Governors Push Back on Illegal Immigration

January was the first time in ten months that encounters at the southern border were under 200K. Some in the Biden administration and media were quick to declare the border crisis over.  As pointed out by Fox News though, border numbers in January 2023 were still slightly higher than border numbers from January 2022.

The Biden administration’s “solution” seems to be to let even more people into the country. On top of that, the immigration enforcement order Title 42 still hangs in the balance. With our federal government seemingly asleep at the wheel as the border crisis rages on, some governors have taken immigration enforcement into their own hands.

Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida recently came out with two initiatives to combat illegal immigration in the state. Mirroring a move in Congress, DeSantis has come out in favor of a statewide E-Verify policy for Florida. As mentioned in a piece for National Review, if successful this move could have national implications and make immigration a front and center political issue.

DeSantis is also making a push to eliminate out-of-state tuition vouchers to Dreamers. These vouchers are currently available to illegal aliens brought into the country by their parents and who attended a Florida high school for three years or more.

As reported by Politico, DeSantis defended his immigration enforcement actions:

“Florida is a law and order state, and we won’t turn a blind eye to the dangers of Biden’s border crisis,” DeSantis said. “We will continue to take steps to protect Floridians from reckless federal open border policies.”

In the past DeSantis has garnered media attention for shipping illegal aliens from Florida to the elite resort island of Martha’s Vineyard. He isn’t the only governor making headlines for his immigration moves.

Texas Governor Greg Abbott recently came out calling for ten year prison sentences for Texans who help illegal aliens cross the border. Abbott also said in a recent news conference, that he’s deployed the Texas National Guard to the border to combat illegal immigration.

As reported in Fox News, Abbott claimed this move has resulted in the apprehension of 25,000 criminals and 330,000 gotaways. He was quoted by Fox saying that illegal aliens are picking the “wrong state” and his administration would do “everything we can to keep you out of our border, to keep you out of our country.”

As the recent midterm elections illustrated, both DeSantis and Abbott scored major victories despite the fact that their party underperformed expectations. These governors and many others have stepped up where the federal government has dropped off, because their states are the ones most affected by unchecked illegal immigration. We can only hope that their actions motivate our federal government to get serious and take action to end the border crisis.