Former President Donald Trump's visit to the Rio Grande Valley in Texas was a "trip of substance" that was made not to address political optics or get photo ops, like the visit Vice President Kamala Harris made last week, former acting Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Mark Morgan, who participated in the visit, told Newsmax Thursday.
"I think it's important where they actually went," Morgan, also a Newsmax contributor, said on "Wake Up America." "Unlike the vice president, they actually left air-conditioned space and they actually went to the epicenter of the crisis."
Harris came under fire for not only announcing last Friday's trip just days after Trump announced his upcoming visit but for visiting El Paso, which is not seen as the epicenter of the immigration crisis.
"Make no mistake, all nine sectors along the southwest border are busy," Morgan said. "We have the worst crisis we've seen in 20 years; 180,000 apprehensions in a single month."
But to truly understand the "true magnitude" of any crisis, one must go to its epicenter, and in this case, that is the Rio Grande Valley, he added.
"They went to the actual physical border," said Morgan, noting that Trump and Texas Gov. Greg Abbott also talked about specific actions that Texas plans to secure the border, "unlike this current administration is doing. It was a great day."
Meanwhile, the Biden administration is planning to lift the Trump administration's use of Title 42, which allowed migrants to be stopped at the border because of the spread of COVID-19, and Morgan said he doesn't think that move will be stopped with the growing rise of the disease's Delta variant.
"Any individual that illegally enters our country, even if they say hey, by the way, I have COVID, I have a test that says I have COVID, they're going to say it's 'not a problem. Come on in,'" said Morgan. "This administration continues to put America last, the rest of the world first, and that's why Gov. Abbott is stepping up to uphold this oath to secure the borders Texas and that helps the entire country because we know what happens to the border doesn't stay at the border."
Meanwhile, the visit demonstrated a "physical manifestation" of what was done under the Trump administration about immigration compared to what Biden is doing.
"It's not just about illegal immigration," said Morgan, because when borders are open, that brings in "every crisis" including increased imports of illegal drugs, human trafficking, increased gang activity, and more criminals coming in.
Morgan also pointed out that the Border Patrol has conducted more than 7,000 rescues in recent months.
"We had a sheriff yesterday at the roundtable, speak to the president and the governor," said Morgan. "He talked about how his deputies this fiscal year have found over 40 dead bodies of immigrants trying to illegally enter the country. That's just one I'm sure along the 2000 miles. We're just now getting into the peak season of heat and we're going to see more dead bodies. Look we don't talk about this enough, but the worst and most inhumane thing that we could do is have open border policies for the immigrants themselves."
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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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