Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo slammed President Joe Biden for his lack of leadership on the chaos at the U.S.-Mexico border Sunday, claiming the White House has no interest in curbing the overflow of migrants illegally entering the country.
"This is malfeasance," Pompeo told syndicated host John Catsimatidis on WABC radio. The Biden administration has "no intention of closing this border to protect American sovereignty. ... Huge costs on the mayor of New York City [Eric Adams] ... [and] big cities across America. That's bad."
Pompeo, who will likely seek the Republican National Committee's presidential nomination next year, said the Biden administration has consistently shown indifference toward the southern border being overrun by migrants and cartels specializing in human and drug trafficking — particularly involving fentanyl.
"It's close to 4 million [migrants] in these first two years. Goodness gracious! My home state of Kansas is a little over 3 million people [in population]," said Pompeo.
"This is no way to take care of middle-class Americans who are struggling to figure out how to buy eggs and milk and put food on the table for the kids. To have that open border in the South is something [the Trump administration] demonstrated could be fixed. We've watched President Biden [act] with some level of malfeasance and clearly no intention of closing it," added Pompeo.
Regarding fentanyl, which is the No. 1 cause of death in American adults ages 18-45, Pompeo criticized the Biden White House for not confronting China or Mexico for the countries' respective roles in smuggling the lethal synthetic opioid across the U.S. border.
"We tried to fix this during [the Trump administration]. We weren't able to convince China to change its behavior. [But] we were able to stop this at our border to a significant degree. Their motivation is really very simple: They see demand in the United States.
"There are cartels prepared to buy this and transit it from China through Mexico into the United States. It is a for-profit enterprise," added Pompeo.
The Drug Enforcement Administration reportedly seized more than 50.6 million fentanyl-laced pills in 2022, along with 10,000 tons of fentanyl powder across the country.
In all, the agency has taken possession of more than 379 million fentanyl doses through the years — which would be enough to kill every American citizen, according to DEA Administrator Anne Milgram.
During the Catsimatidis interview, Pompeo also took aim at Vice President Kamala Harris for her recent claims of drug trafficking being tied to the "root causes" of immigration from Central and South American nations.
"[Republicans] know how to fix this. ... When you hear Vice President Harris, say, 'Well, we have to go to root causes,' that is just junk. We know how to address this. We simply need leadership that's prepared to do it," said Pompeo.
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