Politics
Kamala’s turn: Biden’s border czar resigns soon after comments on ‘pay to stay’ scheme amid record surge of migrants
While repeating the Biden administration talking points about how all of this is normal, seasonal and due to natural disasters and poverty, the CBP also revealed that they “encountered over 172,000 persons attempting entry along the SW border” just in March, a 71% increase from February 2021.
Roberta Jacobson, a former US ambassador to Mexico who advised President Joe Biden on the southern border situation, has resigned on the same day as the media quoted her about paying Central American migrants to stay put.
Jacobson “will retire from her role” at the end of April, National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan announced on Friday, explaining that she made a commitment to serve in the Biden administration’s first 100 days, and “underscored” their “commitment to re-energizing the US immigration system.”
Sullivan explained that Vice President Kamala Harris will take over the “whole-of-government approach” towards the border situation, implying that Jacobson’s duties as the “special assistant to the president and coordinator for the southwest border at the National Security Council” have become redundant.
Earlier on Friday, however, Jacobson had given a round of media interviews, revealing to Reuters that the White House was considering cash payments to residents of Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador to address “both the economic reasons people may be migrating, as well as the protection and security reasons.”
She couldn’t say how that would work, but said the US government “isn’t going to be handing out money or checks to people.”
In a short interview with the New York Times, Jacobson said the appointment of Harris “didn’t have anything to do with my decision” to resign and said “nobody could be more delighted” to see the VP take on the job.
Biden and Harris are seeking “an immigration system that is humane, orderly and safe,” she told the NYT, adding, “I leave optimistically. The policy direction is so clearly right for our country.”
Harris has yet to visit the border, however. On Thursday, the Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) shared a graph showing a surge of illegal crossings starting in January 2021 – when the Biden administration took office.
While repeating the Biden administration talking points about how all of this is normal, seasonal and due to natural disasters and poverty, the CBP also revealed that they “encountered over 172,000 persons attempting entry along the SW border” just in March, a 71% increase from February 2021.
Among them were 19,000 unaccompanied minors, the highest number in recent history, straining the capacity of both the CBP and other federal agencies such as the Health and Human Services (HHS) to accommodate them. The White House has solicited a thousand volunteers from across the federal agencies – including NASA – for a four-month detail to help care for the migrants.
In his first – and so far only – press conference as president, Biden insisted the migrants weren’t coming because he was “a nice guy” but due to social, political and economic pressure of which the US must address the “root causes.”
This was after Jacobson had told the White House press corps that the surge might be due to a “pent up demand” created by the Trump administration’s strict enforcement and that a “more humane policy” of Biden and Harris may be driving more people to make the “decision” to cross.
Jacobson was appointed by President Barack Obama as the US ambassador to Mexico in 2016, and resigned in May 2018 amid an impasse in US-Mexican relations. Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto had just canceled a planned visit to the US after a frosty phone call with his US counterpart Donald Trump, concerning the proposed wall on the border.
Democrats have denounced Trump’s wall as “immoral, xenophobic and racist” and Biden ordered its construction to be halted within days of taking office, but his administration is now reportedly considering filling in the “gaps” that are apparently inviting illegal crossings.
Politics
Biden Wants To Give Separated Illegal Immigrants $450,000 Per Person
The average amount sought through the courts is roughly $3.4 million per family, according to the report.
The Biden administration is mulling a plan to offer immigrant families separated during the Trump administration $450,000 per person in compensation, according to the Wall Street Journal, citing people familiar with the matter.
The payments – part of an inter-agency solution to several lawsuits filed on behalf of separated parents and children claiming lasting psychological trauma could amount to nearly $1 million per family, though ‘the final numbers could shift,’ according to the report.
According to sources, most of the families crossing into the US from Mexico included one parent and one child. Depending on circumstances, many families could get smaller payouts.
The American Civil Liberties Union, which represents families in one of the lawsuits, has identified about 5,500 children separated at the border over the course of the Trump administration, citing figures provided to it by the government. The number of families eligible under the potential settlement is expected to be smaller, the people said, as government officials aren’t sure how many will come forward. Around 940 claims have so far been filed by the families, the people said. -WSJ
In total, the potential payout could reach $1 billion or more.
