02/05/2024
The Senate’s much-anticipated border deal is finally here — and it’s as bad as we could’ve imagined. It does hardly anything about the border, while actually increasing legal immigration. It funds the corrupt NGOs that keep the invasion going and even provides lawyers for illegals — free of charge! The bill accepts that thousands will stream across our border every month. It only does something if the number exceeds a very high threshold, and even the action to stem the tide won’t do much good. It’s worse than no bill at all. One of the most obvious signs that it’s a bad bill: the immigration enthusiast Wall Street Journal calls it “A Border Bill Worth Passing.”
“GOP critics of the bill are pointing to the bill’s modest expansion of legal visas — about 50,000 a year for employment and family visas.
Republicans claim to oppose illegal immigration, but this complaint shows that some really oppose all immigration.” https://t.co/DRCF7PqNHm
— Reily Connaughton (@reilyseanconn) February 6, 2024
Thankfully, many Republicans hate it and it has little chance of passage. But the proposal does reveal how much further the GOP must go to be a true America First party.
The border bill was intended to solve the Biden Rush. In the final months of 2023, Republican senators refused to fund Ukraine to force Democrats to make concessions on immigration. This move indicated a level of dedication to the issue that the GOP Establishment hadn’t displayed before. I praised this surprising outbreak of backbone. It was the first time the GOP had ever dared touch “national security” spending to do something about the border. But this bill wasn’t worth the effort.
Perhaps inadvertently, Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) [NumbersUSA Rating F] explained better than any critic why conservatives should oppose the bill. He laid out the bill in detail in a thread on X. Here are the key portions highlighted:
Minutes ago, the text of the bipartisan national security funding bill was released. It:
-funds Ukraine, Israel, and humanitarian relief
-secures our border and reforms our asylum law1/ As the co-author of the immigration provisions, here’s a THREAD on the key elements:
— Chris Murphy ๐ง (@ChrisMurphyCT) February 4, 2024
Murphy thus undermines GOP supporters of the bill claims about it. The chief Republican architect of the bill is Oklahoma Sen. James Lankford [NumbersUSA Rating A+, but only on illegal immigration], long a VDARE.com target. He demanded more refugees during the Trump administration, tried to introduce an Amnesty for the agricultural industry, and has consistently been one of the squishiest Republicans on immigration in the Senate. Lankford desperately wants to convince conservatives that the bill is actually a serious border security measure. His strategy involves lying about the bill. Thus he claims the bill has been a victim of misinformation, insisting it would not allow 5,000 illegals a day into the country. The problem for him is that the bill specifically does that, as both the bill and Sen. Murphy make clear.
The Border Emergency Authority has been the most misunderstood or maybe just misrepresented parts of the bill. Some people have said it would mean 5,000 people a day are coming into the country every day. That is absurd and untrue.
— Sen. James Lankford (@SenatorLankford) February 5, 2024
And there it is… what Sinema and Lankford swore wasn’t in the bill.
It guarantees that up to 1.8 million illegal aliens can come over our border before it’s an emergency pic.twitter.com/i05pNH29YV
— Ryan James Girdusky (@RyanGirdusky) February 5, 2024
Under the bill, the border would “shut down” (in reality, just direct migrants to ports of entry) if it has a daily average of 5k migrant encounters a day. The “shutdown” would last until the daily average is brought down to 75% of the 5,000 average. These rules would allow for well over 100,000 migrants to illegally cross every month (and these numbers only include the ones they catch). It would only be an issue if the numbers exceed 150,000 a month.
But the measures would not be likely to draw down the numbers. Exceptions would still be granted to migrants who claim they feel very threatened and need to get in. Also, illegals could just go to a port of entry and get their asylum hearing date there. This is hardly a border security measure.
South Dakota Sen. Mike Rounds one-upped Lankford’s tactic by saying the criticism of the bill might be directed from Russia. “I suspect that a lot of the internet rumors are very well coming from overseas, where they would love to see this shut down because some people would rather not see funding for Ukraine,” he told Politico last week [GOP senators fear border deal may already be doomed, by Burgess Everett, January 30, 2024].
So Murphy highlighted some of the worst aspects of the bill, such as the fake shutdown threats, the increase in legal immigration, the free legal aid for migrants, and other such terrible proposals. But there are even more horrible aspects to the bill. It allows Biden to continue to parole as many would-be illegals as he pleases. It offers 250,000 work visas to the children of guest workers. It puts all judicial decisions on what’s included in the bill under the sole jurisdiction of the notoriously Leftist D.C. circuit. It doles out over $2 billion to the Treason Lobby “charities” involved in facilitating the invasion [Senate Releases Establishment’s Migration Bill, by Neil Munro, Breitbart, February 4, 2024].
