The Daily Signal - #371: Do Walls Work?

Episode Date: January 8, 2019

When it comes to border security, what are the facts? Heritage Foundation analyst David Inserra, who focuses on immigration and homeland security, joins us to discuss whether walls work, whether the current situation at the U.S.-Mexico border is a terrorism risk, and the flow of drugs into the United States from other countries. Plus: we play President Donald Trump's full Oval Office address on the border crisis.We also cover these stories:--House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer respond to Trump's immigration remarks.--New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio announced a new program to give comprehensive health care to every resident, regardless of their ability to pay or their immigration status.--A federal appeals judge has ruled that a Virginia politician violated the Constitution when he temporarily blocked a critic from her Facebook page.The Daily Signal podcast is available on Ricochet, iTunes, SoundCloud, Google Play, or Stitcher. All of our podcasts can be found at DailySignal.com/podcasts. If you like what you hear, please leave a review. You can also leave us a message at 202-608-6205 or write us at [e-mail]. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is the Daily Signal podcast for Wednesday, January 9th. I'm Kate Trinco. And I'm Daniel Davis. Well, President Trump went live in prime time last night to make his case for the wall. Today, we'll play that speech back for you and we'll sit down with Heritage Immigration expert, David and Sarah, to discuss what really needs to be done at the border. So first, we're going to play President Trump's speech on the border crisis. My fellow Americans, tonight I am speaking to you because there is a growing, humanitarian, and security crisis at our southern border.

Every day, customs and border patrol agents encounter thousands of illegal immigrants trying to enter our country. We are out of space to hold them, and we have no way to promptly return them back home to their country. America proudly welcomes millions of lawful immigrants who enrich our society and contribute to our nation.

But all Americans are hurt by uncontrolled illegal migration. It strains public resources and drives down jobs and wages. Among those hardest hit are African Americans and Hispanic Americans. Our southern border is a pipeline for vast quantities of illegal drugs, including meth, heroin, cocaine, and fentanyl. Every week, 300 of our citizens are killed by heroin alone, 90% of which floods across from our southern border. More Americans will die from drugs this year than were killed in the entire Vietnam War.

In the last two years, ICE officers made 266,000 arrests of aliens with criminal records, including those charged or convicted, of 100,000 assaults, 30,000 sex crimes, and 4,000 violent killings. Over the years, thousands of Americans have been brutally killed by those who illegally entered our country, and thousands more lives will be lost if we don't act right now. This is a humanitarian crisis, a crisis of the heart and a crisis of the soul.

Last month, 20,000 migrant children were illegally brought into the United States a dramatic increase. These children are used as human pawns by vicious coyotes and ruthless gangs. One in three women are sexually assaulted on the dangerous trek up through Mexico. Women or children are the biggest victims by far of our broken system. This is the tragic reality of illegal immigration on our southern border. This is the cycle of human suffering that I am determined. to end. My administration has presented Congress with a detailed proposal to secure the border and stop the criminal gangs, drug smugglers, and human traffickers. It's a tremendous problem.

Our proposal was developed by law enforcement professionals and border agents at the Department of Homeland Security. These are the resources they have requested to properly perform their mission and keep America safe, in fact, safer than ever before. The proposal from Homeland Security includes cutting-edge technology for detecting drugs, weapons, illegal contraband, and many other things. We have requested more agents, immigration judges, and bed space to process the sharp rise and unlawful migration fueled by our very strong economy. Our plan also contains an urgent request for humanitarian assistance and medical support.

Furthermore, we have asked Congress to close border security loopholes so that illegal immigrant children can be safely and humanely returned back home. Finally, as part of an overall approach to border security, law enforcement professionals have requested $5.7 billion, for a physical barrier. At the request of Democrats, it will be a steel barrier rather than a concrete wall. This barrier is absolutely critical to border security. It's also what our professionals at the border want and need. This is just common sense. The border wall would very quickly pay for itself. The cost of illegal drugs exceeds $500 billion a year, vastly more than the $5.7 billion we have requested from Congress.

