Photo taken on May 1, 2022 shows a section of the U.S.-Mexico border wall in Texas, the United States. (Photo by Nick Wagner/Xinhua)
Under increasing partisanship, immigrants have completely fallen victim to politics. The inaction on the border immigration crisis has seriously undermined the credibility of the U.S. government. If the power-holders are unable to make real changes, the American Dream would sooner or later turn into an American nightmare.
by Xin Ping
"This was a cruel, dangerous, and shameful stunt," Abdullah Hasan, White House spokesperson, said in a statement shortly after the Christmas. On Christmas Eve 2022, Texas Governor Greg Abbott transported about 140 illegal immigrants to a location outside the official residence of Vice President Kamala Harris in protest of the Democratic Party's continued admission of illegal immigrants. At that night, the temperature was below freezing, and many of the immigrants were children.
WORSENING NIGHTMARE
According to the data released by U.S. Customs and Border Protection, in fiscal year 2022, U.S. law enforcement officers intercepted more than 2.38 million illegal immigrants. In November alone, the number exceeded 230,000 at the southern border, setting a new record. Border Patrol officials noted the amount of migrants crossing into El Paso, Texas, reached record levels as many as 2,500 per day in mid-December of 2022.
The dire border migration problem has led to a serious humanitarian crisis. According to CNN, there are more than 20,000 migrants on the Mexican side waiting to enter the U.S. in anticipation of the end of Title 42 of the Code of Federal Regulations, lacking food and clothing and spending nights in huts made of cardboard and improvised tents. In the U.S. border cities, although many schools and churches have been opened as shelters, there are still a large number of refugees sleeping on the streets.
More sadly, this crisis has cost many lives of migrants. The U.S. Border Patrol reported 853 bodies were found in the 2022 fiscal year, more than three times of the 247 found in fiscal 2020. The San Antonio truck tragedy in June 2022 resulted in the astonishing loss of 51 immigrant lives, as one of the worst migrant scandals in the U.S. in recent years.
This photo taken on June 27, 2022 shows the scene of the human smuggling case in San Antonio, Texas, the United States. (Photo by Nick Wagner/Xinhua)
ALL PEACE AND QUIET
As the 2024 election approaching, Biden had to pay his first visit to the southern border to win over immigrants and turn them into a "permanent vote bank" for the Democratic Party. Dramatically, when he arrived in El Paso on Jan. 8, the refugees suddenly and miraculously disappeared. The city was clean and tidy, and Biden did not encounter any migrants, nor the homeless.
The Associated Press reported that before Biden's arrival, the police and border guard forces had removed all the refugees by various "direct means" and cleared the area in less than four days, leaving Biden a shiny city. Few of the refugees were able to escape the initial wave of searches and complained about the brutality of the law enforcement and the "breaking up of families." The police followed up with a second and a third wave of major searches of the city until the homeless were all caught. According to a local immigration website, about 1,000 immigrants were arrested in El Paso on the same day of Biden's visit. Far less peace and quiet.
Although Biden has repeatedly stated that he opposes Trump's Title 42 of the Code of Federal Regulations, he is actually expanding the impact of the regulation. It's worth noting that Biden announced a new measure just a week before his visit: refugees at the southern border will only need to find a "sponsor" in order to enter legally and obtain status, with a limit of 30,000 per month. But with over 80,000 refugees awaiting entering each month, that's a drop in the bucket, and not everyone can find a sponsor.
This photo taken on Feb. 3, 2023 shows the White House in Washington, D.C., the United States. (Xinhua/Liu Jie)
VICTIM OF POLITICAL STRIFE
Despite the crisis situation, neither the Democrats nor the Republicans show real resolve to address the immigrants issue. Instead, they use it as a tool to attack each other and grab political benefits.
Texas Governor Greg Abbott, a Republican, has repeatedly expressed his dissatisfaction with President Biden for his open immigration policy that has led to the border migration crisis. Since April 2022, Abbott and then Arizona Governor Doug Ducey have launched a "people transferring" operation, using buses to transport large numbers of Latin American immigrants to Democratic-run cities. The Christmas Eve farce has been staged several times. More than 6,000 and 1,000 migrants have arrived from Texas and Arizona respectively in Washington as of August 2022. Many of them are living in poor conditions and remain homeless till this day.
The immigration crisis is the result of a long-term political stalemate and exposes the flaws of the U.S. political system: orders change oppositely from one day to the next, ultimately leading to a lack of continuity in policy.
Under increasing partisanship, immigrants have completely fallen victim to politics. The inaction on the border immigration crisis has seriously undermined the credibility of the U.S. government. If the power-holders are unable to make real changes, the American Dream would sooner or later turn into an American nightmare.
Editor's note: Xin Ping is a commentator on international affairs, writing regularly for CGTN, Global Times, Xinhua News Agency, etc. He can be reached at xinping604@gmail.com
The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the positions of Xinhua News Agency.■