All challenges to the statute or any policy, guideline, or procedure Mayorkas sees fit to issue will be heard exclusively by the federal district court in the Swamp. Tough orders from federal district courts in Texas and Florida will be no more. pic.twitter.com/Lt5HjD7tJi
— Rep. Dan Bishop (@RepDanBishop) February 5, 2024
The “border” bill released tonight includes an eye-popping $1.4B for NGOs to resettle illegal aliens in your communities via airplane tickets and hotel rooms (nearly double the record amount from FY23), including $933M available immediately without conditions. ๐งต (1/4) https://t.co/5oLF9AGxPE
— Senator Bill Hagerty (@SenatorHagerty) February 5, 2024
But what may even be worse: how the bill cements the abuse of the asylum system to further the Great Replacement. The bill’s brilliant idea to speed up asylum claims is to put these decisions in the hands of asylum officers, many of whom would be Leftist bureaucrats and activists hired by the Biden Regime. Instead of rejecting most of the ridiculous claims of these illegals, many will be accepted and the illegals would officially be granted asylum status. This would give them a permanent basis in the country and make it much harder to deport. This bill would handcuff Trump’s ability to deport them if he becomes president next year. This is one of the chief reasons why this bill is worse than no bill at all [Senate Border Bill Would Upend US Asylum at the Border With Emergency Limits and Fast-Track Reviews, Associated Press, February 5, 2024].
It’s also pointless. President Biden could aggressively enforce immigration law right now if he wanted to. He could restore Remain in Mexico, make it easier to deport illegals, and unleash ICE without the need for congressional approval. This is all within his power.
But he doesn’t want to do any of these things. Instead, he wants a “bipartisan” compromise to give him political cover while continuing the Left’s chief goal of replacing the Historic American Nation. Biden can claim he solved the border crisis while allowing the invasion to continue on silently. Sadly, a number of Republicans are willing to give him what he wants.
The White Pill: the reaction from conservative media and many Republicans. There is no support for this bill among conservative media, which is a significant contrast from the Gang of Eight Amnesty. Bill O’Reilly, Fox News’s biggest star at the time, along with many others endorsed that Amnesty [Bill O’Reilly endorses immigration reform, by Jonathan Easley, The Hill, June 21, 2013]. In Congress, it’s hard to find anyone besides a few Establishment GOP lawmakers who like this bill. House GOP leadership — including House Speaker Mike Johnson and Majority Leader Steve Scalise — say the bill will never get a vote in their chamber. Several lawmakers in the House are excoriating the bill [G.O.P. Backlash to Border Deal Reflects Vanishing Ground for a Compromise, by Annie Karni, New York Times, February 5, 2024]. Montana Sen. Steve Daines, the head of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, strongly opposes the bill. Senators Ted Cruz, Tommy Tuberville, and Bill Haggerty publicly assail it. Even Sen. John Cornyn, who is one of the least trustworthy Republicans in the Senate, says he has “serious concerns” with the bill [Sen. John Cornyn Raises ‘Serious Concerns’ with Senate Immigration Deal, by Matthew Boyle, Breitbart, February 5, 2024]. Nearly 20 Senators are already a “NO” on the bill.
Updated list of NO votes
๐๐ ๐๐๐ง๐๐ญ๐จ๐ซ๐ฌ
Marsha Blackburn (TN)
— Amy Kremer (@AmyKremer) February 5, 2024
Mike Braun (IN)
Katie Britt (AL)
Ted Budd (NC)
Tom Cotton (AR)
Ted Cruz (TX)
Steve Daines (MT)
Bill Hagerty (TN)
Josh Hawley (MO)
Ron Johnson (WI)
Mike Lee (UT)
Roger Marshall (KS)
Rand Paul (KY)
Jim Risch… https://t.co/VfUkLmwtpX
Lankford is lobbying outside groups and lawmakers to endorse the bill. But he appears to be failing in this endeavor [Sen. James Lankford Begs for Public Statements Backing His Open Borders Senate Plan, by Bradley Jaye, Breitbart, February 4, 2024].
There are good, neutral, and bad takeaways from this fight.
The Congressional GOP is still improving on immigration, despite this terrible deal. If something like this had been offered before Trump, it would’ve been probably accepted by the majority of the GOP. This violent reaction shows that they can no longer be duped by such stupidity.
The bill also shows how extreme the Democrats have become. The paltry restrictions were the only thing they would agree to, even though they will not solve the border crisis. These negotiations prove it’s pointless to try to achieve “bipartisan” solutions on immigration. Republicans must act on their own.
This ridiculous deal shows how deluded many Republicans are. There are still way too many James Lankfords in the party. They truly believe that “bipartisan” compromises are the way to solve this problem. They’re also still eager to find ways to give their donors more access to cheap foreign labor.
RINOS like Lankford need to be primaried to send a message. The days of putting business first are over. The GOP/GAP’s emerging National Conservative base doesn’t want compromises or sellouts. It wants to put America first.
This bill fails to do that — and that’s why it will die.
Washington Watcher II is an anonymous DC insider.
This is a content archive of VDARE.com, which Letitia James forced off of the Internet using lawfare.