The wall will also be paid for indirectly by the great new trade deal we have made with Mexico. Senator Chuck Schumer, who you will be hearing from later tonight, has repeatedly supported a physical barrier in the past. along with many other Democrats. They changed their mind only after I was elected president. Democrats in Congress have refused to acknowledge the crisis, and they have refused to provide our brave border agents with the tools they desperately need to protect our families and our nation.

The federal government remains shut down for one reason and one reason only, because Democrats will not fund border security. My administration is doing everything in our power to help those impacted by the situation. But the only solution is for Democrats to pass a spending bill that defends our borders and reopens the government. This situation could be solved in a 45-minute meeting.

I have invited congressional leadership to the White House tomorrow to get this done. Hopefully, we can rise above partisan politics in order to support national security. Some have suggested a barrier is immoral. Then why do wealthy politicians build walls, fences, and gates around their homes? They don't build walls because they hate the people on the outside. but because they love the people on the inside. The only thing that is immoral is the politicians to do nothing and continue to allow more innocent people to be so horribly victimized.

America's heart broke the day after Christmas when a young police officer in California was savagely murdered in cold blood by an illegal alien. It just came across the border. The life of an American hero was stolen by someone who had no right to be in our country. Day after day, precious lives are cut short by those who have violated our borders. In California, an Air Force veteran was raped, murdered, and beaten to death with a hammer by an illegal alien with a long criminal history. In Georgia, an illegal alien was recently charged with murder for killing, beheading, and dismembering his neighbor.

In Maryland, MS-13 gang members who arrived in the United States as unaccompanied monitors were arrested and charged last year after viciously stabbing and beating a 16-year-old girl. Over the last several years, I've met with dozens of families whose loved ones were stolen by illegal immigration. I've held the hands of the weeping mothers and embraced the grief-stricken fathers. So sad. So terrible. I will never forget the pain in their eyes, the tremble in their voices, and the sadness gripping their souls. how much more American blood must we shed before Congress does its job? To those who refuse to compromise in the name of border security,

I would ask, imagine if it was your child, your husband, or your wife, whose life was so cruelly, shattered, and totally broken. to every member of Congress pass a bill that ends this crisis. To every citizen call Congress and tell them to finally, after all of these decades, secure our border. This is a choice between right and wrong, justice and injustice. This is about whether we fulfill our sacred duty to the American citizens we, serve. When I took the oath of office, I swore to protect our country. And that is what I will always do. So help me God. Thank you and good night. And now on to our headlines. We'll start with the Democrat

response to Trump's speech. Here's House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Sadly, much of what we heard from President Trump throughout this census shutdown has been full of misinformation. and even malice. The President has chosen fear. We want to start with the facts. The fact is, on the very first day of this Congress, House Democrats passed Senate Republican legislation to reopen government and fund smart, effective border security solutions. But the President is rejecting these bipartisan bills, which would reopen government, over his obsession with forcing American taxpayers to waste billions of dollars on an expensive an ineffective wall, a wall he always promised Mexico would pay for. The fact is, President Trump

has chosen to hold hostage critical services for the health, safety, and well-being of the American people, and withhold the paychecks of 800,000 innocent workers across the nation, many of them veterans. Here's Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer. We can reopen the government and continue to work through disagreements over policy. We can secure our border without an ineffective, expensive wall, and we can welcome legal immigrants and refugees without compromising safety and security. The symbol of America should be the Statue of Liberty, not a 30-foot wall. Well, Democrats can't get single-payer health care through Congress or the White House, but liberal bastions like New York and California are going at it themselves. On Tuesday,

