A record number of illegal immigrants have poured into the country since President Biden took office because they believe his administration is presiding over an open border, Border Patrol officials testified Tuesday before a hearing of the Republican House Oversight Committee.
Republicans began the hearing by blaming the Biden administration for incentivizing illegal migration by reversing several effective Trump-era policies, including the Migrant Protection Protocols, which required would-be asylum seekers to remain in Mexico while their cases are being adjudicated.
Representative Byron Donalds (R., Fla.) made the case that Biden’s presidency is the decisive factor that explains the record increase in illegal crossings, recounting the last 12 years of border apprehensions, starting with 447,000 in 2010 and ending with 2.2 million in 2022, nearly two years into Biden’s tenure.
“There was someone who became president of the United States in January 2021. On January 2021, this gentleman actually got rid of the migrant protection protocols, he stopped border wall funding, he gutted interior enforcement against illegal aliens, put a 100-day moratorium to ‘study’ border security protocols,” Donalds said.
Asked whether those policy changes contributed to increased migrant apprehensions, Chief Patrol Agent John Modlin of the Tucson Sector said that many migrants interpreted Biden’s election as an overhaul in the immigration regime. There was an overwhelming belief among border crossers, he said, “that when the administration changed, the law changed.”
Modlin said many migrants believed that “there was an open border.”
Representative (R., Ky.) James Comer agreed that Biden’s messaging has been that migrants won’t be stopped from entering the interior.
“Starting on his first day in office Biden signaled to the world that our borders are open. Open to criminals, human traffickers, and drug traffickers,” he said.
Donalds noted that, in addition to his policy reversals from the Trump administration, Biden’s failure to enforce existing law has fueled the crisis.
“The law did not change. Joe Biden decided not to follow the law,” he said.
The Florida congressman also addressed the humanitarian scandals that have resulted from the border crisis. In the Yuma section of the border in Arizona, his team” found empty capsules of Plan B, empty capsules of birth control,” Donalds said.
“Are there young girls who are being raped on the journey to the southern border?” he asked.
Migrants girls that have been through central processing centers at the border have confirmed to personnel that they were abused, Chief Patrol Agent Gloria Chavez of the Rio Grande sector in Texas said.
Representative Lauren Boebert blamed Biden for invoking amnesty and changing “secure border policies” that “were working for our country.”
“This is intentional,” she said.
Modlin reiterated that migrants assumed Biden’s approach to enforcement would be much more lenient than his predecessor’s, which is why they risked the journey.
“All I know is what we’re being told by people who have crossed and they absolutely unequivocally crossed because they felt like law and policy had changed,” Modlin said.