Opalka said:

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Republicans were on the committee that helped write the bill. It was set to pass until Trump flexed his muscles and got republicans in line. Trump knew that if it passed, he'd lose that talking point in this election cycle. This isn't rocket science, it was in plain site, why Trump (and MAGA) wanted this bill to fail.

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Can you explain why new legislation was needed to secure the border?

Ag with kids said:

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Max Boredom said:

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Ag with kids said:

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Max Boredom said:

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Ag with kids said:

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Max Boredom said:

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Ag with kids said:

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Max Boredom said:

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Ag with kids said:

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What would change in the bill? For starters, everything Mike Lee stated. Just because you "responded" to every point of criticism doesn't mean you're correct. Your responses were perfect if your goal is to allow lots of people into the country.

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Ok, that's fine if you support Lee's ideas. Do you have any suggestions that would actually get past a divided Congress?

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Well, then you pull everything out that isn't bipartisan and pass THAT bill. Then start tackling the things that were taken out one by one and see if you could find some middle ground on them or if they just need to get tossed in the ****ter. That 5000 number? It's going there.

But, the Dems don't want to do that...because they don't REALLY want to reform immigration and prevent people from just coming in.

They had 3 years prior to that to do something and for all 3 years we were told there was NO PROBLEM. Then, when it appeared they could gain a political win by ****ing the Republicans (and the blue states started seeing what it was like to have **** tons of immigrants flowing in), they jumped right into FIXING THE PROBLEM (that didn't exist, remember).

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If not 5000, what do you think the number should be and why?

Keep in mind, this is the number of encounters per day before things get shut down. There is no guarantee that any of those 5000 are allowed into the country. All 5000 will get deported if they don't meet requirements to be here or seek asylum. It's what Lankford said:

Quote:

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"It's not that the first 5,000 [migrants encountered at the border] are released, that's ridiculous," Lankford said on the Senate floor. "The first 5,000 we detain, we screen and then we deport. If we get above 5,000, we just detain and deport."

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I'm assuming (don't know for sure and haven't found a link) that this number is based on what DHS says they can process at requested funding levels without getting overwhelmed. This seems like the right approach in general: let DHS screen and deport as many people as possible at the level we're willing to fund, and then shut it down.

Regarding the 3 year delay from Biden, I completely agree with you. They waited too long thinking things would settle down on their own. They should have gotten more involved way before political pressure ramped up.

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Zero. You don't codify an "acceptable" number if illegal entries into the country. They're illegal entries. Should we start codifying "acceptable" levels of other crimes, too? Say, 100 robberies is Ok, but 200 is where the enforcement starts?

And all 5000 (that's just one day, it's 1.8 million for a year) will be deported? How will you find them?

They deliberately removed everything Trump had done which had severely stemmed the flow and did it ONLY because Trump had put it in place. Why would it settle down? They basically opened the front door and had a "Come on in" sign at the border. Why WOULDN'T people keep coming?

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Ok, ok, I get what you're saying.

First, let's be on the same page, those first 5000 don't get a free pass. When those people run into border patrol, they're going to get screened and they're going to get sent back right away if they're not making an asylum claim. They aren't being released into the country. We don't have to go find people in that group of 5000, because they've already run into border patrol.

And you're right, we don't set an acceptable number of robberies. But we also don't block all customers from entering a store because we caught 1 shoplifter.

Regarding the acceptable number, let's keep in mind that we're trying to balance two different interests here.

Interest #1 is the original intent of our asylum system, to offer protection to people facing death and violence because of war and persecution. For example, hypothetically, how do we help people who are literally fleeing for their lives when the cartels overthrow the Mexican government? Those are the people asylum is designed for and we offer help because a) it's the moral and humane thing to do and b) because we would want others to do the same for us.

While Mexico isn't in the midst of a civil war right now, our asylum policy needs to exhibit the foresight to look into the future and see this as a realistic scenario. Asylum was born from the absolute worst atrocities of the 20th century and we will be failing future generations if we don't empower them to respond to similar catastrophes.