Throughout the Trump administration, thousands of children were separated from their parents (and coyotes paid to bring them into the country) after they had crossed illegally into the country from Mexico. The lawsuits allege some of the children suffered various ailments – including malnutrition, heat exhaustion, and were kept in freezing cold rooms with little medical attention. Some claim lasting mental health problems due to the trauma of being without their parents for several months.
The average amount sought through the courts is roughly $3.4 million per family, according to the report.
“President Biden has agreed that the family separation policy is a historic moral stain on our nation that must be fully remedied,” said ACLU deputy director, Lee Gelernt. “That remedy must include not only meaningful monetary compensation, but a pathway to remain in the country.”
Senate Republicans slammed the plan on Thursday afternoon following the WSJ‘s report.
“The Biden administration’s promises of citizenship and entitlement programs have already caused the worst border crisis in history—a huge cash reward will make it even worse,” said Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR).
The discussions about the payouts have taken place over the past few months among a group of dozens of private lawyers representing the families and government lawyers. Some government lawyers have viewed the payouts as excessive for people who had violated the law by crossing the border, the people said. One government lawyer threatened to remove his name from the case out of disagreement with the potential settlement offer, the people said. -WSJ
“It is a complicated, complex piece of litigation” – trying to resolve hundreds of separate lawsuits at the same time, and “sometimes even more complex to try the cases” said Margo Schlanger, who ran the civil-rights office during the Obama administration at the Department of Homeland Security and now teaches at the University of Michigan law school.
What will the reparations crowd think of this?
Politics
White House To America: ‘We’re Coming Door To Door…With Shots!’
Will CDC soon recommend a nation-wide re-count of Covid deaths?
White House spokesperson Jen Psaki said at the daily press conference yesterday that President Biden’s strategy to get everyone a Covid shot – whether they want it or not – is to start going “door-to-door” to those not yet jabbed. So…they have a list? Also today: bomb-maker Raytheon goes “woke.” Capitol Hill Cops set up shop in California. Will CDC soon recommend a nation-wide re-count of Covid deaths?
Politics
Half A Million Illegals Crossed Since Harris Named Border ‘Czar’
By the time June’s figures are reported in the coming days, the combined number is expected to be over half a million, more than the entire population of Miami, Florida or Cleveland, Ohio.
According to U.S. Customs and Border Protection figures, around 500,000 illegal immigrants have crossed the southern border since Kamala Harris was named border ‘czar’.
The Washington Free Beacon reported the findings, noting that only three months has passed since Harris took on the responsibility, and that the half a million figure is just those that have been apprehended.
The CBP says around 180,000 immigrants are being caught per month. In April agents arrested 178,854 illegal immigrants, the highest monthly figure for 21 years. That figure was then surpassed in May as agents apprehended 180,034 illegals.
By the time June’s figures are reported in the coming days, the combined number is expected to be over half a million, more than the entire population of Miami, Florida or Cleveland, Ohio.
Harris only bothered to visit the border when President Trump announced he was making a trip. Even then Harris visited El Paso, some 1000 miles away from where the crisis is taking place.
Previous to this, Harris lied and claimed she had been to the border, telling NBC’s Lester Holt “This whole thing about the border. We’ve been to the border. We’ve been to the border.”
When Holt pushed back and said she had not, Harris snapped “I—and I haven’t been to Europe. And I mean, I don’t—I don’t understand the point that you’re making,” then again laughed maniacally:
On Tuesday, Republican Senator Ron Johnson argued that Harris’ trip to El Paso was designed to distract the media and keep them away from the real crisis hit areas of the border.
“They took her to a point in the border where she wouldn’t see the crisis and so the press wouldn’t report on the crisis,” Johnson said.
The Senator added, “You just simply can’t understand what this administration is doing. We literally are apprehending now about 6,000 people per day. That’s I mean, that’s a large caravan every day being processed, some of them being returned, others are being dispersed. But this crisis is not going away. It’s just under everybody’s radar because the press isn’t covering it.”


