The Biden administration cited the COVID-19 Delta variant as it’s reason for continuing the enforcement of international travel bans for even virus-free, vaccinated travelers who want to enter the United States, but that ban has a backdoor: illegal immigrants streaming across the southern border with no regard to vaccination status — or even potential infection — despite Title 42 health restrictions.
Title 42 of U.S. Code, Section 265, gives the Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention the authority to "prohibit … the introduction" into the United States of individuals when the Director believes that "there is serious danger of the introduction of [a communicable] disease into the United States."
The Trump administration found this to be an effective tool to curb illegal immigration, according to Matthew Tragesser, spokesman at the Federation for American Immigration Reform, a Washington, D.C.-based non-profit that publishes position papers on current and proposed immigration policy.
"Title 42 is arguably the most important and effective tool helping mitigate the spread of COVID-19 at the U.S.-Mexico border," he said. "Since October, the order has quickly removed some 750,000 illegal aliens from the country rather than them being released into the interior and never seen again."
But that was then. FAIR said that, although the administration continues to apply Section 42 restrictions, it does so selectively.
"The Biden administration is not fully enforcing the order and is not applying it to most family units and unaccompanied minors," Tragesser said. "Even more alarming, the administration has indicated it intends to lift the authority in a matter of days."
The Biden White House has said it was considering lifting Title 42 restrictions altogether, as early as July 31.
And the immigrants flooding the southern border aren’t limited to people from Mexico and Central America, according to the Center for Immigration Studies.
"Haitians and Cubans are among the most numerous non-Central American, non-Mexican immigrants crossing the border right now," said Todd Bensman, a senior CIS national security fellow. "There’s a great wide-open land route they are using."
Fox News national correspondent Bill Melugin, who’s reporting on conditions at the border, confirmed that illegals aren’t coming merely from Mexico and the Central American triangle countries of Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras.
"An absolutely massive group of 350+ migrants have arrived at the border fence here in Del Rio," he tweeted recently. "They are from all around the world. Haiti. Africa. Brazil. Colombia. Very few from Northern Triangle. More are streaming down the path from the Rio Grande after crossing."
Bensman reported as early as last year that Customs and Border Protection agents encountering the growing throng of infected apprehended illegal immigrants were becoming infected themselves — and some even losing their lives because of those infections, in effect dying in the line of duty.
"Lifting this order at a time when illegal immigration totals remain at levels not seen in 21 years — with many coming from hot-spot regions around the world — would be catastrophic," he said. "This could jeopardize public health as many of these migrants are being bused and flown across the country with unknown vaccination statuses. It could also increase the chances of infection for immigration authorities at the border and prevent them from being able to work amid this crisis."
Asked during Thursday’s daily briefing about potential COVID-19 positive border crossers, the White House Principal Deputy Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said only that CBP "takes its responsibility to prevent the spread very, very seriously."
The administration announced July 26 that restrictions that have barred legal travel to the United States since 2020 will remain in place.
"Given where we are today with the Delta variant, the United States will maintain existing travel restrictions at this point," a White House official told Reuters at the time.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki reiterated that decision at Monday’s briefing.
"We will maintain existing travel restrictions at this point for a few reasons," she told reporters. "The more transmissible Delta variant is spreading both here and around the world. Driven by the delta variant cases are continuing to rise here at home, particularly among the unvaccinated, and are likely to continue in the weeks ahead
But those travel restrictions don’t appear to apply at the southern border. Accordingly, Tragesser believes that, even if an influx if illegal immigration were advisable, the middle of the COVID pandemic would be the least advisable time to have it — especially considering that legal travelers continue to be denied entry.
"The Biden administration would be wise to keep this public health authority intact," Tragesser said, "and also fully enforce it on all single adults, unaccompanied minors, and family units until COVID-19 is better controlled."
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