Last week, during President Joe Biden’s State of the Union address, he pleaded to legislatures to come together on the issue of immigration reform. It is no secret that the Biden administration would like to see a change in border policy to make it easier for immigrants to gain citizenship. The administration believes this would help with the shortage in labor supply.
“Let’s also come together on immigration and make it a bipartisan issue once again,” Biden said during his State of the Union address. “But American border problems won’t be fixed until Congress acts. If we don’t pass my comprehensive immigration reform, at least pass my plan to provide the equipment and officers to secure the border, and a pathway to citizenship for dreamers, those on temporary status, farm workers [and] essential workers.”
Biden proposed his immigration reform plan, The U.S. Citizenship Act, the day that he took office. The proposed bill focuses on "provid[ing] pathways to citizenship and strengthen[ing] labor protections," "prioritizing smart border controls" and "addressing root causes of migration."
On Feb. 7, the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability held a hearing titled “On the Front Lines of the Border Crisis: A Hearing with Chief Patrol Agents.”
“It sounds like the cartels are taking advantage of historically high flow of illegal immigration to overwhelm border patrol agents’ resources, place migrants in peril and undermine border security by introducing deadly narcotics, criminals and terrorists into our country,” Chairman James Comer said after testimony from Chief John Modlin for the Tucson Sector.
Comer also said it was “unfortunate” that the Biden administration “removed many of the deterrent policies that were working to reduce the flow of illegal border crossings and keep cartels in check.”
According to the New York Post, one of the immigration deterrents Biden removed was the “zero tolerance” policy from 2018, which prosecutes illegal border crossings and seeks to unify parents with their children.
NBC News reported that after a Supreme Court ruling, Biden was allowed to reverse the “Remain in Mexico” policy, which required immigrants seeking asylum at the southern border to stay in Mexico until their situation was decided on.
Later in the president’s State of the Union address, Biden spoke about the opioid epidemic and how fentanyl is now killing “more than 70,000 Americans a year.” Immediately after the president said this, a number of Republicans shouted back at the president to “close the border,” to which Biden replied, “You got it.”
The U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency (CPB) reported in November 2022, the most recent information, that they encountered 206,239 migrants.
