Morning Wire - The Border Crisis Hits Small Town USA | Sunday Extra

Episode Date: March 4, 2024

A small town in Wisconsin has seen a massive influx of illegal immigrants in the last two years. We spoke to a reporter who visited Whitewater, Wisconsin to learn how people are responding to their new neighbors. Get the facts first on Morning Wire. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

An estimated 8.5 million illegal immigrants have crossed the southern border since Joe Biden took office in 2021. While most of the attention falls on the border towns of Texas and Arizona and the big cities that are getting crushed by the population influx, there are new migrant populations showing up everywhere. In this episode, Daily Wire Investigations editor Brent Scher speaks to a reporter who visited Whitewater, Wisconsin, a small Midwestern town that saw its population spike by 10% in just two years. years due to immigration. I'm Daily Wire editor-in-chief John Bickley with Georgia Howe. It's Sunday, March 3rd, and this is an extra edition of Morning Wire. The following is an interview between Daily Wire Investigations editor Brent Scher and Joe Simonson, a reporter for the Washington Free Beacon.

We're joined today by Joe Simonson, a reporter for the Washington Free Beacon, who I actually had the pleasure of editing in a prior life. Joe, thanks so much for coming on. Thanks for having me, Brent. So it's been accepted that the border crisis now extends into the whole country. It's not just border towns, but most of the attention usually falls on big cities like New York and Chicago that have been unraveling with the influx of migrants. But you found yourself in Whitewater, Wisconsin, a town of just 15,000 people that recently became the home to at least a thousand illegal immigrants. What kind of impact is that massive influx having on life in Whitewater? Sure, yeah. So I think you made an interesting point in your little intro there about how most of the attention is just on cities such as Chicago and New York and Denver. And I think for even a lot of Americans today, the border crisis is really an abstraction. And so most of the interaction people have with the open border is really just news clippings of people pouring in or Eric Adams screaming about how he needs more money.

But in the past year, we're seeing the border crisis really have an impact in smaller towns such as Whitewater. And what that looks like in practice is actually really similar to the problems that Eric Adams complains about or Brandon Johnson in Chicago, basic stuff such as where are these people going to live, who is going to teach their kids in the schools. They don't speak English. And a town like Whitewater, which is, Wisconsin's a pretty white state. But in particular town like Whitewater, it's almost entirely white. So they don't really have any experience with native Spanish speakers at all. They end up hiring a bunch from out of the county. And that costs money, right?

And it also costs money when you have uninsured families who just need basic medical attention. It costs money to hire more police officers because suddenly your town has increased by 10 percent. and you need more people to patrol the streets. So the same things that you see in big cities, people complaining about, which actually have a lot more capacity, right? You know, not that Eric Adams has nothing to complain about, but New York is a very wealthy city that's much bigger than a whitewater. And so, yes, they have to make difficult budget considerations of all these new people, but they can absorb migrant populations way easier than the rest of the country. But, you know, not every migrant is going to end up in. New York City.

Eric Adams is screaming about 175,000, give or take a few. But we've had seven and a half million illegal border crossings under Biden and probably around four and a half million that we know of who are now in the United States basically permanently. You brought up a really interesting number there that Whitewater's population has increased by 10% all with illegal immigrants. If that happened in New York, it would be more than a million. new people. So it'd be close to two million. Yeah. Yeah. So it's really just a stunning influx of people.

Why are they coming to Whitewater? I mean, in your piece, it makes clear that while this is an example of things that are happening to small cities across the country, this isn't happening in every single small town in Wisconsin. Yeah, it's really unclear. And everyone there kind of has their own theory. It's a very liberal town. It's basically a college town with a U.S. satellite campus there. So some people thought, well, maybe because the city council is so liberal, they thought, oh, I'd be welcome here. You know, it is an hour west of Milwaukee.

So potentially people are going to work there and they can find cheaper housing in whitewater. But no one really knows. And it's not like Greg Abbott is shipping them to Wisconsin. And I think that's a really important point, which is, again, not every migrant who has crossed or illegal alien who has crossed into the United States under President Biden. is just going to end up in a big city. They're going to go where normal Americans live because it's cheaper because they can find work. Some people think they can go to Whitewater because they can hide.

And so no one really has an answer. And, you know, a thousand out of four and a half million that we know of who are here today is a small number. So it kind of makes sense that they're just going to end up being scattered around the country. You brought up an interesting point there that this is actually a liberal town. and the residents there who are horrified by what it's doing to the town, whether it's just the crime or there's a mention in your piece of a family that in the cold Wisconsin winter was found with a kid in the shed. And it's not just conservatives who would be horrified. This isn't your, you know, typical Trump voter, correct? No, not at all.

