Updated February 1, 2023 at 6:23 PM ET
Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee used the first hearings of the new Congress to set their sights on what they called the crisis at the southern border of the United States.
The chairman of the committee, Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan, presided over a hearing Wednesday called “The Biden Border Crisis – Part I.” As the name suggests, this is the first of many his GOP-led hearings on the situation at the U.S.-Mexico border.
Jordan and other Republicans on the committee blamed the administration’s policies for the record number of immigration arrests at the border over the past two years — including the pandemic restrictions Biden is known as the title of President Trump. Despite maintaining some of the major border policies.42.
Some of the Republican majority have amplified controversial rhetoric about immigration “invasion” and pushed questionable claims about how the synthetic opioid fentanyl is being smuggled into the United States.
While Republicans attempted to portray the immigration surge as a threat to communities across the country, Democrats accused them of inciting fear and spreading misinformation.
“The border is open. The border is dangerous,” said Republican Rep. Andy Biggs from Arizona. “International terrorists, members of criminal gangs, drugs flood people around the world.”
The Biden administration disputes the open borders, arguing that recent enforcement actions have reduced the number of illegal border crossings in recent weeks.
However, senior Biden administration officials were not called to testify, leaving Democrats on the committee to defend their record.
“The Biden administration actually expelled more than 1.1 million people last year, and its recent expanded use of Title 42 is of great concern to many of us on the committee,” said a committee chief. New York Democratic Rep. Jerrold Nadler, a member, said. who described the hearings as “political theatre.”
Questionable Allegations About Fentanyl Smuggling
Republicans on the committee also sought to draw attention to the rising death toll from fentanyl, which is often smuggled across the southern border from Mexico.
The committee heard testimony from Brandon Dunn, who lost his 15-year-old son to fentanyl poisoning last year. Dan and his wife co-founded a nonprofit called Forever 15 to spread awareness about fentanyl addiction.
“The amount smuggled in a backpack or waist pouch, even in someone’s pocket, is enough to kill thousands of people,” Dunn said.
Committee members from both parties offered their condolences to Dunn, but their interpretations of his testimony differed widely.
Democrats pointed out The majority of fentanyl seizures occur at official ports of entry., often in vehicles driven by US citizens. Border agents seize relatively few items between ports of entry, and few migrants who turn themselves in to seek asylum, experts say.
Pennsylvania Democrat Mary Gay Scanlon said Republicans “seem to confuse the issue of immigrants seeking asylum through our legal process with the very real scourge of fentanyl trafficking.” criticized.
However, Republicans say the large numbers of immigrants crossing the border are a distraction from the work of the Border Patrol, so they say there is a connection.
“Border Patrol is currently preoccupied with human processing,” Texas lawmaker Chip Roy said. “Border Patrol cannot capture all fentanyl at a port of entry, nor can it capture all fentanyl between ports of entry.”
White House spokesperson Ian Sams said Wednesday evening, “Funds secured by the president allowed his administration to seize record levels of fentanyl before it even crossed the border.” After a decade of congressional inaction, House Republicans should join President Biden in passing comprehensive immigration reform and rolling up their sleeves to strengthen border security, which the president has already secured. It would build on record funding for border security, but most House Republicans opposed it.”
Witnesses paint a starkly different picture of the border
The commission also heard from a pair of law enforcement officers in the border area who painted a very different picture of the current situation.
Cochise County, Southern Arizona, Sheriff Mark Danells said the border was “the worst thing I’ve ever seen.” He says his resources are running low to help Border Patrol agents catch migrants trying to sneak through the desert.
“Agent morale is very low and collective dissatisfaction among all levels of law enforcement is very high,” said Danells. “This is the biggest crime scene in the country.”
But the committee was also briefed by El Paso County Judge Ricardo Samaniego on a completely different scenario. “There are no open borders in El Paso,” Samaniego said, explaining that migrants regularly turn themselves in to border patrols and are being processed in an orderly manner.
Samaniego says local officials and nonprofits have worked closely with Border Patrol and other immigration officials for years to come up with a viable strategy for dealing with the large number of immigrants seeking protection in the United States. testified to have developed
“Humanitarianism and security are not a binary choice. It’s the federal government’s responsibility to do both,” Samaniego said.
Fierce rhetoric about “invasion”
Republicans on the committee have suggested on several occasions that the Biden administration is deliberately encouraging immigrants to cross the border illegally. to represent the flow of immigrants across national borders.
Critics associate the term with the so-called replacement theory, a false conspiracy theory that the Democratic Party is deliberately trying to replace white Americans with immigrants of color for political gain.
El Paso Judge Samaniego dismissed that framing.
“There are no immigrant invasions in our communities, nor are there immigrant hordes committing crimes against citizens or wreaking havoc in our communities,” Samaniego said. “Claiming this continues the false racist narrative.”
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