Senate Dems and some Republicans are hyping up the secret border deal that will continue seeing major cities terrorized with a massive influx of invaders who, under the deal, will be fast-tracked to legal status.
The Arizona Independent rebutted the argument by some conservative lawmakers that the Senate deal’s emergency border shutdown power — which is set to kick in automatically at an average of 5,000 border encounters a day — would green-light thousands of illegal crossings. Those new expulsion authorities would end the government’s “catch and release” operations, asylum screenings would accelerate and Congress would limit the use of parole authority for southern border crossings, she said.
“The rumors that are swirling about what this legislation does are wrong. Our bill ends catch and release. It ensures that the government both has the power and must close down the border during times when our system is overwhelmed. And it creates new structures to ensure that folks who do not qualify for asylum cannot enter the country and stay here,” Sinema told reporters.
Does it end “catch and release”? Nope.
The majority of invaders are applying for asylum, as the New York Times even recently admitted, so the term ‘catch and release’ is mostly meaningless.
Under the terms of the still-unreleased deal, if the border is shut down, asylum seekers could still make claims at ports of entry and would have 90 days in which to make an asylum interview. If those interviews are successful, asylum seekers can still be in the country until their case is decided, which would take 90 days. A failed interview would result in immediate removal, Sinema said.
Those who claim asylum at places other than ports of entry would be detained immediately under the deal, with their asylum claim decided in detention. Those individuals would be removed within 15 days if they fail their interview. Those who qualify for asylum, which would require meeting a higher standard if the legislation is enacted, would receive a work permit and potentially a path to citizenship, Sinema said.
“They are going to two places: Detention or a short term alternative to detention, which includes monitoring by the government, until their claims are adjudicated. And then they’re either removed or set on a path to to become asylees,” Sinema said of the new process.
“A short term alternative to detention” is exactly what we have now. They’re set loose. They may be given an app they have to put on their phone or perhaps even a mostly useless ankle tracking bracelet. (What happens if they take it off? Nothing.)
Worse still the accelerated 90-day asylum interviews could easily mean, especially under this administration, a huge number of illegal alien invaders being fast-tracked for asylum status based on nonsensical claims like high crime in their home country that are being used as a basis for asylum requests.
The bottom line is should anyone trust that this administration, which has done everything possible to enable this invasion, intends to stop it or to expand it?
Republicans enabling it are just helping Democrats blame the border crisis on their own party, as Sen. Ted Cruz pointed out.
“This is an entirely foolish proposition. It is clear that there is no path for this bill to pass. The Speaker of the House has been unequivocal that the Senate bill is dead on arrival in the House. So I asked my colleagues why on Earth would they be pushing a bill that divides the Republican conference, that unites all the Senate Democrats and has zero chance of ever passing into law,” Cruz said, recounting his arguments at the lunch.
“I think it has functionally become a messaging bill for Democrats to, number one, do nothing to actually secure the border but, number two, blame the chaos at the border on Republicans,” he added.
The only thing this will do, if it fails, is help Biden shift the blame to Congress, and if it succeeds, it will make the current crisis even worse.