And the people there, even the conservatives, you know, no one is bigoted. They're really proud of the fact that Whitewater has essentially taken these people in. But the problem is that they can't afford it. And even your most liberal city council member there who is celebrating this is simultaneously saying, oh, wonderful, we want as many people here as possible. But, oh, hey, federal government, we need, like, aid immediately. And that's kind of the central tension that exists here. And it's a tension that exists in all these blue cities.

I mean, people, you know, have been knocking sanctuary cities under Biden because you guys wanted to be a home for the entire world. And suddenly now when that's becoming the case, you're freaking out. And that's a similar dynamic that's happening in Whitewater. So what's the solution being offered here? Your piece notes that the Democrat governor, Tony Evers, visited Whitewater because this is a major problem for the people. But is he actually doing anything to help them? Well, Evers, and it's a bipartisan problem. You know, Democrats and Republicans might disagree on how to solve it, but Democrats and Republicans

are both asking the federal government for money. And there is no solution in sight. You speak to lawmakers in Wisconsin, and a Republican will tell you, well, this isn't going to stop until the border is sealed. It's not like Whitewater can start enforcing federal immigration law and kicking these people out. So in the short term, in the interim, what they need now is money. But in the long term, the only way to get this under control, and I think even a liberal would agree, would be we need to control the flow of people coming into this country, because once they're here, as your listeners

know, they can virtually go anywhere they want. And you can't just keep them in big cities that have lots of services. They're going to want to go wherever normal people want to go. So probably part of the reason why both Democrats and Republicans are responding to their problems as that Wisconsin is a swing state, and it's an election year. So when you were there, when you were talking to the locals, is the blame in town falling on Joe Biden? I mean, from everything you're saying, it sounds like they know that as long as the border is open, people are going to end up in Whitewater. And the Whitewater Police Department has made a plea directly to the White House asking for more resources. It wrote a letter stating that there were three times as many unlicensed drivers on the streets,

that it needed to buy costly translation technologies to interact with these migrants. And it also cited serious crimes like sexual assault that it was attributing to the migrant influx. But in the end, it seems like no help arrived. So do you think Biden is losing support? I think it falls down on partisan lines. I think that conservatives in the town or more centrist-minded people, and even some on the center left, certainly understand that this is completely a consequence of what's happening on the southern border. and the president bears responsibility for that.

I think for the more liberal members of the town, and again, it's a very liberal town. It's a college town, even though it's surrounded by red counties. I think, honestly, your average liberal Biden supporter, self-identified Democrat, would say, you know, this is fine. It's really not that big of a deal. The only issue is that we need more money. And that contradiction, and what I always tell people talking

the story is just, you know, I could solve the homeless crisis tomorrow. Just give me all the money. Give me $100 billion. And I'll build a really big house and let everyone live there. But you have to give me the money. And I think that's the tension there. You know, it's really easy to be welcoming when you expect someone else to pay for it. And the only people who can pay for it is the federal government and ultimately the taxpayer. Because Wisconsin just is not, you know, it's not even California, it needs federal subsidies to take in all these people. So you say that you think the liberals would be like, oh, this is fine, this isn't a problem, we just need money.

But the drugs and the crime that have spiked in Whitewater, there's probably something that a small town like that in Wisconsin has never seen before. And it's hard to deny why it's happening, or is it? Are they denying a causality there? Yeah, so that is like kind of the awkward, and I say the most contentious issue in my piece because it is undeniable. And the police chief who is not really a political guy at all is really in an awkward position because he's very careful to say, yes, we're seeing more crime and yes, any more officers, but I'm not a bigot. You know, this isn't about any particular race or group of people, but, you know, this is a reality on the ground. And what that's actually done, unfortunately, is the city council.

has been targeting the local police department saying you're hassling these migrants, you're giving them too hard of a time, and they've been growing more suspicious of the local police because, unfortunately, whenever these migrants are pulled over, a lot of them didn't really know to drive before they came here, they don't have any form of identification. And then the police chiefs in an awkward position because he has to offer them a citation. And then once the liberal city council hears that you're giving a lot of migrants, all these citations, you're suddenly prejudiced, you're suddenly targeting them. So that is like the real source of tension where the liberal city council is very uncomfortable

with that fact that there is a rise in crime. And unfortunately, a lot of it has to do with all these new arrivals. Yeah. All right. Well, Joe, thanks for coming on. You could read his great piece and all his work at freebegan.com. Thanks, Brent. That was Daily Wire Investigation's editor, Brent Scher, interviewing Joe Simonson

of the Washington Free Beacon. And this has been an extra edition of Morning Wire.