President Joe Biden is working on a deal to pay illegal immigrants $450,000 per person to those who were separated at the southern border during former President Donald Trump’s administration. According to The Wall Street Journal, many families could also get smaller payouts depending on their circumstances which means the total payout may be more than $1 billion. According to The Journal:
“The U.S. Departments of Justice, Homeland Security, and Health and Human Services are considering payments that could amount to close to $1 million a family, though the final numbers could shift. Most of the families that crossed the border illegally from Mexico to seek asylum in the U.S. included one parent and one child.”
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) said there are several thousand individuals that were separated under the zero-tolerance policy. The Biden administration is working to resolve nearly a thousand lawsuits filed by families. The news has angered many who argue for stronger border protection and immigration laws. Representative Dan Crenshaw (R-TX), a Navy SEAL veteran, took to Twitter with his complaint:
“Biden wants to pay illegal immigrants $450,000 for their hardship while breaking our laws. For perspective, if a service member is killed in action, their next of kin gets an insurance payment of $400,000. Let that sink in.”
Chuck Grassley
(Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
Former Acting Department of Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf said there were “no limits” to what the Biden administration would do to damage border security, saying this latest plan “may be at the top of the list.” And Senator Chuck Grassley (R-IA) tweeted: “UNACCEPTABLE Report says Biden admin considering payments of 450k per person 2ppl who crossed the border ILLEGALLY Those are taxpayers dollars We should not be paying anything to ppl who break our laws.”
The report said discussions have taken place over the past few months between lawyers representing families and government attorneys. The latter suggests the payment is too much, especially for people who had violated the law. “One government lawyer threatened to remove his name from the case out of disagreement with the potential settlement offer.”
The border crisis continues to grow out of hand with approximately 1.66 million arrests of illegal aliens for Fiscal Year 2021, according to data released by U.S. Customs and Border Protection. In 2019, at the peak of illegal crossings during the Trump administration, the Border Patrol made about 850,000 arrests, The Journal relayed.
Recently, Liberty Nation reported on a caravan that could be headed from Mexico into the U.S. This is on the heels of a surge in Texas of nearly 10,000 mostly Haitian migrants. The Biden administration is under fire for its handling of the immigration situation and his refusal to even visit the border – other than back in 2008 while on the campaign trail – to see for himself what is happening. Border state governors have pleaded for help from the White House and have so far been unable to even get a meeting with the president or his staff.
~ Read more from Kelli Ballard.
