From the Abraham Lincoln Radio studio at the George Washington Broadcast that Armstrong, Armstrong and Jetty Show. In a statement on the situation in Del Rio this afternoon, Texas Governor Greg Abbott said, in part quote, the Biden administration is in complete disarray and is handling the border crisis as badly as the evacuation from Afghanistan. So it's not getting
near enough news coverage. But there are well that hasn't gotten near enough news coverage for years, or the last year, or the last six months, or the last month, or the last twenty four hours. We now have ten thousand immigrants under a bridge in the heat. Over half of them are from Haiti. It's a number one story if you're on Fox or The Washington Examiner. It barely gets covered at all if you're on other channels. Whenever we're on this topic, we often go to the Center for
Immigration Studies to talk to somebody. In this case, it's gonna be Todd Benzman, who's a senior National security fellow, to talk about what's going on with the border and the bridge and everything else. Todd, welcome, How are you, sir? I'm doing quite well. Thank you. I'm glad to be here. So how desperate is the situation at the border? Describe
it for us? We know we've been there. Yeah, I'm actually on the International Bridge right now in Del Rio and spent huh much of yesterday among the immigrants who are now crossing in very very significant numbers and establishing this unprecedented beachhead on the U. S side. There are ten thousand. Uh. It's started at two thousand in on Monday and by yesterday it was ten thousand, just to give you an idea of scale. And they are mostly Haitians.
There are some Cubans I met in there, and there's probably some Central Americans, but it looks like it's they're mostly not from Central America or Mexico. And they are crowding in because they are being given UH tickets to
process into the United States. So they're basically being waved through UH and they'll get legal permission to enter the United States probably forever, all of them, And that's why they're coming, because they're being allowed to come and and all being paroled into the United States within a matter of days. Normally in this case, UH, it won't be that quick because there are so many that they've overwhelmed
order patrol. There's not enough of them to process these people in, so there might be a two or three week wait. You know. One of thee confusing thing to me is Kamala Harris said don't come. So I don't understand why people are continuing to come because she said clearly don't come. But we share a many thousand mile border with Mexico. Understand how those people get here and then from Central America, you know, you can look at them happen. How are the people from Haiti getting to
the border. Well, most of these Haitians, I would say all of them actually are not from Haiti. They have been living for years and years in Chili and Brazil, whose government who have the strongest economies in Latin America, and whose governments gave them residency and work authorization, and so they've been living in secure, uh you know, South Hollow or Santiago for many years already and earning good
livings and no persecution or anything. But they saw that the border was open under Biden, and so all of those populations in Chile are now on their way here. That that's who these people are, That's why they're usually well dressed and have cell phones and all that and can afford the smuggling fees. Policy wise, what's different now than it was a year or two ago. Is it just word got out in Central America, South America or
are there policies specifically causing this. Yes, there are specific policies and they all hear about this on the on their Internet. The main thing was the elimination of wait in Mexico. That was a Trump policy that was highly
highly effective at deterring illegal entries. That meant that you would be pushed back into Mexico to make your asylum claim there, not inside the United States, because the game being that if you make your asylum claim inside the United States and lose, you're still inside the United States and you're not leaving. They're going to have to come hunt you down. And that never happened. So we're having to to lose your asylum claim while you were in Mexico was like not the point, you know, So they
stopped coming just for that. And then the other thing was, you know, deportations back to the to other countries to make their asylum claim in these other countries. Biden administration got rid of all of those and then decided to allow all families and unaccompanied miners to enter and win
parole inside the United States immediately. And so when the world heard that families were being allowed in, like these ones here at the bridge, Uh, they every family that could muster themselves and smuggling fees, we're coming because they were getting in. And that's why we've had hundreds and
hundreds upon hundreds of thousands of immigrants just being allowed in. Well, I'd like to remind listeners that a Harvard study showed that about two thirds of Americans preferred those Trump policies, about two thirds, and that was a couple of months ago, all, but it's higher now or certainly after this weekend. If you're you're, you're they're looking at the crowd. Is it mostly adults? Is that families and all men are what? What's the makeup of the ground. It seems to me
that it's mostly families. Uh, there's also a lot of single adults, but lots of children of all ages, you know, infants, Uh, lots of lots of children, lots of pregnant women and uh, you know, families, they're coming in because they you know, like I said, everybody knows that families get a free pass right into the United States. Don't pass go within
three or four days. Once they cross and turn themselves in, they get they get on a bus and they drive to portline or whatever and settle all over the country. That's just too powerful, uh and incentive or around the world Uh to resist. Nobody can resist that. It's like an open gate. Uh. And if you're a single adult, you you you're not going to get that. But but the border patrol is so busy processing in those people that you can just walk in and just run and
get in anyway and disappear. Because the other big policy that people forget about that Biden did immediately was he eliminated all deportation. There is no deportation in America. I don't think you are listening to me. Earlier the Vice President said, don't come, so it seems to me. And and tell me if you agree or disagree. I'm scanning the big papers even as we're chatting and h The
New York Times has this story fairly prominently. The Washington Post kind of medium, but the verbage being used in the journalism is surprisingly critical. Do you feel like there's a growing awareness of the disaster on the border. I don't really know. I mean my feeling. I know, the New York Times was here yesterday in the Washington Post, I saw those reporters. Uh. Normally, though I spent a lot of time on the border, I never see any
media anywhere. Ever. There's usually nobody down here. And and it's striking because the drama is intense. There are thousands and thousands of people just being waved right over the border, right up into the interior of the country, these families, and I mean, there's a lot of drama. I'm just
surprised that it's not a bigger story. This thing is attracting the New York Times in the Washington Post because it's really unusual that ten thousand people we in a makeshift settlement on the U. S. Side at one time. I don't think that's ever happened. I think that's the first time that anything of this proportion has developed on the U. S. Side of the border. And that is really going to be a problem that the Biden administration has to deal with. Remember they the administration put these
policies in place, is what caused this to happen. All of these people are here because as of those Biden policies, and they'll tell you that, yeah, that's a good that's a good place. That's a good place for us to end, Todd, great report, Todd Benzman, Senior National Security Fellow with the Center for Immigration Studies, and will probably be checking back it in with you because I don't think this story is going away. Yeah, well done, Todd, thanks a million,
all right, thank you. Yeah, And that was a good way to end. You gotta remember it's there are policy decisions that were made that caused this to be what it is. And I point out once again the Harvard study anyway, two thirds of Americans preferred Trump's policies. Right. You know, there's a misperception about the Haitians that I made myself. I assumed they were fleeing the recent national
disasters and and the assassination and the rest of it. No, they fled the earthquake, and as uh Todd mentioned, they've been living quite well in South America, but saw the door swing open. We're such a weird culture country right now. We're doing things. I just don't know if any country or empire has ever done, has any empire ever gotten just so kind of lazy and comfortable and taken care
of that millions of people are coming in. You're just like, yeah, I wish that wouldn't happen, but there's something good on TV and a right, I don't want to be a racist, and I'm kind of for the guy in the White House now, so I gotta pretend it's not happening. And and I think most I think there's just a lot of it is just we're just all so comfortable and everything's okay. I don't know, I'm sorry. What did you say.
I was watching TikTok videos on my phone, right, Uh, we gotta take a break, and uh, if you've got any comment on that, our text line nine five k f TC