Interest #2 is protecting the American people and our resources. We have to be able to screen people coming in and we can't write a blank check to every person who puts their hand out.

Our asylum system is absolutely being abused. The majority of people requesting asylum at our southern border are coming here for economic reasons (better jobs) and don't have a valid asylum claim. But we can't just throw the baby out with the bath water. We need to find ways to honor the original intent of asylum while still protecting our American interests.

If you're entrenched in your position that we should block asylum claims if we have more than 0 illegal entrants, then it's clear we have different opinions on what America should aspire towards as the shining city on a hill. We'll have to agree to disagree.

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Customers don't tend to come through the windows and back door.

Asylum should be RARE.

Look, reality is, every single country south of the US sucks to some level. Some have bad crime. But, we can't just let them all in. And very VERY few of of those people have asylum claims that meet the true qualification. The cartels are all over Mexico. Do ALL of them get to come in because it's ****ty there?

And, we HAVE a way to come into the country and claim asylum. Come to a port of entry. Wait in line. When it's your turn, they can evaluate it. If you don't meet the criteria, tough ****, go away.

EVERY SINGLE PERSON that crosses not at a port of entry needs to get the **** out and go get in line AT the port of entry. We'll get to you some time or the other.

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You and I generally agree on the situation. Asylum should be exceedingly rare. People are definitely trying to take advantage of the asylum process. You'll get no argument from me there.

I hear what you're saying about ports of entry. I honestly wrestled with that a bit, but here's the rationale I settled on:

• If your house is on fire and you call 911, we don't check if you're current on your property taxes before sending a truck
• If your head is smashed in a car accident and you're rushed to the ER, we don't run your insurance before trying to save your life

We respond that way because those are emergency situations. Likewise, our asylum process was meant to deal with emergency situations (the next Rwanda, the next Holocaust, etc.). We should do everything in our power to keep those avenues open for when people really need it. I think we can find ways to do that and also effectively filter out and deter the economic migrants.

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There's not an emergency south of us. It just sucks to live there because they have ****ty governments that are corrupt.

There are almost ZERO true cases that deserve asylum that come through our southern border. "My country sucks" is not a legimate reason.

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Yeah, I'm agreeing with you. There's not an emergency south of us right now. But our asylum process should be designed thinking ahead to when there eventually is an emergency.

The number I've heard is ~15% of applicants have legit asylum claims and only a portion of those will be granted asylum. I took a quick look at FY23 numbers which showed a few thousand people granted asylum from Mexico, El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras. That doesn't correlate 1:1 with the southern border, but it gives a sense of scale.

Slicer97 said:

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Opalka said:

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Republicans were on the committee that helped write the bill. It was set to pass until Trump flexed his muscles and got republicans in line. Trump knew that if it passed, he'd lose that talking point in this election cycle. This isn't rocket science, it was in plain site, why Trump (and MAGA) wanted this bill to fail.

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Can you explain why new legislation was needed to secure the border?

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There's two main reasons legislation is necessary. I posted a lot of this earlier in the thread, so apologies for the repeat.

First, Trump's policies were effective at the time but Trump didn't fix the underlying structural issues with our immigration system. He didn't modernize our asylum process (which was never meant to handle these volumes at the border, and is being abused) and he didn't do anything to improve the process for legal immigration.

Second, many of Trump's actions were struck down by the courts or facing legal challenges. I put this in another thread, but these are some of major policy changes under Trump that were struck down:

Quote:

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Quote:

