A group of more than 70 sheriffs is urging Congress to take action to extend the Title 42 public health order, which has allowed border agents to immediately expel illegal border crossers but is slated for termination on May 23.
Lawmakers have warned the southern border will likely see a huge surge in illegal immigration when the order ends. The policy was first handed down under the Trump administration at the start of the pandemic.
“Title 42 is the only policy provision left since January 2022 that helps to stop the unhealthy (no COVID testing) border crossings by millions of illegal entrants to our country,” writes the group of sheriffs organized by the National Sheriff’s Association in a letter to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.) and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.) on Thursday.
The letter says the Biden administration’s efforts to undo Trump-era immigration policy, including ending the Remain in Mexico policy and construction on the border wall, mean that “we simply have no border left in Arizona, New Mexico, Texas or Southern California.”
“Today, there are thousands of immigrants in the jungles of the Darien gap headed to the US border. We simply don’t know their health status and implore you to keep Title 42 as the last policy we have to keep Americans safe from COVID and a host of other communicable diseases carried by these immigrants,” the group adds.
The letter notes that Border Patrol agents have already encountered more than a million migrants in just the first half of the fiscal year.
“This letter addresses Title 42 so we won’t speak about the amount of fentanyl, cocaine, methamphetamine, ghost guns, ammunition and other deadly substances flowing across our border at this very moment,” the letter says.
While McConnell has called the decision to end Title 42 “outrageous,” Schumer had advocated for its termination, saying the policy was “disastrous for immigrant families seeking asylum from the horrors in their own countries.”
McConnell warned that the policy’s end will cause a “gusher” of illegal immigration at the border, at a time when there were already 221,000 encounters in March with the order in place. The policy allowed the U.S. to expel half of those migrants.
With Title 42 set to end next month, the Biden administration has warned some 18,000 migrants could turn up at the border each day.
The letter comes after a bipartisan group of senators introduced legislation that would delay the end of Title 42 by at least two months until the administration outlines a plan to combat the consequences of lifting the order.
Democratic Senator Gary Peters of Michigan, who is chairman of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, told reporters earlier this week: “Unless we have a well-thought-out plan, I think it is something that should be revisited and perhaps delayed. I’m going to defer judgment on that until I give the administration the opportunity to fully articulate what that plan is.”
Meanwhile, recent polling from Morning Consult found that a majority of Americans — 56 percent — oppose lifting Title 42.