Illegal Immigration is Already Hurting Commerce at the Border

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Last week, many media figures and members of Congress warned the Trump administration that some of its ideas to deter illegal immigration would devastate commerce at the border. But it appears now that not stopping the border flow is already resulting in a partial shutdown of commerce at our points of entry. Agents are being diverted from points of entry to manage and process the asylum scam at our border, resulting in lane closures and partial shutdowns at certain points. We should use those resources to enforce an immigration and asylum shutdown, to push back the aliens or detain them in tent cities in order to stop the flow, and in the long run, to reopen commerce.

Last week, Customs and Border Protection (CBP) redirected roughly 545 of its “blue shirt” customs officers who man the points of entry to help the “green shirt” Border Patrol agents deal with the influx of Central American families and children entering between the points of entry. However, they are not being redirected to hold the line against the influx and deter the aliens from entering, but rather to further expedite catch-and-release.

LINK: Wait times at U.S.-Mexico border soar as 

officers are reassigned to deal with migrants

Yesterday, the Washington Post wrote a long article chronicling the complaints of trade associations regarding the slowdown at points of entry: the “trucks backed up for hours and industry leaders warning of possible produce shortages and supply-chain interruptions.” They tacitly accuse the administration of implementing “a slow-motion facsimile of the border closure that President Trump threatened two weeks ago before backing down amid protests that shutting down the border would hurt the economy.”

Furthermore, as of the beginning of this month, CBP has shut down all commercial trucking lanes at the Nogales, Arizona, port on Sundays until further notice. It cites the redeployment of customs agents to deal with the border crisis as the cause.

Read the rest from Daniel Horowitz HERE.

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