As conditions at the border continue to worsen, the Biden Administration is looking for who to blame.
Since undoing nearly all of Trump’s immigration policies, migrants seeking to enter the US have exploded to levels that haven’t been seen in nearly two decades. In February, it’s estimated that 100,000 illegal immigrants have been apprehended by Custom Border Protection (CBP). This is in sharp contrast to the nearly 16,000 apprehensions made last April.
According to the Daily Mail, “Biden officials claim Trump officials did not fully cooperate with his transition team, hindering their ability get a realistic view of potential migration, and that Trump deconstructed the immigration and asylum system – which they then inherited.”
CNN reported Julie Rodriguez, Biden’s Director of the White House’s Office of Intergovernmental Affairs, said “As we were coming into the administration, we knew we were inheriting an absolute mess from the previous administration — that there were aspects of our legal immigration system that had been gutted and a department that lacked the personnel to administer our laws.”
The finger-pointing comes after weeks of the Biden Administration downplaying the worsening conditions at the border. However, conditions forced the Administration to call in FEMA to aid with the crisis.
Even though many speculate the influx at the border is due to Biden’s lax immigration policies, various federal agencies are quick to divert focus away from Biden’s policies and cite living conditions within South American countries.
“The federal government is responding to the arrival of record numbers of individuals, including unaccompanied children, at the southwest border. Since April 2020, the number of encounters at the border has been rising due to ongoing violence, natural disasters, food insecurity, and poverty in the Northern Triangle countries of Central America,” the DHS said.
