America's Talking - U.S. Border Data: 284 Suspected Terrorists Apprehended So Far in Fiscal 2023

Episode Date: March 24, 2023

Nearly 300 suspected terrorists have been apprehended attempting to enter the U.S. in the first few months of fiscal 2023 as 28 members of Congress formed a new caucus to address the crisis at the northern border, where record numbers of foreign nationals continue to illegally enter from Canada. The Northern Border Security Caucus, formed by U.S. Reps. Mike Kelly, R-Pennsylvania, and Ryan Zinke, R-Montana, is expressing concerns about “the increased human and drug trafficking, along with the decrease in Border Patrol agents and lack of security, along the U.S.-Canada border.” Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/america-in-focus/support Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hello, everyone, and welcome to America in Focus. I am Dan McAulib, executive editor of the Center Square Newswire Service. Joining me today, as he does every week, is Casey Harper, the Center Square's Washington, D.C. Bureau Chief. We are recording this on Friday, March 24th. Let's jump right into it. Lots of news this week about the border crisis. Border Patrol, U.S. Customs and Border Patrol, updated their online data, saying that 284 suspected terrorists have been apprehended so far this fiscal year.

The federal government's fiscal year begins October 1st. So in fewer than six months, 284 suspected terrorists have been apprehended trying to illegally get into the country. That's a little scary, isn't it? Yeah, I mean, you're absolutely right. Crisis is the optimal word here. And, I mean, to see such a large number of such dangerous people coming across the border is alarming. And, you know, the polling shows that Americans are really concerned about that kind of thing. But, you know, you called it a crisis.

And I want to, I mean, this is so interesting to me because, you know, a crisis is thought of as a really bad problem that's for a short period of time. If you have a health crisis, you know, you spend a week in the hospital or something. If you have a financial crisis, you know, it's a year or two, not even not. But we've, we've had a crisis at the border. I mean, we're going on like a decade. We're going years and years, right? So how long can you have something that's a crisis before it becomes something bigger? I don't know what's bigger than the border crisis.

But as you pointed out, I mean, this is a real big problem. Of course, there's, you know, it's highly politicized, and there's a lot of demagoguing and attacking on both sides. But even if you set aside some of the political and ideological arguments, there's just a real flat-out safety concern. I mean, you know, whether, what kind of people we should help and how many people we should help is an interesting political question. But when you have quite literally hundreds of suspected terrorists in one year, if any

country knows it's the United States, it doesn't take 280. for terrorists to orchestrate a devastating attack. And so to have hundreds of suspected terrorists coming in, it crosses the line of politics and humanitarian aid and crosses into the safety question. I guess I'm going to push back a little bit on you, Casey. We've certainly had an immigration problem for decades for a very, very long time. Congress really refuses, and this is both Democrats and Republicans, refuse to reform the immigration system, as you mentioned, who we should be letting in the country who we should not be letting in the country? What are the paths to citizenship for those who come from other countries into the United States? That's been an ongoing problem. I'd say the border crisis,

personally, really started when President Joe Biden took office and they started changing our border policies, who they are going to detain, who they are not going to detain. True or not, it has incentivized more and more foreign nationals, folks from Mexico, folks from other Latin American countries. Folks from all over the world, really, because Border Patrol has apprehended people for more than 150 countries over the last two years, and it's in the millions. Now, more than 4 million people have tried to enter the country illegally since President Biden took office. That is really what I was saying when I was calling it a crisis. Crisis is a loaded word. There's no doubt it's a loaded word. Is it a crisis? Is it not a crisis? Some would say it's not a crisis. But when you're talking about,

nearly 300 people who were on the terrorist watch list, the FBI's terrorist watch list, trying to enter the country in just a few months. That's a problem because what we don't know is the folks who are on the terrorist watch list who haven't been apprehended that got into the country illegally. We don't know who they are. We don't know where they are. And then you add on top of that the fentanyl crisis that we have in this country, being smuggled in by foreign nationals entering the country illegally from Mexico, through Mexico,

at least, more and more Americans are dying of fentanyl overdoses, but many of them are really poisonings because people don't know that what they're taking that's being smuggled in from Mexico is actually fentanyl. It's other opioids that have been laced with fentanyl by Mexican drug cartels. You raise some good points, which is illegal immigration has soared since Biden took office, and that's not a political statement, it's just a factual statement if you look at the numbers coming in. And I appreciate that you pointed out that we actually don't, we have no idea how many people have come into the country illegally and how many suspected terrorists. We only know how many people Border Patrol knows about that came in. But if somebody is able to sneak in undetected and Border

Patrol never knows about it or sees it or can guess that they were there, they're not counted in this kind of data. So who really knows? We don't know. You might ask, how is it that during a presidential administration could make such a change? And I think there's a few reasons for that. One is just the attitude, you know, people who are wanting to come here illegally knew that Trump was not friendly to that. And so there was kind of a greater deterrent, greater fear, greater support for Border Patrol and ICE, Immigration and Customs Enforcement. And so those who are considering coming to the country illegally, I think, waited it out. And so once, you know, a more friendly administration's kind of thing came in, they took advantage of that. And that's not, again,

that's not even opinion either. I mean, we wrote about this at thecentersquare.com, but President Biden changed the policies for immigration and customs enforcement and really have severely restricted their ability to deport and arrest and deport people who are here illegally. They pretty much only focus now on dangerous criminals. It used to be that if someone came here illegally, they would be concerned that ICE might catch and deport them. But at this point, that's really not a legitimate concern for people to have. And I think word has got out on that. If you can just make it across, you'll be fine. ICE is not really going to come knocking in your door unless you're basically a murderer or suspected terrorist. Right. So that's a really

substantive policy change that was just done at the executive level that has totally changed our immigration system and fueled what I agree with you is now a border crisis. We know, too, at the center square, our border correspondent, Bethany Blankly, she talks. She has good sources within border patrol. And they tell us that the Mexican drug cartels are the ones that are controlling the flow of foreign nationals coming into the U.S. It's a matter of human smuggling. And, of course, some percentage of these people are carrying illicit drugs such as fentanyl into the U.S.

We know that fentanyl overdoses, fentanyl poisonings, have just dramatically climbed in the last couple of years. So that in itself, the drug smuggling that's occurring is a problem. And it has been called a crisis by many. When Republicans took control of Congress in January, they started investigating the border crisis, the fentanyl crisis, but they need to do more. The president of the United States and Congress need to work together to solve this issue, but it doesn't seem like they're willing to work together to solve the issue. Yeah, I mean, it's one of the most deeply divisive issues we have. But if somebody, there's so much money to be made in fentanyl and the human smuggling that somebody's going to be

in control of it. There's such a huge financial incentive to control the southern border of the richest country in the world when you really think about it. So if our own government is going to control it and we're not. I mean, even those who have testified, even those within the system of trying to maintain the border say that we're really not in control of it, if we're not in control, who is? And the answer right now is the cartels. It's a false choice just to say that if we are lax on it, then it's just the kinder thing to do and whoever wants to come here can. If we're not in control of it, someone else will be. And if we want to make a decision as a country to increase the number of migrants that we allow in substantially, which is something

than we could do and really secure the border, then that's the way to do it if we want to have large numbers, you know, millions of people come in every year. But the way we're doing it now is not sustainable and it gives us the cartels a ton of power. Well, as you said, Casey, this is an issue that has been ongoing for a very long time escalated when President Joe Biden took office and changed essentially our border policies. Listeners can keep up with this story and more at thecenter.com. But for Casey Harper, I'm Damocaleb. Please subscribe. And Thank you for listening. Freedom and liberty are important to all of us.

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