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio announced a new program to give comprehensive care to every resident, regardless of their ability to pay or their immigration status. The program would cover health costs for up to 300,000 illegal immigrants in the city and will include primary and special care. De Blasio said it will cost at least $100 million. And out in California, newly sworn in Governor Gavin Newsom is pushing a similar plan that would prop up Obamacare in that state and help illegal immigrants obtain health care. He said that he would reinstate the individual mandate at the state level, and he said that Medi-Cal, which is the state's health insurance program,

would let illegal immigrants stay on the program until they turn 26. Currently, ages 19. Mexico is taking action to make its border with Guatemala more secure. Interior Secretary Olga Sanchez Cordero said that at hundreds of areas where illegal crossings occur, quote, will be guarded and controlled. to prevent the entry of undocumented people, per the Associated Press. Sanchez Cordero also said, We have information that a new caravan is forming to enter our country in mid-January,

and we are already taking the necessary steps to ensure the caravan enters in a safe and orderly way. Well, a federal appeals judge has ruled that a Virginia politician violated the Constitution when she temporarily blocked a critic from her Facebook page. Phyllis Randall of Loudoun County blocked a man from her campaign page for 12 hours. He had previously accused school board members and their relatives of corruption and conflicts of interest. She said her page was a private website, but the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals disagreed. They say it was public and that the man's First Amendment rights were violated. The case is directly relevant to a case involving President Trump.

Last year, a district judge ruled that he could not block critics from his Twitter account because it was a public space, but he held that it was a private space. He lost that case, but he's currently appealing. Well, not everyone on the left is 100% thrilled about new representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. The views, Whoopi Goldberg, had some stern words for the young Congresswoman in a recent episode. And you just got in there, and I know you got lots of good ideas, but I would encourage you to sit still for a minute and learn the job. You know, and just, you know, because there are people in that party who have been working their tails off for this country.

And they know a lot. And they know a lot. And you could learn some stuff from them. And I just feel like, you know, you don't have to be born into it. You don't have to know it when you step out. But before you start pooping on people and what they've done, you got to do something too. Well, up next we talk to Heritage Immigration expert David and Sarah about the wall and what's needed on the border. Do you have an opinion that you'd like to share?

I'm Rob Blewey, editor-in-chief of The Daily Signal, and I'm inviting you to share your thoughts with us. Leave us a voicemail at 202-608-6205 or email us at letters atdailysignal.com. Yours could be featured on the Daily Signal podcast. The crisis of the border continues, but Democrats and Republicans remain at an impasse over the wall and a host of other issues. Joining us to discuss is David and Sarah, a policy expert at the Heritage Foundation, who focuses on immigration. David, thanks for joining us. Thanks so much for having me. Okay.

Now, one, I'm going to admit we are doing this a couple hours before the president's speech, just due to scheduling issues. So it is what it is. But we know the main topic, so we're going to hit them with David. And first of all, we know. We're going to be talking about a wall. So a lot of lefties have been saying that walls don't work. What is the deal? Do walls work and do they make sense as part of a broader border security strategy?

The reality is that border barriers of some kind, whether that be a fence, whether it be double-layer fence, whether it be a wall, in certain areas, they can have good effects. So if it takes someone, you know, 20 seconds or a minute to get over a border barrier, to climb over wall. You really need that border barrier in areas that extra minute or that extra 20 seconds, whatever it is, if you're in a suburban or urban area where one side of the wall is Mexico and the other side is like a busy street in San Diego. That extra minute is important time that gives the Border Patrol time to swoop in, run in, and apprehend the person crossing illegally. In other areas, though, of the border, the advantages, the benefits of

of a border bearers is less clear. It doesn't seem like there are so many advantages. If it takes, if you're in the middle of the desert and you build a wall and it takes a minute to get over the wall, but the journey to the nearest town is another three hours. Well, you've basically now made it a three hour and one minute journey, which is that really a great bang for our buck to spend a lot of money just to get that extra one minute to add it on to another three hours that they're already going to be spent traveling. And that's where the answer is probably no.

