Originally Authored at TheFederalist.com
By Eddie Scarry
The ridiculous border bill put forth by Senate Democrats and a few naive Republicans would make a supermajority of American voters want to march each and every one of them to the gallows and whistle. Sadly, this is not a sane world, and the more you learn about the bill—which was finally made public over the weekend—the more heinously offensive it becomes. And I am not just talking about what the national media, which fervently supports its passage, says.
Look at this from Axios on Monday: “The $118 billion package includes $60 billion for Ukraine and $14 billion for Israel. An additional $10 billion is earmarked for humanitarian assistance in Gaza, the West Bank, and Ukraine. The border changes include $20 billion for transportation for deportation, shelters, 4,000+ new asylum officers, more border agents, and anti-fentanyl trafficking efforts.”
In short, that’s $84 billion to be sent overseas, the vast majority to Joe Biden’s dearly beloved Ukraine, and then a quarter of that amount would hire new government workers in the United States to process more poor illegal immigrants dumping themselves onto the care of American taxpayers.
Where do we sign?!
On the same day, Politico heralded the bill as a set of gangbuster “wins” for Republicans — a defined and secured U.S. territory is only a benefit for half the country, you know — but admitted there are some minor drawbacks. “The border emergency authority that is a centerpiece of the bill, for instance, is not absolute,” it said. “Unaccompanied minors and trafficking victims are not included, and immigration officers are empowered to make other exceptions.”
Politico further noted the president’s authority to limit border crossings “can also be suspended by Biden for up to 45 days if it is ‘in the national interest’ and the powers can be exercised for no more than ‘270 days in the first calendar year, 225 days in the second calendar year, and 180 days in the third calendar year.’” After three years, the whole thing is null and void.
In other words, all those new “limits” on who gets to hop into the United States are at the discretion of Joe Biden. That is not a whiff of a difference from what we have now. In just the time he’s been in office, unaccompanied minors encountered by agents at the border totals nearly half a million. Tack on “trafficking victims” (i.e., anyone who paid a smuggler to lead him here through the jungle, so basically everyone else) and we’re once again, exactly where we started.
Again, I’m not quoting Republican officials who hate the bill. That’s Axios (which calls this a “remarkably strict” proposal) and Politico (“Senate Republicans will be hard-pressed to turn down the policy advances in the bill”).
We get it. Washington is in heat for more Ukraine money. House Republican terms for that were simple: If we must, we should at least also do something related to the flood of foreign terrorists and Latin America’s destitute coming across the Rio Grande.
This shouldn’t even be a negotiation, but that’s the hand the Biden administration and congressional Democrats are choosing to play. But if the offer is that Ukraine receives another $100 billion, whether our own Southern border is secure or not, why bother sending money at all?
Let’s not.