Rep. Jim Banks: Biden's border crisis – PR stunts to deflect blame won't work. Here's what has to happen

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Last Wednesday, the Biden administration held a meeting about the border crisis.

They didn’t discuss policies to lower the skyrocketing rate of illegal immigration, like a responsible administration would. Instead, they brought in outside groups to talk to them about how they should talk to the public about the border crisis.

In other words, they asked political consultants to help them deflect from a humanitarian crisis.

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The Democrat Party’s heftily paid communications specialists settled on: "it’s not my fault, he did it!"

That message was all over cable news this Sunday. On Fox, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas claimed that solving the border crisis, "takes times because the entire system was dismantled." He told ABC there was not "the ordinary, safe and just transition from one administration to another." 

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And on CNN’s State of the Union, the secretary claimed that the "entire system" of immigration "was torn down during the Trump administration, and that is why the challenge is more acute than it ever has been before."

There was no crisis on our border under the Trump administration. But, weeks after he left office, illegal immigration surged, and voters are supposed to believe that’s Trump’s fault?

That is an insult to common sense, and it’s tempting to dismiss Mayorkas’ comments out of hand. But Mayorkas’ message is more subtly dishonest than it first appears, and much more dangerous.

According to the Biden administration, the border crisis is a result of flaws with the "immigration system." The problem is that the United States isn’t properly processing illegal immigrants – the problem is not illegal immigration.

The Biden administration will keep making the crisis worse until Republicans shut down their broader claim: that the issue lies with a broken "immigration system," not lax border security.

Biden’s response to the crisis reflects this false worldview. When DHS deployed FEMA to help with the border crisis, they weren’t tasked with securing the border, instead, they were told to "safely receive, shelter and transfer unaccompanied children."

Democrats’ desperate play to blame the border crisis on President Trump is ridiculous and it won’t work.

The Biden administration is sidestepping the actual problem: 29,792 unaccompanied minors were detained at the border in February, which is five times the amount the month prior. Instead, they’re facilitating even more illegal immigration in the future.

Last week, we learned that the Biden administration is considering flying illegal immigrants from packed border facilities to states in the upper Midwest. Again, instead of addressing the root issue, the Biden administration is literally throwing it to the wind.

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As Democrat Congressman Henry Cuellar of Texas explained, "The administration’s message has to be better… It’s got to be clear and concise: ‘Don’t come in here illegally.’ That should be the message."

What kind of message did House Democrats send last week when they pushed through two amnesty bills, both of which are endorsed by President Biden? Not only are Democrats refusing to fix the issue, they’re actively making it worse.

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Democrats’ desperate play to blame the border crisis on President Trump is ridiculous and it won’t work. What’s more dangerous, and less obviously untrue, is their attempt to separate the border crisis from their open border policies.

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The border crisis is really a "large amount of illegal immigration crisis." It can only be fixed by reducing the rate of illegal immigration, by increasing border security. 

Republicans should use this moment to remind Americans which policies are responsible for the border crisis.

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