There's probably other tools we can use. So right what you just said there, I mean, that sort of gets at an assumption within the Trump's argument, which has been walls work. They block people. It seems like you're saying any wall can be climbed over with the appropriate equipment. Is it possible to build wall? Like it seems like what Trump has been proposing from the beginning of his campaign was a wall that cannot be climbed over that will block people totally. Is that possible? I mean, he's talked about Israel, has that. You know, what if he put like a electrical stuff on it or, you know, obviously you can militarize it, which is not what, this is not what you may want. Yeah, I think you have to go to such extremes that you'd quickly run afoul of, of a lot of sort of, you know, human rights type folks or various treaties we signed on to. But just in general, I think the idea of, you know, like completely militarizing the border and going that direction is something which, you know, I just don't think that it's probably

the right way to handle this, but also even if you do go. in the direction of building, yeah, like this really tall, really tall wall. The reality is, is we should, if you're a criminal, if you're a smuggler, there are ways over walls. If you build a 30-foot wall, the price of a 40-foot ladder is $250 at Home Depot. I can go buy one. So, walls are not, there's almost never like an impenetrable. There's always a more clever criminal out there who's going to find a way to defeat it. Furthermore, walls are also only dealing with people who are crossing the border illegally. They do nothing to deal with people who are showing up at the port of entry and claiming asylum. And they do nothing to deal with

people who once they climb over the wall, we catch them. Well, what do we do with them now that we've caught them? How do we deport them? What are our deportation procedures? Or what about the people who have overstayed a visa? They came here legally and now they've overstayed that visa. The best estimates are that 40% of the people who are in the country right now are here because they came on a legal visa and overstayed. And that numbers only... Just to be clear, you mean 40% of those who are here illegally, right? Yeah, 40% of those who are here illegally.

And that number is only increasing every year. I think in 2012, there was an estimate that in 2012, the total influx of illegal immigrants, it was like 58% of the illegal immigrants in 2012 was people who overstayed a visa. So the vast majority of illegal immigrants that we get today are people who overstay a visa, not people who, like, get by the border patrol. So right now, so the border wall only does so much, even if it does, it can be defeated and there's a ways around it as well. So just briefly, you mentioned, you know, there's more than one kind of wall. And you mentioned, you know, double fencing.

I know the Trump administration has thrown out various kinds of walls over the past few days. Could you explain what those walls are? Yeah. And especially because the Trump administration has actually looked into, they've tried it on those tests, the models that they built all of the ones. which were actually not successful in meeting all of their criteria, shows you how even if you have eight prototypes, none of the eight prototypes actually met all the requirements that they had. But the point is these are different ideas.

And so basically you've got some walls that only stop, or some walls are barriers that only stop vehicles. So very low, you know, very low barriers. They might only be posts in the ground, but they stop trucks or vehicles from getting through or make it at least more difficult for them to get through. You have anti-pedestrian. barriers. And these barriers can be anything from just a thin piece of metal to bar to a chain link

fence all the way up to a full concrete barrier. And so you have a whole variation of types of barriers. Obviously, what you want in a barrier is something that is a cost effective. You don't want it to cost an arm and a leg to have to build it. You want something that hopefully is relatively easy to maintain. And you want something that prevents people from something that cannot be easily defeated by an illegal immigrant who wants to get over or through it or under it. And so these are the types of things you have to consider. And I know right now the Trump administration, I think they're considering moving toward a sort of steel slats model of a wall or I guess you could call it a fence more or less.

And one of the reasons they actually prefer that is because the Border Patrol actually prefers something you can see through. If you just have a straight up fence or straight up concrete wall and I'm a Border Patrol agent and I'm trying to figure out, you know, where the incoming smugglers are, what's going on, but I can't see through. Well, I'm there. The Border Patrol is blinded by a pure wall as the smugglers are. So it actually works to the smuggler's advantage to have a pure wall in some cases.