• 2017 - ICE ended the Family Case Management Program and rolled out a policy of prolonged and indefinite detention of asylum seekers; Blocked by a federal court in 2018 in Damus v. McAleenan
• 2018 - Jeff Sessions announced a "zero-tolerance" policy to criminally prosecute asylum seekers, triggering widespread family separation. Federal judge ruled against this practice in Ms. L v Ice; Civil lawsuits are still ongoing for civil rights violations
• 2018 - Jeff Sessions introduced policies to block asylum seekers suffering from domestic and gang violence; Federal judge blocked this in Dec 2018 in Grace v. Whitaker
• 2018 - CBP implemented "turn back" / metering policy to turn away asylum seekers and force them to wait weeks or months before applying; Federal judge found this illegal in Al Otro Lado v. Nielsen
• 2018 - Trump admin barred migrants crossing outside ports of entry from asylum eligibility; Multiple lawsuits found this illegal, including at the appeals court level (for example East Bay Sanctuary Covenant v. Trump)
• 2019 - MPP (Remain in Mexico) - In April 2019 a federal district court in California granted a preliminary injunction, which would have temporarily halted the policy. The Ninth Circuit initially stayed the injunction allowing MPP to remain in effect but restored it in February 2020, ruling unequivocally that MPP violates both U.S. and international law. The government then appealed to the Supreme Court, which put the injunction on hold as it considered the case, leaving the policy in place until the Biden administration terminated it. Following the termination, the Supreme Court sent the case back to the district court, which vacated the injunction as moot. The labor union representing asylum officers filed an amicus brief with the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals asking the court to strike down MPP as a directive that was "fundamentally contrary to the moral fabric of our nation and our international and domestic legal obligations."
• 2019 - USCIS issued a memo to take away protections from unaccompanied minors during the asylum process; Blocked by a federal judge with a restraining order in August 2019 (J.O.P. v. U.S. Department of Homeland Security), settlement discussions are ongoing

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We can look specifically at restricting asylum to ports of entry since Ags With Kids and I were debating this:
- Trump blocked asylum outside ports of entry in 2018 (see above)
- ACLU sues, court rules Trump's action is illegal
- Biden asks Congress for explicit authority to block asylum under some conditions
- The Senate border bill includes this authority but gets shot down
- After the bill died, Biden blocks asylum outside ports of entry (similar action to Trump with a few tweaks)
- ACLU plans to sue again and there's a really good chance Biden's change gets blocked

So we need new laws, there has to be a change coming from Congress on this.

Max Boredom said:

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Slicer97 said:

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Opalka said:

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Republicans were on the committee that helped write the bill. It was set to pass until Trump flexed his muscles and got republicans in line. Trump knew that if it passed, he'd lose that talking point in this election cycle. This isn't rocket science, it was in plain site, why Trump (and MAGA) wanted this bill to fail.

---

Can you explain why new legislation was needed to secure the border?

---

There's two main reasons legislation is necessary. I posted a lot of this earlier in the thread, so apologies for the repeat.

First, Trump's policies were effective at the time but Trump didn't fix the underlying structural issues with our immigration system. He didn't modernize our asylum process (which was never meant to handle these volumes at the border, and is being abused) and he didn't do anything to improve the process for legal immigration.

Second, many of Trump's actions were struck down by the courts or facing legal challenges. I put this in another thread, but these are some of major policy changes under Trump that were struck down:

Quote:

---

Quote:

• 2017 - ICE ended the Family Case Management Program and rolled out a policy of prolonged and indefinite detention of asylum seekers; Blocked by a federal court in 2018 in Damus v. McAleenan
• 2018 - Jeff Sessions announced a "zero-tolerance" policy to criminally prosecute asylum seekers, triggering widespread family separation. Federal judge ruled against this practice in Ms. L v Ice; Civil lawsuits are still ongoing for civil rights violations
• 2018 - Jeff Sessions introduced policies to block asylum seekers suffering from domestic and gang violence; Federal judge blocked this in Dec 2018 in Grace v. Whitaker
• 2018 - CBP implemented "turn back" / metering policy to turn away asylum seekers and force them to wait weeks or months before applying; Federal judge found this illegal in Al Otro Lado v. Nielsen
• 2018 - Trump admin barred migrants crossing outside ports of entry from asylum eligibility; Multiple lawsuits found this illegal, including at the appeals court level (for example East Bay Sanctuary Covenant v. Trump)
• 2019 - MPP (Remain in Mexico) - In April 2019 a federal district court in California granted a preliminary injunction, which would have temporarily halted the policy. The Ninth Circuit initially stayed the injunction allowing MPP to remain in effect but restored it in February 2020, ruling unequivocally that MPP violates both U.S. and international law. The government then appealed to the Supreme Court, which put the injunction on hold as it considered the case, leaving the policy in place until the Biden administration terminated it. Following the termination, the Supreme Court sent the case back to the district court, which vacated the injunction as moot. The labor union representing asylum officers filed an amicus brief with the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals asking the court to strike down MPP as a directive that was "fundamentally contrary to the moral fabric of our nation and our international and domestic legal obligations."
• 2019 - USCIS issued a memo to take away protections from unaccompanied minors during the asylum process; Blocked by a federal judge with a restraining order in August 2019 (J.O.P. v. U.S. Department of Homeland Security), settlement discussions are ongoing

