Immigration numbers that are already surpassing records at the border will become even worse if President Joe Biden pulls back on the use of Title 42 guidelines put in place under former President Donald Trump, Rep. Scott Fitzgerald, who visited the border in McAllen, Texas, last week, warned Monday on Newsmax.
"Law enforcement, especially in McAllen, is saying that if Title 42 is repealed, look out, because if you think the numbers are high right now ... the repeal of Title 42 is a huge concern," the Wisconsin Republican said on Newsmax's "Wake Up America."
Fitzgerald said he and other lawmakers arrived in McAllen last Wednesday and spent a full day on Thursday touring the border with Homeland Security and Border Patrol agents, and saw a "mass migration of individuals."
Further, the immigrants aren't remaining at the border, but they are "arriving at an intake center and being processed over a 24-hour period and then moved to either a secondary facility or they're being placed on a jet and they could be anywhere throughout the United States," said Fitzgerald. "It's very clear what's going on right now, and the repeal of Title 42 is a huge concern."
Title 42 expulsions are used by the government to remove people who have recently been in a country where a communicable disease was present and was enacted as policy in 2020 by the Trump administration to control entries at the U.S.-Mexico border.
Fitzgerald said the Border Patrol is concerned that Biden's plan to remove the use of Title 42 at the border will be a "bullhorn" to people in South America to head north to the United States, making the already constant stream of migrants even worse.
"The 600 people they're picking up in McAllen, that's going to double, triple," said Fitzgerald. "We were out there until late in the evening, and there were a lot of young children, young adults, that were on their own. Groups of 50, groups of 100, just coming across and then being in processed, and moved from there to other places. It's really out of control there."
In addition, the border wall is not being built, said Fitzgerald.
"We visited many different sections of the wall," he said. "What they're trying to do is control the flow and figure out exactly who is coming into the U.S., versus the idea that they're just stopping people. That's not happening."
The Border Patrol and Homeland Security are saying they are "much more concerned" about the flow of drugs into the country, Fitzgerald added.
"We have to figure out a way" to determine just who is coming across at this point, because it's a free-for-all right now," he said.
He also agreed that there is a double standard between what's going on at the border and with Cuba, with Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas saying that refugees fleeing the island nation should not try to enter the United States.
"Irony, I'm not sure what it is, but it's absolutely a double standard," said Fitzgerald, adding that local law enforcement told his group that there is "zero testing" of people that are being flown out of McAllen to other parts of the country.
"Nobody knows what these people are carrying," he said, noting the irony of asking kids to mask up in schools while allowing migrants who potentially are carrying COVID to enter the country.
"Certainly the Border Patrol doesn't have the capacity or the ability to do any of this testing," he said.
Fitzgerald also commented on reports that the Border Patrol is ordering more body bags to handle the numbers of people who are dying after entering the country.
"The intense summer heat that we're seeing, it's obvious that the Border Patrol and Homeland Security, with the environment we're in now and the amount of people, they're not able to keep up with processing these individuals," said Fitzgerald. "Groups are finding themselves (stranded) in the middle of nowhere."
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Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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