And so that's why over time, I think the discussion has moved more toward barriers that you can see through, that are things like steel slats. But the reality is, all these different types have different tradeoffs, different advantages. But what we should be looking for are things that are costing. effective that hopefully make it difficult for people to cross, slow them down, and also, you know, like I said, enhance the security of the agents who are actually working on behind the wall. Well, you said that in some places it does make sense to have a wall, but it seems like right now we've just got a total breakdown in negotiations where at least it seems like

Democratic leadership is not even really interested in blocking people from coming over in those parts. And so at least where the places where it makes sense to have a wall, is the Trump administration right to push for that and and what are the prospects yeah i mean there there are certainly areas where i think you could argue for new a new wall or new barriers or where currently where there's existing barriers you could say you want to improve the barriers um especially near urban urban areas um like san diego exactly like san diego um very effective there i think i think it at least slows people down long enough for yeah for border patrol agents to be able to mount an a response So I do think that's the area.

But like I said, we keep in mind that if you build a wall in one area, people will go around it to the area where there is no wall. But yeah, right now the problem is that you need that extra border barrier, like said, in those urban areas. And right now, I don't think we haven't heard anything from the left that takes the concept of border security seriously at all. They might say the wall, and we've heard we've heard them say the walls are immoral, which I think is a pretty ridiculous statement. But the concept is just that, you know, in some places they work well, in some places they don't. But I don't think the left is taking the concept of border security or stopping people seriously. Because even if you don't want to do the wall or whatnot, we haven't seen any serious proposals for them to deal with illegal immigration in years. It used to be that the left still opposed illegal immigration, but there was just some differences.

Now, you know, abolish ICE and, you know, sanctuary states are sort of the new, you know, the new thing. on the left, that's explicitly pro illegal immigration language. Right. And so you can disagree with how much wall or how much, you know, fencing or what tactics we use. But right now that's not where the left is. The left is talking about just wholesale rejection of sort of any immigration enforcement or border security.

Right. And of course, in California recently, we had the case of a police officer and the person alleged to have killed him as an illegal immigrant who was not able to, because of sanctuary city rules. Okay, so on a slightly different topic, the Trump administration has also correlated border issues to the issues of drugs in this country. How big a problem is drugs coming up through the southern border? Yeah, so this is, I think many of your viewers may have seen narcos or any of the other great TV shows out there. I mean, clearly drug cartels and their influence and their operations remain significant issues. However, I would point to the fact that,

fact that I think like any big organization, the primary method that they used, that we've seen that they use for trafficking in drugs or other goods is often the ports of entry. So if you're a business, the best way, and they often view themselves as sort of like businesses, the best way to move a large quantity of things, of objects, is to put them on tractor trailers or to put them in cars. And so if we're really worried about countering drugs coming into the country, I would argue that we need to look more at what's happening at the ports of entry. You need to have the resources there, the bombs, the drug sniffing dogs, the number of agents, the facilities to be able to effectively pull a vehicle over and inspect it while not also completely shutting

down the flow of other vehicles wanting to come in. So that's more of a question of what do we do at ports of entry. A border walled, I think there's very little actually to help us stop drug flow because, yeah, they're not largely using the open desert. Yes, they are using just the border, but I think the main flow is through ports of entry. And that's the way I think that's, that would be the target if we really want to cut off drug supplies to go after, is to increase resources at ports of entry, not what's between the ports. Well, something the president's also expressed concern about as terrorists coming across the border. Is that, is that a, is that a, growing problem.

Yeah, and we've seen a few statements from the administration on this, whether it be Sarah Sanders or a vice president Pence. And I'll be frank, I think there's been, I've been concerned by some of their statements because I don't think they accurately reflect what's going on at the border. And I think they're seeing statistics and they're, they're, they're misinterpreting them and they're getting them wrong. And I sort of, I've been able to trace back where did this statistic come from? President Trump said we're catching 10 people in a very short period of time where Sarah Sanders saying 4,000 people, terrorists were caught the southern border.