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We can look specifically at restricting asylum to ports of entry since Ags With Kids and I were debating this:
- Trump blocked asylum outside ports of entry in 2018 (see above)
- ACLU sues, court rules Trump's action is illegal
- Biden asks Congress for explicit authority to block asylum under some conditions
- The Senate border bill includes this authority but gets shot down
- After the bill died, Biden blocks asylum outside ports of entry (similar action to Trump with a few tweaks)
- ACLU plans to sue again and there's a really good chance Biden's change gets blocked

So we need new laws, there has to be a change coming from Congress on this.

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How about we have consistent enforcement rather than engaging in political games that screw over and kill Americans? You are part of the problem.

Way back when the Dems got Reagan to agree to a "compromise"-
many rightly predicted that over time it would end being mostly the Dem favored parts that would actually be instituted and, as Max said above, the Republican parts held up by the courts, or outright disobeyed.
Modern GOP does not trust the Democratic Party enough to want to deal with them.

Max Boredom said:

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BusterAg said:

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Before I deep dive into this one, are you talking about humanitarian parole like what was used to bring in Afghans? Or something else? As far as I know, not even the House bill proposed shifting this to the judicial branch.

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You were asking me for common sense protections. This is one of them. Shift the decision to provide humanitarian parole to the courts.

Another thing that would be helpful is to codify that people that are here under humanitarian parole are not fully subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, and all children born in the U.S. to parents who are here on humanitarian parole are not birthright citizens.

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Gotcha, thanks for confirming.

I think it makes sense to update the laws to put guardrails around parole. There are terms today ("urgent humanitarian reason" and "significant public benefit") that could probably use definitions in the law. The language proposed by Republicans in the House is more restrictive than what I'd use, but that's probably something that could be compromised on.

As far as moving authority to the judicial branch, I don't think I'm sold on that. There's a legit national security concern connected to humanitarian parole. It's been used going back 70+ years to allow in Hungarians escaping the Soviets, Cubans escaping Castro and recently Afghans escaping the Taliban. There were undoubtedly people in those groups who were helping the US in some way, maybe even some we were promised asylum for their help. That's really the kind of thing I'd want the executive branch to have flexibility over. Maybe there is a compromise in there with more judicial oversight for parolees?

The other thing with parole is that it's heavily connected to the backlog at the southern border. If we can fix the asylum process, beef up CBP/immigration judges, etc, the parole situation probably fixes itself to a large extent.

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Most of the paroles in the last several years have been illegal. The law states that the Secretary can grant them case by case. Not that the Secretary can give a blanket parole amnesty.

The gaslighting effort is pretty ridiculous after their team:

1) campaigned on not building a wall and "paths to amnesty" for all (obviously sending an open invitation as the caravans started after Election Day and were here by inauguration),

2) then ending remain in Mexico and the infectious disease title and fighting/suing border states like Texas for trying to add deterrence at the border as they let over 10 million migrants from over 180 different countries in three years to waltz on in here unfettered,

To now blame republicans for not signing a **** bill three years in.


Instead of trying to defend that ****ty bill that was three years too late, how about one of the +81 million explain why they voted for the open border? You got what you wanted. Explain why you wanted this. Why do we need this and why is it good for us?

Max Boredom said:

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Slicer97 said:

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Opalka said:

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Republicans were on the committee that helped write the bill. It was set to pass until Trump flexed his muscles and got republicans in line. Trump knew that if it passed, he'd lose that talking point in this election cycle. This isn't rocket science, it was in plain site, why Trump (and MAGA) wanted this bill to fail.

