The situation at our nation's borders is "unsustainable," according to Inspector General Dr. Joseph Cuffari. The Biden administration's open border policies not only pose significant national security risks, but they are destroying the morale of those who are now managing and staffing the massive influx of illegal aliens. A series of OIG reports and OIG testimony from the Department of Homeland Security arguably show that the Biden administration is either willfully pushing open border policies or falling woefully short of enforcing the laws of the land. Call it politics or call it policy. The American border to the North and the South is officially an open invitation to cartels, illegal border crossings, and bad actors of all stripes.
One of the more startling admissions is found in the Sept. 6, 2023 report. It says we do not know where these individuals are in the majority of cases, nor will we ever be able to locate them. The report's title?— "DHS Does Not Have Assurance That All Migrants Can be Located Once Released into the United States." BINGO. In fact, an Oct. 9, 2023 report from the House Judiciary Committee states the Biden administration has "failed to remove, through immigration court removal proceedings, over 99 percent of those illegal aliens who have been released into the country."
The numbers are simply staggering. According to the House Judiciary report, there have been more than 5 to 8 million illegal alien encounters along the Southern border between January 2021 and Mar. 31, 2023. And "at least 2,464,424" of those encountered "had no confirmed departure." DHS released at least 2,148,738 illegal aliens into the United States, according to the report. These numbers do not include 'gotaways' or those who evaded detection. The idea that DHS is removing illegals on an expedited basis, per Secretary Mayorkas's statement in April, is arguably a complete farce.
Per the report, Biden's DHS continues to ignore asylum laws as well. The report states that "only six percent were screened for fear of persecution," a requirement for claiming asylum. An additional 205,473 were released through other "illegal categorical parole programs." Venezuela, Cuba, Haiti, and Nicaragua are the countries cited in those parole programs by the report. In the first ten months of FY2023, the DHS "released into the United States 929,496 illegal aliens" at the southwest border. Of those releases, "the CBP One mobile application facilitated 182,425 through the parole programs," according to the report. In a podcast from the Center for Immigration Studies, Todd Bensman discusses how the CBP One application has made it easier for otherwise "inadmissible aliens" to cross our borders. The program also makes it easy for the Biden administration to skirt political controversy because, according to Bensman, it makes the "border crisis less visible."
"The strategy of the CBP One scheme is to let inadmissible aliens who would otherwise cross illegally make an appointment to cross at an official port of entry instead, to make border crisis less visible and politically damaging for the Biden administration," writes Bensman and Mark Kirdorian. "The scheme, which includes a work permit, has been going on since May 2021, paroling into the U.S. nearly a quarter million inadmissible aliens from nearly 100 countries, including thousands from countries of terrorism concern."
Bensman also highlights Biden's use of parole programs using the CBP One app for "Special Interest Aliens" (SIAs). He states that nearly 250,000 foreign nationals were paroled into the U.S. through August 2023. Of that total, "only 136,000 came from Cuba, Haiti, Venezuela, and Nicaragua." The rest came from "a startingly broad array of 93 other countries." 24 of those nations, according to Bensman, "have been designated by the U.S. government as being of national security concern."
SIAs or SIMs (special interest migrants) are deemed to be a higher risk to national security. However, the Biden administration, by promoting the CBP One app for use by SIAs, "affirmatively chose to authorize their parole entries. In the past, the government has been forced to contend with SIAs because they crossed illegally of their own volitions and got caught," writes Bensman. CIS FOIA litigation "suggests" that the vetting for such entries is poor, "approving 99.7 percent of all such applicants for parole." Only "698 individuals were rejected" in the process, and the government "has withheld all information on the handful of rejections," according to CIS.
The most recent OIG report exposes several worrisome issues associated with Biden's immigration policies. Transparency and accountability top the list and are concerns that materially affect the nation's security. As a result of Biden's open border policies, drug cartels have become further emboldened to operate with impunity. Illegal drug trade, human trafficking, and crime are all on the rise, and the problems are not confined to border states. The OIG reports that "DHS did not consistently comply with National Instant Criminal Background Check System requirements." For example, a migrant on the Terrorist Watchlist was released into the interior U.S., and "information sharing challenges" made it difficult for ICE to arrest the individual in question. No doubt there are other such cases the DHS is reluctant to tell Americans about. Inefficiencies in the process "result from manual organizational processes" that make it difficult to easily track individuals on the Terrorist Watchlist.
The issues are not limited to illegal crossings. The OIG reports significant vulnerabilities in "trade-based money laundering (TBML)." According to the report, "TBML is a scheme that disguises criminal proceeds by using legitimate trade transactions. The Trade Transparency Unit does not have automated technology to identify import commodities at high risk for TBML." Instead, they apparently do it manually by searching import records.
This administration's chaotic open border policies have also "negatively impacted the morale of CBP and ICE employees," according to Inspector General Dr. Joseph Cuffari, who testified in June 2023 before the Subcommittee on National Security, the Border, and Foreign Affairs. Through observations and interviews at 31 sites and survey results, Cuffari testified:
"Law enforcement personnel feel overworked and are assigned to duties not germane to their primary mission. In the last 4 years, CBP and ICE have faced exceptional challenges beyond their control. Migrant encounters at the Southwest Border have increased by 143 percent."
The massive numbers have created staffing challenges, overcrowding, and "non-compliance with National Standards on Transport, Escort, Detention, and Search," according to his report. The ratio of Border Patrol Agents to the number of encounters on the Southwest border is stunning. CBP and ICE staffing ratios are also worrisome.
To make matters worse, DHS technology systems cannot and do not support the "high volumes of migrant tracking along the Southwest border." Instead, the OIG reports an antiquated reliance on "physical paper files and whiteboards to support tracking from apprehension to release."
Stunning data has also emerged on "gotaways" in the OIG report. These are gotaways that were "observed and documented" only, with the actual numbers "unknown." The graphs tell the tale, but since 2019, there has been a 303 percent increase in the number of gotaways, according to Cuffari.
Arizona Congressman Andy Biggs speaks to the results of the DHS OIG report on Biden's border policies during his interview with Bannon on Jan. 4, 2024. He makes some bold statements about the criminality of the programs that have allowed approximately 8 million people to cross our borders since Biden took office.
Biggs states that most of those who cross are "self-identifying," meaning we are using the proper identification systems like the "DNA swab system sparingly. So, if you are under age 14, they aren't taking metric information. I have talked to agents who told me this person could be in his low 20s or high teens, but they will say they are 12 because then they will not take the data on them. It isn't just a scam; it is a criminal enterprise by this regime. We are facilitating the logistical arm of the cartels that have no regard for human life." Moreover, added Biggs, "The Biden administration is slow-walking getting additional information that the IG requested related to the border crisis and other issues. So the IG has to fight the administration constantly to get what it needs." The Biden administration announced the end of the rapid DNA testing program on May 31, 2023.
