years, it has been a kaleidoscope of metaphor — representing love, cuckoldry, speed, seduction, whimsy, fantasy, and ostracism. Among those many meanings is an idiom for when the “cuckoo calls” — when someone makes a statement of sheer foolishness and naïveté that befits either utopia or a dream.

The Biden administration’s border policy seems to circumscribe all these themes. Bringing them all together has been the cuckoo-like line oft-repeated by its heavyweights: “Do not come. Do not come.” It was first uttered by Kamala Harris, who flew last June to countries of the Northern Triangle to carry forth the message. Whereas AOC and the Left directed their wrath at Biden for being unfriendly to migrants, conservatives rightly pointed out the disconnect between words and actions. Even as the administration was loosening Trump-era restrictions on immigration — e.g., the Migrant Protection Protocols (known as the “Remain in Mexico” policy), the “zero tolerance policy” to arrest and detain illegal immigrants per U.S. law, and, later, Title 42 — moves set to draw hordes of migrants north, it was saying, “Do not come.”

The contradiction was massive yet tolerated by the Biden administration, which kept it up. “Do not come,” officials kept chanting as the migrants kept coming. Biden has often uttered some version of it — e.g., “Don’t leave your town” — but, apparently and unsurprisingly, cannot stay on message. Homeland-security secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, following the battering taken by Harris, has now become the clarion cuckoo who chants this call. He repeated the refrain on Sunday, appearing on CNN with Dana Bash, where he drove home the statement.

Sorry, but migrants are smart enough to not be deluded by TV sophistry. Like the rest of us, they pay attention to policy. As long as the Biden administration keeps loose or further loosens rules at the border — under pressure from the progressive Left — migrants will continue coming. If the administration truly wished they didn’t come, it would erect a physical barrier, enforce immigration law, keep asylum applicants in Mexico, and resurrect Safe Third Country Agreements with Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador. Otherwise, nothing will come of their phrase. “Do not come” is but a spin on the chaos of migration. Each call only sounds out the irony and failure of Biden at the border.