Speaker 1: From the Abraham Lincoln Radio studio at the George Washington
Speaker 1: Broadcast that Armstrong, Armstrong and Jetty Show. In a statement
Speaker 1: on the situation in Del Rio this afternoon, Texas Governor
Speaker 1: Greg Abbott said, in part quote, the Biden administration is
Speaker 1: in complete disarray and is handling the border crisis as
Speaker 1: badly as the evacuation from Afghanistan. So it's not getting
Speaker 1: near enough news coverage. But there are well that hasn't
Speaker 1: gotten near enough news coverage for years, or the last year,
Speaker 1: or the last six months, or the last month, or
Speaker 1: the last twenty four hours. We now have ten thousand
Speaker 1: immigrants under a bridge in the heat. Over half of
Speaker 1: them are from Haiti. It's a number one story if
Speaker 1: you're on Fox or The Washington Examiner. It barely gets
Speaker 1: covered at all if you're on other channels. Whenever we're
Speaker 1: on this topic, we often go to the Center for
Speaker 1: Immigration Studies to talk to somebody. In this case, it's
Speaker 1: gonna be Todd Benzman, who's a senior National security fellow,
Speaker 1: to talk about what's going on with the border and
Speaker 1: the bridge and everything else. Todd, welcome, How are you, sir?
Speaker 1: I'm doing quite well. Thank you. I'm glad to be here.
Speaker 1: So how desperate is the situation at the border? Describe
Speaker 1: it for us? We know we've been there. Yeah, I'm
Speaker 1: actually on the International Bridge right now in Del Rio
Speaker 1: and spent huh much of yesterday among the immigrants who
Speaker 1: are now crossing in very very significant numbers and establishing
Speaker 1: this unprecedented beachhead on the U. S side. There are
Speaker 1: ten thousand. Uh. It's started at two thousand in on
Speaker 1: Monday and by yesterday it was ten thousand, just to
Speaker 1: give you an idea of scale. And they are mostly Haitians.
Speaker 1: There are some Cubans I met in there, and there's
Speaker 1: probably some Central Americans, but it looks like it's they're
Speaker 1: mostly not from Central America or Mexico. And they are
Speaker 1: crowding in because they are being given UH tickets to
Speaker 1: process into the United States. So they're basically being waved
Speaker 1: through UH and they'll get legal permission to enter the
Speaker 1: United States probably forever, all of them, And that's why
Speaker 1: they're coming, because they're being allowed to come and and
Speaker 1: all being paroled into the United States within a matter
Speaker 1: of days. Normally in this case, UH, it won't be
Speaker 1: that quick because there are so many that they've overwhelmed
Speaker 1: order patrol. There's not enough of them to process these
Speaker 1: people in, so there might be a two or three
Speaker 1: week wait. You know. One of thee confusing thing to
Speaker 1: me is Kamala Harris said don't come. So I don't
Speaker 1: understand why people are continuing to come because she said
Speaker 1: clearly don't come. But we share a many thousand mile
Speaker 1: border with Mexico. Understand how those people get here and
Speaker 1: then from Central America, you know, you can look at
Speaker 1: them happen. How are the people from Haiti getting to
Speaker 1: the border. Well, most of these Haitians, I would say
Speaker 1: all of them actually are not from Haiti. They have
Speaker 1: been living for years and years in Chili and Brazil,
Speaker 1: whose government who have the strongest economies in Latin America,
Speaker 1: and whose governments gave them residency and work authorization, and
Speaker 1: so they've been living in secure, uh you know, South
Speaker 1: Hollow or Santiago for many years already and earning good
Speaker 1: livings and no persecution or anything. But they saw that
Speaker 1: the border was open under Biden, and so all of
Speaker 1: those populations in Chile are now on their way here.
Speaker 1: That that's who these people are, That's why they're usually
Speaker 1: well dressed and have cell phones and all that and
Speaker 1: can afford the smuggling fees. Policy wise, what's different now
Speaker 1: than it was a year or two ago. Is it
Speaker 1: just word got out in Central America, South America or
Speaker 1: are there policies specifically causing this. Yes, there are specific
Speaker 1: policies and they all hear about this on the on
Speaker 1: their Internet. The main thing was the elimination of wait
Speaker 1: in Mexico. That was a Trump policy that was highly
Speaker 1: highly effective at deterring illegal entries. That meant that you
Speaker 1: would be pushed back into Mexico to make your asylum
Speaker 1: claim there, not inside the United States, because the game
Speaker 1: being that if you make your asylum claim inside the
Speaker 1: United States and lose, you're still inside the United States
Speaker 1: and you're not leaving. They're going to have to come
Speaker 1: hunt you down. And that never happened. So we're having
Speaker 1: to to lose your asylum claim while you were in
Speaker 1: Mexico was like not the point, you know, So they
Speaker 1: stopped coming just for that. And then the other thing was,
Speaker 1: you know, deportations back to the to other countries to
Speaker 1: make their asylum claim in these other countries. Biden administration
Speaker 1: got rid of all of those and then decided to
Speaker 1: allow all families and unaccompanied miners to enter and win
Speaker 1: parole inside the United States immediately. And so when the
Speaker 1: world heard that families were being allowed in, like these
Speaker 1: ones here at the bridge, Uh, they every family that
Speaker 1: could muster themselves and smuggling fees, we're coming because they
Speaker 1: were getting in. And that's why we've had hundreds and
Speaker 1: hundreds upon hundreds of thousands of immigrants just being allowed in. Well,
Speaker 1: I'd like to remind listeners that a Harvard study showed
Speaker 1: that about two thirds of Americans preferred those Trump policies,
Speaker 1: about two thirds, and that was a couple of months ago, all,
Speaker 1: but it's higher now or certainly after this weekend. If
Speaker 1: you're you're, you're they're looking at the crowd. Is it
Speaker 1: mostly adults? Is that families and all men are what?
