GOP Chairman: Terrorists Are Taking Note of Lack of Border Enforcement

Terrorists are undoubtably taking note of the lack of immigration enforcement as the Obama administration allows record numbers of illegal immigrants to stream across the southern border and remain in the U.S., according to House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R-VA).

“There is no doubt that terrorists from ISIS-controlled countries are taking note of the lack of border enforcement. They have publicly announced they will infiltrate this country posing as refugees,” Goodlatte said Thursday at the outset of a House subcommittee hearing examining the renewed surge of illegal immigration at U.S.-Mexico border.

In recent months the level of illegal immigration by unaccompanied minors and adults traveling with children have dwarfed already elevated migration rates. Goodlatte said this year the number of unaccompanied minors and family unite that cross the southern border this year could top 177,000, the population of Fort Lauderdale, Florida — surpassing the previous record in 2014 by 30 percent.

Democrats argue violence in Central America has spurred the northern migration, Republicans have pointed to the Obama administration’s casual immigration enforcement and amnesty policies.

Goodlatte, Thursday, pointed to a leaked Department of Homeland Security memo revealing that “the Obama Administration’s lax immigration policies are fueling this current surge.”

“During July through September 2015, Customs and Border Protection agents interviewed 345 family units apprehended at the border,” Goodlatte said. “Nearly 70 percent said that they heard that if they came to the United States they would be released or receive some sort of immigration relief, such as asylum. Additionally, nearly 60 percent said it was the U.S. immigration policies that influenced their decision to come to here.”

The Virginia lawmaker further expressed outrage a the President Obama’s “unresponsiveness” in the face of the crisis and recalled U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Gil Kerlikowske recent reaction to the border surge.

“We could very well be seeing the new normal,” Kerlikowske said in December.

“Americans do not want our government to throw up its hands and capitulate to the masses of foreign nationals illegally surging across our borders, as though it is inevitable,” Goodlatte said Thursday. “They want us to address the problem head-on and solve it. It’s not complicated. The President simply must have the will to secure our border.”