Biden's FY23 Budget: Border Crisis
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Last month, President Biden released his fiscal year (FY) 2023 budget, which deliberately doubles down on the failed policies that created the worst border crisis in over 20 years. The President’s budget makes cuts to critical agencies responsible for securing the border, even as the Administration prepares to end the Title 42 border policy, which will result in more than double the current number of illegal border crossings per day – projected to reach 18,000.“President Biden’s budget puts cartels and human traffickers first, not the American people. The cartels are currently making $32 million per day, roughly $1 billion in profit each month, from human smuggling across our southern border. Meanwhile, the President is proposing to cut Immigration and Customs Enforcement by $150 million next year. With the hypocritical repeal of Title 42, cartel profits will skyrocket. The President is not only turning a blind eye to the border for the second year in a row, he is deliberately making matters worse – even continuing to illegally withhold and divert to other purposes the $1.9 billion in tax dollars that Congress passed to build the border wall. It’s clear from this budget that President Biden has no interest in securing our southern border. The American people will continue to suffer because of the President’s inaction and indifference on the border crisis he created,” said House Budget Committee Republican Leader Jason Smith (MO-08).
Biden’s Border Crisis
- Over 2.9 million border encounters since Joe Biden became president, which is a 426% increase over the previous year
- 976,000 pounds of narcotics - including 12,200 pounds of fentanyl - have been seized by border patrol over the last year, enough to kill every American man, woman, and child six times over
- $6 million being paid each day to Department of Defense contractors to not build the wall
- $350 million of already-purchased, border wall steel continues to rust at the southern border
- $2 billion diverted from COVID-19 testing, vaccines, and therapeutics as well as the Strategic National Stockpile to house illegal immigrants.
- Taxpayer dollars used to fly illegal immigrants from the southern border into the interior of the United States
- $600 million cut to the Department of Homeland Security, when removing $3 billion in unnecessary climate funding
- $150 million cut to Immigration and Border Enforcement
- $4 billion reward to Central American countries flooding U.S. with illegal immigrants
- Fails to enforce the successful “Remain in Mexico” policies despite a court order
- Continues catch-and-release
- Zero accounting for taxpayer dollars spent on flights to transport illegal immigrants from the border to other parts of the country
- During a hearing before the House Budget Committee, the Biden Administration admitted they are using the $1.9 billion Congress gave for border wall construction to instead fund “environmental restoration” and “community consultation"
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