Speaker 1: What's the makeup of the ground. It seems to me
Speaker 1: that it's mostly families. Uh, there's also a lot of
Speaker 1: single adults, but lots of children of all ages, you know, infants, Uh,
Speaker 1: lots of lots of children, lots of pregnant women and uh,
Speaker 1: you know, families, they're coming in because they you know,
Speaker 1: like I said, everybody knows that families get a free
Speaker 1: pass right into the United States. Don't pass go within
Speaker 1: three or four days. Once they cross and turn themselves in,
Speaker 1: they get they get on a bus and they drive
Speaker 1: to portline or whatever and settle all over the country.
Speaker 1: That's just too powerful, uh and incentive or around the
Speaker 1: world Uh to resist. Nobody can resist that. It's like
Speaker 1: an open gate. Uh. And if you're a single adult,
Speaker 1: you you you're not going to get that. But but
Speaker 1: the border patrol is so busy processing in those people
Speaker 1: that you can just walk in and just run and
Speaker 1: get in anyway and disappear. Because the other big policy
Speaker 1: that people forget about that Biden did immediately was he
Speaker 1: eliminated all deportation. There is no deportation in America. I
Speaker 1: don't think you are listening to me. Earlier the Vice
Speaker 1: President said, don't come, so it seems to me. And
Speaker 1: and tell me if you agree or disagree. I'm scanning
Speaker 1: the big papers even as we're chatting and h The
Speaker 1: New York Times has this story fairly prominently. The Washington
Speaker 1: Post kind of medium, but the verbage being used in
Speaker 1: the journalism is surprisingly critical. Do you feel like there's
Speaker 1: a growing awareness of the disaster on the border. I
Speaker 1: don't really know. I mean my feeling. I know, the
Speaker 1: New York Times was here yesterday in the Washington Post,
Speaker 1: I saw those reporters. Uh. Normally, though I spent a
Speaker 1: lot of time on the border, I never see any
Speaker 1: media anywhere. Ever. There's usually nobody down here. And and
Speaker 1: it's striking because the drama is intense. There are thousands
Speaker 1: and thousands of people just being waved right over the border,
Speaker 1: right up into the interior of the country, these families,
Speaker 1: and I mean, there's a lot of drama. I'm just
Speaker 1: surprised that it's not a bigger story. This thing is
Speaker 1: attracting the New York Times in the Washington Post because
Speaker 1: it's really unusual that ten thousand people we in a
Speaker 1: makeshift settlement on the U. S. Side at one time.
Speaker 1: I don't think that's ever happened. I think that's the
Speaker 1: first time that anything of this proportion has developed on
Speaker 1: the U. S. Side of the border. And that is
Speaker 1: really going to be a problem that the Biden administration
Speaker 1: has to deal with. Remember they the administration put these
Speaker 1: policies in place, is what caused this to happen. All
Speaker 1: of these people are here because as of those Biden policies,
Speaker 1: and they'll tell you that, yeah, that's a good that's
Speaker 1: a good place. That's a good place for us to end, Todd,
Speaker 1: great report, Todd Benzman, Senior National Security Fellow with the
Speaker 1: Center for Immigration Studies, and will probably be checking back
Speaker 1: it in with you because I don't think this story
Speaker 1: is going away. Yeah, well done, Todd, thanks a million,
Speaker 1: all right, thank you. Yeah, And that was a good
Speaker 1: way to end. You gotta remember it's there are policy
Speaker 1: decisions that were made that caused this to be what
Speaker 1: it is. And I point out once again the Harvard
Speaker 1: study anyway, two thirds of Americans preferred Trump's policies. Right.
Speaker 1: You know, there's a misperception about the Haitians that I
Speaker 1: made myself. I assumed they were fleeing the recent national
Speaker 1: disasters and and the assassination and the rest of it. No,
Speaker 1: they fled the earthquake, and as uh Todd mentioned, they've
Speaker 1: been living quite well in South America, but saw the
Speaker 1: door swing open. We're such a weird culture country right now.
Speaker 1: We're doing things. I just don't know if any country
Speaker 1: or empire has ever done, has any empire ever gotten
Speaker 1: just so kind of lazy and comfortable and taken care
Speaker 1: of that millions of people are coming in. You're just like, yeah,
Speaker 1: I wish that wouldn't happen, but there's something good on
Speaker 1: TV and a right, I don't want to be a racist,
Speaker 1: and I'm kind of for the guy in the White
Speaker 1: House now, so I gotta pretend it's not happening. And
Speaker 1: and I think most I think there's just a lot
Speaker 1: of it is just we're just all so comfortable and
Speaker 1: everything's okay. I don't know, I'm sorry. What did you say.
Speaker 1: I was watching TikTok videos on my phone, right, Uh,
Speaker 1: we gotta take a break, and uh, if you've got
Speaker 1: any comment on that, our text line nine five k
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