Imagine living in a country where drug smugglers and human traffickers brazenly violate the law. Where cartels use military tactics to overwhelm law enforcement. Where men are beaten and bloodied for trying to maintain order. And where a day care-turned-drug front killed a 1-year-old child with fentanyl.

You could be forgiven for wanting to flee that country for the United States. Unfortunately, that country is the United States. It’s the inevitable result of President Joe Biden’s rhetoric and his administration’s refusal to enforce the law. Day by day, Biden is turning America from a land of peace and prosperity into a land of chaos and fear.

It started on the 2020 presidential campaign trail when then-candidate Biden promised to halt deportations, stop construction of the border wall, and end the Trump administration’s “zero-tolerance” policy. Immediately, illegal immigration spiked.

Things only got worse when Biden took office and made his open-door rhetoric a reality. In fiscal 2021, U.S. authorities encountered nearly 2 million people at the border — the highest such number in decades. That number rose above 2.7 million the following year. This year, we are on track to break every record in the book. Some of these people are turned away, but the vast majority are not. By some estimates, 3.8 million illegal immigrants have entered and stayed in the U.S. thanks to Biden-era policies.

It goes beyond statistics. For border communities such as Eagle Pass, Texas, this crisis means the transformation of a small town into what one resident calls “a war zone.” For major cities such as New York, it means unbearable strains on public housing and utilities that, according to Democratic Mayor Eric Adams, are “destroying” everything . And for tens of thousands of people throughout the country, it means death — fatal poisoning from synthetic, "made in China" opioids that are smuggled into the U.S. through Mexico.

Responsibility for this carnage rests squarely on Biden’s shoulders. Some Democrats deny this, blaming natural disasters, a changing climate, corruption, down-trending economies, and political unrest across developing nations. However, all of these circumstances existed during the time of the Trump administration. The key difference between then and now is one of priorities — and the Biden administration is not prioritizing the interests of the U.S. and its citizens.

Last month, federal agents were caught on camera cutting physical barriers Texas constructed to prevent illegal immigration. That may be in someone’s interests, but it is certainly not good for the public. Securing our border is one of Washington’s most basic constitutional duties. Unfortunately, it is a duty that Biden has willfully chosen to neglect.

This is unfair not just to us but to our children and grandchildren because the longer our borders remain open, the stronger a lure they become to virtually every desperate person in every struggling nation on Earth. If we are on the leading edge of mass migration from the Global South to the Global North, we need to set a good precedent now, one that upholds the law, provides for Americans’ needs, and discourages would-be illegal immigrants from risking their lives on a tortuous, dangerous journey. Simply put, we need the president to reverse course.

The president won’t do that, though, which means Congress must try to force his hand. This goes beyond simply spending more money on the border. It means enacting substantive policy changes to ensure that the executive branch is not using taxpayer dollars to traffic illegal migrants into the country. The U.S. cannot sustain unchecked illegal immigration. No country can, no matter how wealthy and resource-rich.

Congress has various tools we can and should use to begin changing the behavior of this lawless administration. Ultimately, however, it is up to the people to elect a government that aligns with their values. This is how we will make a real difference on the border and improve the lives of hardworking citizens.

Marco Rubio is Florida’s senior U.S. senator.