Sessions’ New Border Measures Aren’t As Bad As Media Portray, But Could Be Better

U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions has a strict new approach for people illegally crossing the border.

“If you are smuggling a child, then we will prosecute you and that child will be separated from you as required by law. If you don’t like that, then don’t smuggle children over our border,” Sessions stated last Monday. “We are not going to let this country be invaded. We will not be stampeded.”

Sessions unveiled a new “zero tolerance” policy regarding illegal border crossings last month, but the number of prosecutions began increasing last year. On Monday he vowed the U.S. Department of Justice would prosecute as many cases as possible “until we get to 100 percent.” No longer will illegal aliens be merely bused back across the border. Instead, in most cases they will be prosecuted. As has been widely reported, this will result in thousands of family separations, because detainees will be held in prison awaiting trial, not detention centers, and children cannot be detained in prison.

Under current law, first-time illegal entry into the United States is a misdemeanor. The zero tolerance policy is a step above the “one-strike” policy of Sessions’ April 2017 memo, which stated that only illegal aliens who enter the country after already having been sent back will be referred for felony prosecution, which carries a two-year sentence.

The DOJ will have its hands full, to say the least. DHS reports the number of “inadmissable border crossings” has tripled since last April, and the Washington Post reports that in the last month alone, border officials say they’ve found 50,000 individuals attempting entry. DOJ is adding 18 more immigration judges (a 50 percent increase) and 35 prosecutors to help.