69传媒

Nolan Finley

The Detroit News

(TNS)

The torrent of illegal border crossings that marked the four years of the Biden administration has slowed to a trickle in the two weeks since President Donald Trump returned to the White House.

Illegal crossings are averaging less than 600 a day across the nine sectors of a southern border that once saw as many as 9,000 daily unauthorized entries.

The numbers affirm the obvious solution Trump offered on the campaign trail for getting the border under control: Enforce the law.

The new president on his first day in office declared a national emergency on the border, issuing a flurry of executive orders that, among other things, ended a Customs and Border Patrol app that eased entry for asylum seekers; sent active-duty troops to man the border and allowed agents to make arrests in schools, churches and hospitals.

Then he did what he said he would do: started the removal of the 12 million migrants who are in the U.S. illegally.

And almost immediately, the massive numbers of migrants who had viewed the border as more a suggestion than a barrier stopped coming.

All of this could have happened four years ago, before the eight million illegal border crossings encouraged by President Joe Biden's open border policies.

But laws are only as good as the will to enforce them. And Biden had no stomach for securing the border. So the endless caravans of migrants kept coming, walking and wading across the border as if it didn't exist.

It was only when the former president recognized the immigration issue was top of mind with voters that he restored some of the measures Trump had used to control crossings during his first term. Illegal entries dropped sharply, to 1,200 to 1,400 a day by last summer. But he didn't have the courage to fully shut-off the spigot.

Trump will. And when he does, the nation can get back to an immigration policy that serves the country's need for workers at every strata of the economy, and also provides refuge and opportunity for those from other lands who are willing to follow the legal process for gaining entry.

The U.S. hasn't been able to administer a rational immigration system for years because of the chaos at the southern border. Officials couldn't be certain who was coming in, or from where, or whether they'd be contributors or a drain on resources once they got here.

Immigrants from across the globe who were eager to come here and contribute were shut out.

Restoring an orderly immigration process was a primary reason voters returned Trump to the White House.

Yet the teeth gnashing is growing louder with every step toward that goal. Opponents of deportations want the president only to send back those who have committed additional crimes since they arrived, and leave the rest be, regardless of their legal status.

It won't work that way. Unless America demonstrates its national boundaries are sovereign and inviolable, without exception, illegal immigration will continue.

Once the borders are secure, we may find it to our benefit to carefully screen those targeted for deportation and create a process that would allow many to remain.

But we first have to firmly establish the principle that the U.S. has the right to decide who comes into the country, and who is welcome to stay.

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