Encounters at the southern border have skyrocketed, and the announcement that Title 42 expulsions will be ending has led to the expectation that the number of migrants seeking to illegally enter the United States will further increase.
This has led southern border states to consider alternative tactics to stem the influx of migrants, including declaring the southern border crisis an “invasion.”
Ken Cuccinelli, a senior fellow for Homeland Security and Immigration for the Center for Renewing America, said Texas Gov. Greg Abbott must take a strong hand in correcting this problem and ending the onslaught of people crossing the border.
“Nothing Texas has done to date will stem the flow of illegal border crossers,” Cuccinelli told Austin Journal. “Until Gov. Abbott steps up and uses his constitutional authority to actually return illegal invaders back into Mexico, Texas will not reduce the numbers. Of course, the numbers month-to-month prove that I am right about that.”
Cuccinelli has written about the issue extensively. The Center for Renewing America published his “Policy Brief: How the States Can Secure the Border” in October.
“There can be no disputing that the influx of well over 1.3 million illegal immigrants this calendar year alone and thousands of pounds of fentanyl and other deadly narcotics, facilitated by the widespread human trafficking efforts of violent international drug cartels, constitutes an invasion of the southern border of the United States,” Cuccinelli wrote.
He also reported that as of March 2021, cartels were earning around $14 million each day moving migrants across the border.
“Because the cartels control the border, they treat it as a massive 'toll booth' for moving people and goods across the U.S. border,” Cuccinelli told the Austin Journal. “When border crossings go up, so does the amount of drugs and the amount of money the cartels are making off all of the traffic.”
Cuccinelli served as acting director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services from June 2019, until January 2021. He said the toll on people and communities near the border is not fully appreciated.
“The destruction being wrought in border communities is often hard for other Americans to appreciate, including crime, violence, disruption and expenses,” Cuccinelli said. “But it goes beyond border communities, America's poor lose jobs and wages to illegal aliens, and the deaths that come with much cheaper and more plentiful drugs are felt in every community in America. That's why former CBP Commissioner Mark Morgan says ‘every town is a border town.’”
In March, 159,900 unique individuals were encountered nationwide, a 37% increase from February. There were 221,303 total encounters along the southwest land border in March, a 33% increase compared to February. U.S. Customs and Border Patrol noted that total numbers may be misleading, as the increased number of expulsions resulted in higher than normal occurrences of multiple crossing attempts.
Of the 221,303 encountered, “28% involved individuals who had at least one prior encounter in the previous 12 months, compared to an average one-year re-encounter rate of 14% for fiscal years 2014-2019.”
A commentary by the Wall Street Journal editorial board noted that the end of Title 42 expulsions, which rejected 2 million migrants since March 2020, “is an invitation for migrants to keep coming for any reason.”
One proposed solution is to declare the southern border crisis an “invasion,” which would result in the ability to use state personnel to deport migrants but may open Texas law enforcement to federal scrutiny. Abbott is reportedly mulling the idea and Land Commissioner George P. Bush endorsed it, according to the Austin Journal.
Bush sought the Republican nomination for attorney general, losing to incumbent Ken Paxton.
During the campaign, he supported the idea of declaring the immigration influx at the southern border an invasion.
“President Joe Biden has abandoned the state of Texas, leaving our communities to suffer the crippling effects of a mass invasion perpetrated by known terrorists, drug cartels, and human smugglers,” Bush said. “The administration’s abject failure to act has created an unlimited criminal enterprise for these bad actors that seek nothing other than personal gain at the expense of everyday Texans.
"Texas has been left with no choice," he added. "We must assert our sovereignty and immediately declare an invasion of our state under the U.S. Constitution. Texas National Guard and DPS troopers are already deployed to the border yet are handcuffed by our current federal policies.”
The Center for Renewing America has favored the invasion declaration strategy, drawing attention to the human cost of loose border policies. In October, the Center for Renewing America issued a release noting the deadly cost of unauthorized entry into the country.
“There can be no disputing that the influx of well over 1.3 million illegal immigrants this calendar year alone and thousands of pounds of fentanyl and other deadly narcotics, facilitated by the widespread human trafficking efforts of violent international drug cartels, constitutes an invasion of the southern border of the United States,” it said.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton sued the Biden administration April 22 over the removal of Title 42 migrant expulsions.
“Without Title 42, hundreds of thousands more illegal aliens will flood Texas every month — even more than have been pouring over in the past year,” Paxton said in a release.
The intention is to freeze the order to allow expulsions to continue until a more permanent legal decision can be reached.
Cuccinelli has no doubt that securing the border will decrease human trafficking.
“Absolutely,” he said. “Just as higher numbers make it worse because it's so easy for the cartels, cracking down on illegal border crossings also reduces both human trafficking and drug trafficking. It’s the right thing to do.”
Cuccinelli served in the Virginia Senate from 2002-10, was Virginia's attorney general from 2010-14 and the Republican candidate for governor in 2013, losing to Democrat Terry McAuliffe.
Cuccinelli earned a bachelor’s of science degree in mechanical engineering from the University of Virginia, a law degree from George Mason University School of Law and a master of arts in international commerce and policy from George Mason University.