America is currently facing what is said to be the worst border crisis yet. The standards this country once held true for dealing with such national securities are being undermined by our President. Not only is there violence emerging, but also a drastic overflow of migrant arrests at the Mexico-United States border. Lawmakers claim that the current issues are a direct result of President Joe Biden’s reversal of Trump administration border policies. 

Failing governments in countries such as Venezuela, Nicaragua, and Cuba are bringing new waves of migrants to the United States. What is the United States government doing to control the situation? Instead of providing asylum for refugees, there has been a 175% increase in arrests and detainments since last August 2021, according to the Customs and Border Protection. Rather than allowing migrants to obtain humanitarian protection, the Biden administration blames the government of these countries because of their severed ties with Washington D.C. making it difficult to send the deported migrants back to their countries. Instead, Biden’s new open border policies “are fueling criminal activity and abuses by cartels facilitating illegal border crossings,” according to the Senate Republican conference. By signaling that our nation’s borders are open, many illegal immigrants are trying to cross the border and are met with violence by United States border control when they do so. 

 According to The Texas Tribune, United States law enforcement has made 2.3 million arrests this year at the southern border, which is much greater than last year’s 1.7 million. While some may argue that the distorted numbers of border crossing may be the result of “repeat crossings,” it still raises concerns over the President’s new border policies and what dangers they pose to Americans. 

The Senate Republican Conference recently accused President Biden of ending Title 42 – put in place during the Trump-era to suspend illegal entries into the United States to decrease the spread of Covid – with the aim of overwhelming the border. Now that the policy has been terminated, the soldiers on the borders are incredibly overwhelmed. Many cheered Biden on in this endeavor because it allows immigrants to seek safe asylum in the United States but lawmakers claim it is causing an overwhelming amount of pressure on border enforcement. Many argue that Title 42, a policy placed during the pandemic, decreases family separations. The El Paso sector, one of nine border control sectors across the Southwest, has also recently come across many illegal immigrants with previous gang and drug affiliations. 

Limiting immigration enforcement in general has gotten major criticism in relation to the Biden administration. According to the Senate Republican Conference, this has led to “over 20,000 unaccompanied children” at the border who are exposed to many risks. According to USA Today, during the Trump administration “The feds lost — yes, lost — 1,475 migrant children.” Biden has lost more than 10 times that number of children—with no media outrage.

On April 26, the Biden administration will go before the Supreme Court to end the “Remain in Mexico” program which is a Migrant Protection Protocol program placed during the Trump-era requiring illegal immigrants to wait in Mexico before they hear about their United States immigration cases. Ending this program puts risks on migrant families who are frequently smuggled into the United States and exploited by the cartels. 

The overwhelming violence and chaos at the United States-Mexico border has no doubt increased since President Biden took office. While many of his changes to border security and control are cheered on because it allows more freedom for refugees to seek asylum from their corrupt governments, it is also leaving the country wide open for many more issues. The Biden administration needs to take a long and close look at the risks these policy changes are posing for both migrants and Americans. It affects everyone and therefore we must redeem more control at our borders for the sake of health, safety, and migrants’ safe passage to the United States.