Biden and Mayorkas' Open Border: Advancing Cartel Crime in America

U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Homeland Security

By Jessica M. Vaughan on July 19, 2023

Thank you, Mr. Green and Mr. Thompson, for the opportunity to testify today. The mass migration crisis instigated by the Biden administration’s misguided immigration policies has caused incalculable harm to American communities, to the integrity of our immigration system, and, tragically, to many of the migrants themselves. While there are a number of beneficiaries of these policies, including employers seeking cheap, exploitable workers; NGOs who are awarded huge contracts to provide services to migrants; and politicians who welcome the addition of non-citizen constituents to their districts, to name a few, the biggest winners under the Biden-Mayorkas policies are the criminal cartels and other transnational criminal organizations who are reaping profits on a nearly unimaginable scale. Drug trafficking is big business, and we’ve witnessed an alarming spike in the most dangerous drugs like fentanyl, but reportedly in recent years the cartels actually have been making more money from human smuggling and trafficking than from drugs. The fiscal and human cost is serious and enormous. Congress should take certain steps to combat the cartels specifically, but the most effective action would be to address the main cause of the problem – the array of policies, unauthorized entry programs, and legal loopholes that generate the most profitable customers for the cartels – illegal migrants.

Read the full testimony.