Kamala’s Plan to Address Root Cause of Migration: Expand Socialism to U.S.

The ongoing debate as to whether Vice President Kamala Harris was the “border czar” misses a more important point about her role in the border crisis.  When President Biden announced her new role, he did not expressly name her as border czar.  But he and Harris did announce a strategy to address the “root cause” of the surge in the countries of origin, with her in charge. It was strategy not intended to work, and she gave it minimal effort.  Instead, it appears her strategy is to have the U.S. implement the same failed policies of those countries.

Biden made the announcement on March 24, 2021, just two months after taking office.  He was responding to an unprecedented surge at the southern border.  The cause was obvious.  He had on day one, reversed virtually all of President Trump’s border policies, most importantly, the “remain in Mexico” policy. 

Recall that Trump’s number one issue when he ran in 2016 was the border.  President Obama had begun treating immigrants crossing the border illegally as migrants seeking political refugee status.  Migrants learned that rather than trying to evade border patrol, it is better to turn yourself in and claim refugee status. Under Obama you would be processed and then await your hearing years down the road in the United States. Migrant encounters reached 553,000 during Obama’s last year. 

Trump reversed that. He continued to allow them to apply for political refugee status but required them to wait in Mexico for their hearing.  While he also tried to expand the border wall, this change in policy was far more important than any wall. The new policy eliminated most of the incentive for migrants to come.  The numbers dropped substantially due to the change.  Migrant encounters were just 458,000 in Trump’s last year.

Biden reversed the policy, turning the faucet back on.  Under the Biden-Harris administration, migrants became free to cross anywhere they please along our almost 2,000-mile border southern border.  They are not required to enter through an official entry point. Cross the desert, the mountains, or the river at the place of your choosing (or, more accurately, at the drug cartel’s choosing).  No problem, we will bring border patrol to you, and gladly process you right there and allow immediate entry.

They are processed and allowed in as political refugees, not illegal immigrants. That is the hook and the key to the Biden-Harris open border experiment.  U.S. immigration law (Title VIII, Section 1158(b)) provides, “To establish that the applicant is a refugee . . .the applicant must establish that race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion was or will be at least one central reason for persecuting the applicant.”

Migrant encounters surged to over 1.7 million in the Biden-Harris first year, and over 2.3 million in their second and third years, over five times that of Trump’s final year.

Of course, the vast majority of these migrants are not coming here to escape persecution.  They are coming because they are poor, which is not a ground for asylum. If they were escaping persecution, where are the reports of millions of central and south Americans being persecuted because of their race or religion? That would be odd considering they are virtually all the same race and religion. While there are certainly some being persecuted for political beliefs in places like Venezuela, those numbers are small comparatively.  

If there were such persecutions, then this would be the “root cause” of the migration, and Harris would be down there trying to combat political persecution and discrimination. But she has never mentioned any kind of discrimination.   

In making the announcement, Biden avoided identifying the most obvious reason for migration, asserting instead that “the reason why so many people were leaving, we learned, was that not only gang violence and trafficking and cartels, but natural disasters, hurricanes, floods, earthquakes.”  Still, none of these are grounds for political asylum.  

Blaming the surge on “natural disasters” comes from the socialist/globalist playbook.  They regularly assert that climate change causes migration. So, as they open borders, they assert if you want migration controlled, you better address climate change. Harris, of course, was a big backer of the “Green New Deal,” even co-sponsoring legislation originally introduced by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. 

The poverty they are escaping is primarily caused by socialist governments run by corrupt officials.  Rather than solving the border problem by simply reinstating the remain in Mexico policy, Biden-Harris announced a plan of stopping migration not at our border, but at the source, turning around the economies of the countries from which they come. In other words, they put a socialist in charge of fixing socialism.

Biden explained, “the best way to keep people from coming is keep them from wanting to leave.”  Some would argue the best way is to enforce your border. Needless to say, this is an ambitious and expensive plan considering that most countries have a more poverty than the U.S. 

In support of the plan, they announced they would send millions of U.S. taxpayer dollars.  Biden said he would reimplement an Obama plan, which the Trump administration had cancelled, of sending $700 million to the Northern Triangle countries.  

In June 2021 Harris announced another $310 million in humanitarian relief and food assistance.  She also visited Guatemala at that time. That has been her only trip to the Northern Triangle countries during her Vice-Presidency despite identifying these countries as the primary source of migrants. Of course, her minimal efforts have not worked. The numbers only increased since her taking on her new role. 

Part two of her strategy is the quiet part: implementing the same socialism here in the U.S.  If the U.S. also has a corrupt, socialist government, it will no longer be a place to escape to.  This alleviates the need for a border wall or for ICE, both of which she has opposed. Her support for socialism is well-documented, from her support of the Green New Deal to Medicare for all and the end of private insurance to her infamous statement and tweet that “equity” means “we all end up at the same place,” i.e. equality of outcomes. This is a socialist/communist concept, in line with “from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.” Regardless of your individual merit, you get the same reward.  

Based on her actions and inaction, it is safe to assume a Harris victory will assure the continuation of an America-last administration when it comes to immigration policy.