Too many migrants are entering illegally, but the system for legal admissions has broken down as well.
Illegal border crossings continue to dominate the migrant debate, which is understandable given that we are, as John Adams put it, a nation of laws. Illegal entries have reached record highs in recent years, and the Biden administration’s response is best summarized as somewhere between incompetence and indifference.
Republicans want Democrats to pay a political price in next year’s election, and perhaps they will. But the situation on the border isn’t simply another political headache for the administration, like high gasoline prices or upticks in violent crime. Rather, it’s a major issue that could reverberate for decades—no matter which party wins next year.
For starters, porous borders compromise homeland security. The world is a dangerous place, as recent events have reminded us, and the government needs to know who’s entering the country. Increasingly, the southern border has become a portal not only for Central Americans but also for tens of thousands of foreign nationals from as far away as Asia and Africa. A large majority are economic migrants in search of employment and better living conditions. Still, the possibility that some small percentage is coming here to do us harm deserves more attention than it’s getting from the White House.
Continue reading the entire piece here at The Wall Street Journal (paywall)
______________________
Jason L. Riley is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, a columnist at The Wall Street Journal, and a Fox News commentator. Follow him on Twitter here.
Photo by LOREN ELLIOTT/AFP via Getty Images