Nearly three years in, and the unprecedented crisis at the southern
border
is not slowing down. In fact, encounters at the border increased every month from June to September. There were
269,735 encounters
at the border this September, an 86% increase from June 2023, according to Customs and Border Protection. The chaos represents a major national security threat, a humanitarian crisis, and a public safety nightmare.
As a
new report
released this week by the House Committee on Homeland Security makes clear, the financial cost of the Biden administration’s open-borders policies is also becoming unbearable for families and is stretching local and state budgets to the breaking point.
BIDEN-XI MEETING: TRUMP REMATCH ANXIETY HAMPERS ECONOMIC COMPETITION WITH CHINA
And there is no doubt about it: The policies of Homeland Security Secretary
Alejandro Mayorkas
are to blame.
Under Mayorkas’s leadership, DHS has paroled or released nearly 3 million people into the country, while another
1.7 million known gotaways
have entered without apprehension. That’s nearly 5 million people, at least, now at large in communities, overwhelming local officials and placing massive strains on limited resources.
Look no further than New York City to see the devastating, comprehensive costs of this crisis. In August, the city was spending nearly
$10 million per day
to provide shelter and services to illegal aliens. New York City Mayor Eric Adams
estimated
the total cost of paying for illegal aliens arriving in the city would exceed $12 billion by 2025. And,
according
to local authorities, the 5%, across-the-board agency budget cuts Adams proposed to defray these costs could wipe out overtime pay for first responders, taking police and firefighters off the streets.
Testifying before my committee in September, New York City Council Minority Leader Joseph Borelli
laid the blame
squarely in one place: “It’s only been since Secretary Mayorkas has taken over where we have had this level of unprecedented migration to our cities from people who are relying on the city taxpayer.”
Borelli is right: The Biden administration is orchestrating this crisis.
Consider just the burdens placed on healthcare providers across the country. In New York City, hospitals have recorded nearly
30,000 visits from illegal aliens
arriving in the city in the past year alone, along with around 300 births. Gregory Bovino, chief patrol agent for the Border Patrol’s El Centro Sector, told our committee during a transcribed interview in July that hospital administrators in his sector are “concerned about … the costs associated with illegal immigration.” Jonathan Lines, a county supervisor in Yuma, Arizona, also
testified
to our committee in September that Yuma Regional Medical Center, the only major hospital facility in the region, has been “overrun” by illegal aliens seeking free care, even overwhelming the maternity ward.
It is little wonder, then, that total Medicaid costs for “emergency services for undocumented aliens” in fiscal 2021 and 2022 exceeded $12 billion,
according
to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
How about education? One
study
recently estimated that New York City could spend around $440 million next year to provide services to migrant students in the city’s public education system. These students often cost more to educate because they lack proficiency in English. According to the latest
school budget
for Fairfax County, Virginia, the average additional cost to educate students for whom English is not their primary language is around $4,600. One New York teacher
told
the press last year, “We’re overwhelmed. We’ve all got migrant students in our classrooms. The teachers don’t speak Spanish. There’s no resources helping us out right now.”
Meanwhile, law enforcement — particularly at the southern border, where budgets are even tighter — is assuming all manner of increased costs. In
one Texas county
, government employees recently took a pay cut to cover the costs of burying and cremating illegal aliens found dead in their jurisdiction. Sheriff Emmett Shelton of McMullen County, Texas, home to approximately 600 residents, provided documents to my committee this summer showing that his department spends roughly half a million dollars on illegal immigration response annually. In Cochise County, Arizona, “border-related booking costs” in 2022
totaled
$4.3 million.
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And these are just the costs policymakers can document. Many others are almost incalculable, though some have done their best. According to one May 2023
report
, the total cost of providing shelter and services just to the known gotaways and illegal aliens released under Mayorkas’s policies may exceed $450 billion annually.
One thing is abundantly evident:
Mayorkas
and this administration are not serious about border security. While the testimonies of the men and women who have appeared before this committee have demonstrated
the immense human cost of the border crisis
, our latest report demonstrates the consequences also constitute a debilitating financial bill that is now coming due for the smallest border town all the way to the Big Apple.
Mark Green is a U.S. representative for Tennessee, a physician, and a combat veteran of Afghanistan and Iraq, where he served three tours. He serves as chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee and on the House Armed Services and Foreign Affairs Committees.
