Why Trump Must Declare a Second Border Emergency

The New York Times threw cold water on the suppositions of anti-Trump media figures and politicians this week in an ominous story headlined “Border at the ‘Breaking Point.’” For months, I have been jousting on television with various border “flat-earthers” who insist there is no crisis, simply because President Trump says there is.  For these never-Trump zealots, opposing the president always and everywhere precludes actual analysis of the dangerous border situation and even supersedes the immediacy of protecting American citizens.

For example, describing Trump’s Oval Office speech about the border situation in January, MSNBC host Nicolle Wallace opined: “The big scam of the whole address was that there’s a crisis; there is no crisis.”  Wallace’s colleague Joe Scarborough condescendingly asked, “How stupid are Americans who still believe there’s a crisis on the southern border?”  Liberal politicians similarly objected, with Speaker Nancy Pelosi admonishing the president to “stop manufacturing a crisis” and DNC Chairman Tom Perez asserting that “no crisis exists and anyone making the argument is most likely guilty of fear-mongering.”  

These media and political elites, mostly ensconced in TV studios and guarded offices in New York and Washington, long ignored the grave attestations of actual on-the-ground law enforcement about the perilous, porous border. For example, Customs and Border Protection agent Fernando Grijalva  reported to CBS News in January that “I’ve seen six different presidents the time I’ve been with the Border Patrol, and this is the worst crisis I’ve seen.”  Agent Grijalva also argued for the wall, stating, “Operationally I can tell you that without a physical barrier, the Border Patrol, we have a very tough time.”  

That long-promised wall finally will be built, thanks to President Trump’s insistence via executive order.  But while the wall will become a very useful tool in defending America in years to come, this proximate crisis requires nimble and immediate further action.  The president must declare an additional emergency under his explicit powers granted in the National Emergencies Act of 1976 and suspend immediately our practice of accepting all illegal border crossers who subsequently claim asylum.  

Why an additional declaration and why now?  Because the wall will take years to complete, and Central American migrants now pour into our country illegally, fully cognizant that under U.S. law, unlike illegal immigrants from Mexico, they cannot be immediately repatriated.  Moreover, if they claim asylum, they are guaranteed months, even years, of legal residency in the United States, often far into the interior of the country, and cared-for at taxpayer expense.