CRISIS? WHAT CRISI?
Odd claim as kids sent alone from Mex
President Biden’s Department of Homeland Security chief claimed Monday that “loving parents” are sending 9-year-old children alone to the US-Mexico border — while insisting there is no immigration crisis.
Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas made the eyebrowraising claims as he tried to defend the administration’s repeal of several key immigration policies of former President Donald Trump that have led thousands of people, including unaccompanied kids, to recently try to cross the border.
The Biden administration opened two overflow detention facilities for minors who arrive at the border without parents — facilities that critics, including even progressive New York Democratic Rep. Alexandria OcasioCortez, have blasted as similar to the “cages” used under former President Trump.
With the White House under fire over the facilities, Mayorkas led off press secretary Jen Psaki’s daily briefing with reporters, saying minors who arrive without their parents must be detained by US authorities before possible foster-care placement.
“We are not apprehending a 9-yearold child who’s come alone, who has traversed Mexico, whose parents — whose loving parents — had sent that child alone, we are not expelling that 9-year-old child to Mexico when that child’s origin, country of origin, was Guatemala, Honduras or El Salvador,’’ he said.
Reports of sexual abuse are common among unaccompanied minors, including while in US government custody. The children also can fall prey to human traffickers and must endure inhumane and sometimes deadly conditions as they struggle to survive on their journeys.
While the latest US Customs and Border Protection statistics show that illegal crossings more than doubled in January over the same month last year, Mayorkas denied that the nation was in the midst of an immigration crisis.
His denial comment came hours before it surfaced that hundreds of Border Patrol agents were being redeployed to the Rio Grande Valley as the agency “seeks to deter and dis
We are not apprehending a 9-year-old child who’s come alone . . . whose loving parents had sent that child alone . . . Alejandro Mayorkas (above)
rupt human smuggling activities . . . and ensure our personnel are properly equipped to maintain border security,’’ according to The New York Times, citing a source and CBP statement.
Mayorkas, asked earlier by a reporter about the crisis designation, replied, “The answer is no.”
“We are challenged at the border,’’ Mayorkas conceded before insisting, “The men and women of the Department of Homeland Security are meeting that challenge.”
Trump on Sunday slammed his successor, saying, “Joe Biden has triggered a massive flood of illegal immigration into our country the likes of which we have never seen before.
“They’re all coming because of promises and foolish words,’’ Trump said. “Perhaps worst of all, Joe Biden’s decision to cancel border security has single-handedly launched a youth migrant crisis that is enriching child smugglers, vicious criminal cartels and some of the most evil people on the planet.”
Mayorkas said the Trump administration was to blame for the current problems, saying it “dismantled our nation’s immigration system in its entirety.”
Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador last month said migrants believed the borders were now open under President Biden.
“The prior administration dismantled our immigration system in its entirety,’’ Mayorkas claimed. “Quite frankly, the entire system was gutted.
“When I started 27 days ago, I learned that we did not have the facilities available or equipped to administer the humanitarian laws that our Congress passed years ago. We did not have the personnel, policies, procedures or training to administer those laws.”
Mayorkas, while denying there was any crisis, still encouraged migrants not to come to the United States.
“They need to wait,” he told reporters. “If they come, if families come, if single adults come to the border, we are obligated to, in the service of public health, including the health of the very people thinking of coming, to impose travel restrictions under CDC guidelines and return them to Mexico — and we have done that.”