---

Can you explain why new legislation was needed to secure the border?

---

There's two main reasons legislation is necessary. I posted a lot of this earlier in the thread, so apologies for the repeat.

First, Trump's policies were effective at the time but Trump didn't fix the underlying structural issues with our immigration system. He didn't modernize our asylum process (which was never meant to handle these volumes at the border, and is being abused) and he didn't do anything to improve the process for legal immigration.

Second, many of Trump's actions were struck down by the courts or facing legal challenges. I put this in another thread, but these are some of major policy changes under Trump that were struck down:

Quote:

---

Quote:

• 2017 - ICE ended the Family Case Management Program and rolled out a policy of prolonged and indefinite detention of asylum seekers; Blocked by a federal court in 2018 in Damus v. McAleenan
• 2018 - Jeff Sessions announced a "zero-tolerance" policy to criminally prosecute asylum seekers, triggering widespread family separation. Federal judge ruled against this practice in Ms. L v Ice; Civil lawsuits are still ongoing for civil rights violations
• 2018 - Jeff Sessions introduced policies to block asylum seekers suffering from domestic and gang violence; Federal judge blocked this in Dec 2018 in Grace v. Whitaker
• 2018 - CBP implemented "turn back" / metering policy to turn away asylum seekers and force them to wait weeks or months before applying; Federal judge found this illegal in Al Otro Lado v. Nielsen
• 2018 - Trump admin barred migrants crossing outside ports of entry from asylum eligibility; Multiple lawsuits found this illegal, including at the appeals court level (for example East Bay Sanctuary Covenant v. Trump)
• 2019 - MPP (Remain in Mexico) - In April 2019 a federal district court in California granted a preliminary injunction, which would have temporarily halted the policy. The Ninth Circuit initially stayed the injunction allowing MPP to remain in effect but restored it in February 2020, ruling unequivocally that MPP violates both U.S. and international law. The government then appealed to the Supreme Court, which put the injunction on hold as it considered the case, leaving the policy in place until the Biden administration terminated it. Following the termination, the Supreme Court sent the case back to the district court, which vacated the injunction as moot. The labor union representing asylum officers filed an amicus brief with the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals asking the court to strike down MPP as a directive that was "fundamentally contrary to the moral fabric of our nation and our international and domestic legal obligations."
• 2019 - USCIS issued a memo to take away protections from unaccompanied minors during the asylum process; Blocked by a federal judge with a restraining order in August 2019 (J.O.P. v. U.S. Department of Homeland Security), settlement discussions are ongoing

---

We can look specifically at restricting asylum to ports of entry since Ags With Kids and I were debating this:
- Trump blocked asylum outside ports of entry in 2018 (see above)
- ACLU sues, court rules Trump's action is illegal
- Biden asks Congress for explicit authority to block asylum under some conditions
- The Senate border bill includes this authority but gets shot down
- After the bill died, Biden blocks asylum outside ports of entry (similar action to Trump with a few tweaks)
- ACLU plans to sue again and there's a really good chance Biden's change gets blocked

So we need new laws, there has to be a change coming from Congress on this.

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The law requires anyone requesting asylum to either be at a port of entry or in the country.

Quote:

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Under 8 U.S.C. Sec. 1325, it is a crime for any noncitizen to enter (or even to "attempt" to enter) the United States anywhere other than a designated entry point, or "port of entry" or "POE." Therefore, in order for asylum seekers to avoid exposure to criminal prosecution for illegal entry to the United States, they must seek asylum at a port of entry along the border. While many asylum seekers follow the proper procedure by applying for asylum at a por

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Quote:

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The other thing with parole is that it's heavily connected to the backlog at the southern border. If we can fix the asylum process, beef up CBP/immigration judges, etc, the parole situation probably fixes itself to a large extent.

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More likely to get Trump to give a four hour speech without ever using the first person.

Biden / Harris doesn't want to FIX the asylum problem, they want to make it permanent. This bill would have done that.