During President Biden’s inaugural address, he used the word “unity” at least a dozen times. He told us, “Today, on this January day, my whole soul is in this: Bringing America together. Uniting our people.” Three years later, his irresponsible policies and incendiary rhetoric have rendered the nation more divided than at any time in recent memory. Nowhere is this more evident than at the southern border where Biden has created a humanitarian crisis by ignoring federal immigration law and suing the state of Texas for exercising its constitutional right to defend itself from what its governor accurately describes as a foreign invasion.
Instead of bringing people together, he made them suspicious of one another. Instead of uniting the nation, he has divided it further.
As Gov. Greg Abbott said in a Jan. 24 statement, “I have already declared an invasion under Article I, § 10, Clause 3 to invoke Texas’s constitutional authority to defend and protect itself. That authority is the supreme law of the land and supersedes any federal statutes to the contrary.” The Biden administration disputes Gov. Abbott’s contention that the hordes of illegal aliens pouring into the Lone Star state amounts to an invasion. The voters, however, agree with Gov. Abbott. A Rasmussen survey conducted early this month found that “65 percent of likely U.S. voters believe it is accurate to describe the current situation with migrants at the border with Mexico as an ‘invasion’ of the United States.” (READ MORE from David Catron: College Grads for Trump)
Ironically, Biden’s attack on Texas has produced “unity” among presidential candidates who agree on little else. On Truth Social, former President Trump wrote, “When I am President, on Day One, instead of fighting Texas, I will work hand in hand with Governor Abbott and other Border States to Stop the Invasion.” Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. echoed this on X: “As President, I will end this humanitarian crisis once and for all. I will secure the border and destroy the business model of the drug cartels.” Nikki Haley expressed her support on X: ‘Governor Abbott is right: the state of Texas has every right to defend itself and its borders.” In addition, 25 GOP governors declared their support of Gov. Abbott:
We stand in solidarity with our fellow Governor, Greg Abbott, and the State of Texas in utilizing every tool and strategy, including razor wire fences, to secure the border. We do it in part because the Biden Administration is refusing to enforce immigration laws already on the books and is illegally allowing mass parole across America of migrants who entered our country illegally … Because the Biden Administration has abdicated its constitutional compact duties to the states, Texas has every legal justification to protect the sovereignty of our states and our nation.
Meanwhile, the Biden administration’s legal assault on Texas produced a Pyrrhic victory when the Supreme Court vacated an injunction that prevented the Customs and Border Patrol (CPB) from removing concertina wire installed on the border by the Texas National Guard. Despite all the sound and fury it generated, the ruling doesn’t require CPB to remove concertina wire. Nor does it forbid the National Guard from installing additional wire. Despite breathless “news” reports to the contrary, there is no “standoff” between the CPB and the Texas National Guard. A senior CPB official told Fox News, “Bottom line: Border Patrol has no plans to remove infrastructure (c-wire) placed by Texas along the border.” (READ MORE: The Democrats Can’t Disgorge Biden)
It turns out that rank-and-file border patrol agents are none too enthusiastic about President Biden or his administration’s immigration policy. A spokesman for the National Border Patrol Council (NBPC), the union that represents them, posted the following on X last Friday: “Rank-and file BP agents are not going to start arresting TX NG members for following their LAWFUL orders … BP agents appreciate and respect what TX has been doing to defend their state in the midst of this catastrophe that the Biden Admin has unleashed on America.” The border patrol agents have not forgotten that Biden betrayed them during the phony “whipping” scandal. Here’s what he said when asked if he took responsibility:
Of course I take responsibility. I’m President, but it was a horrible thing to see what you saw. To see people treated like they did — horses nearly running over people being strapped. It’s outrageous, I promise you, those people will pay. They will be — there is investigation underway now, and there will be consequences. There will be consequences. It’s an embarrassment, it’s beyond an embarrassment. It’s dangerous. It’s wrong, it sends the wrong message around the world, sends the wrong message at home. It’s simply not who we are. Thank you.
The border patrol agents were obviously not inclined to thank the President for taking that scripted question and casually throwing them under the bus. In reality, as eventually became blindingly obvious, the “horrible thing they saw” simply did not happen. The photographer who shot the notorious photos of the event, Paul Ratje, told Newsweek that neither he nor his colleagues witnessed Border Patrol agents using whips on any of the migrants: “I’ve never seen them whip anyone.” Yet President Biden never bothered to set the record straight much less apologize for slandering the border Patrol agents based on transparent lies. Consequently, the rank-and-file border patrol agents hate his guts.
All of which brings us back to Biden’s inaugural address. The border disaster over which he has presided is a microcosm of his presidency. He inherited a system in which federal officials were working fairly well with state agencies to keep a complex problem under control — then chaos ensued. Instead of bringing people together, he made them suspicious of one another. Instead of uniting the nation, he has divided it further. He has created unity in only one sense. Most Americans agree that it is past time for him to retire.
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