And I can go back and find where those statistics started, but it's sort of like a game of a telephone where someone said something and someone said something and then by the end it's not the original story. And so what we're seeing is DHS is saying, yeah, in a given year we encounter 10,000 or 4,000, say terrorists or known or suspected or people who are on watch lists. but that includes people who like we prevent from getting on planes. And so the reality is most of the people who we encounter who are terrorists are not at our land borders. They're at our air borders that we're saying you can't get on that plane. They're coming in through our ports on a boat. I think it was I think in 2016, I think it was 87% of the encounters that DHS had was at air or sea ports. So that's 13% for land borders.

And even the 13% that's not, that includes Canada. And from what I've seen, there's more issues with terrorism in Canada than we do have with Mexico. So the amount of the terrorist issue at our southern border is in no way close to the 4,000 people or the 10 people a day that some officials have been claiming. So lastly, is the crisis of the border worse than usual right now? I mean, obviously illegal immigration has been an issue for decades. I mean, back to Reagan, frankly, in amnesty. Are we at a moment of crisis? Yeah, I would say that in certain ways, we're not in a crisis in the sense that we, in sheer numbers of people, we don't have the sheer numbers of people crossing the border illegally that we used to have.

At the end of the Clinton administration, we had, I think, a million people entering the country illegally in a given year. We don't have that. But we do have are some concerning new tactics, things like the caravan system where we're going to try to just, you know, come as a group and sort of overwhelm people who might try to stop us. That is a new concerning development. And as is the fact that we're increasingly seeing the use of asylum claims and loopholes is the way you get into the United States, catch and release, which President Trump is through some executive actions that they've taken are trying to stop that from happening. So there are some unique challenges that we have now that we haven't had in the past. But the numbers as a total hole are lower. And so I do think that this is an area where if we really want to clamp down on these unique problems that we're having right now, it means dealing with those actual problems.

It means dealing with the asylum system, the loopholes, stopping catch and release and the enforcement and how we're deporting people and removing them efficiently. That's where the current real debate. That's where the current problem is. you can put up more wall if you want, but ultimately the real problem we have is not catching people. It's about how do we deport them once we know they've already, you know, they're already here illegally. Would it be fair to say that maybe the crisis isn't as bad as it's been, but it is a pivotal moment in the Trump administration because they're two years in, they just had them in terms, and, you know, you don't really pay much of a political cost. The political cost of having a shutdown is minimal right now because you're two years away from an election.

So it seems like maybe that's what's, at least to me, maybe that's what's what's provoking it is not so much the policy crisis, but the moment is right to deal with the issue. I mean, I think there's certainly an element of politics, definitely at where, no, just practically speaking. Sure. That might be it. But I think also what we're seeing is the fact that when Trump came into office, you saw a steep decline in illegal immigration because there was sort of the Trump effect. People were under the impression. The average illegal immigrant was like, I'm not going to be able to get to the United States. Trump is deporting everyone.

Right. And that Trump effect, though, has worn off over time because the reality is, is these loopholes are hamstringing our ability to actually deport people. So right now, actions are speaking louder than words. If you get to the United States right now and you have a kid and you claim asylum, you're probably getting released, or at least you were until some of these new executive actions kicked in. And I think what Trump has been seeing is basically the continuing his efforts to stop illegal

immigration, while initially successful, are now sort of being, he's being confronted with sort of the harsh reality of the nature of the weakness in our laws. And that's, I think, it's just been building over time. And that's what I think is sort of provoked this in the last, in the last few months. It just keeps getting worse and worse and worse. And now the caravan especially, it's just, is targeting specifically those loopholes. Come with children, come seek asylum, and basically will release you. And I think it's all these factors coming together. And Trump has, he's had enough and he wants to stop illegal immigration, which I think all Americans should be supportive of.

Okay. Well, thank you so much for joining us today, David. Thank you. Do conversations about the Supreme Court leave you scratching your head? Then subscribe to SCOTUS 101, a podcast breaking down the cases, personalities, and gossip at the Supreme Court. Well, we'll leave it there for today's episode. Thanks so much for listening to the Daily Signal podcast brought to you from the Robert H. Bruce radio studio at the Heritage Foundation.

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