Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo slammed President Joe Biden's administration Thursday night after a new report detailed the chaos at the southern border.
Pompeo, speaking on Fox News' The Ingraham Angle, was reacting to a Wall Street Journal story about how migrants from throughout Latin America have been drawn to the border 'by the hundreds of thousands.'
The former secretary of state said the Biden administration is wrecking the Trump administration's blueprints for the region.
'This is another example … where we left them a perfectly good plan,' he said. 'We left them a perfectly good plan in Afghanistan, they turned it into chaos. We left them a perfectly good plan with respect to how we handled our southern border, how we kept our sovereignty.'
Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo slammed President Joe Biden's administration Thursday night after a new report detailed the chaos at the southern border on Fox News' The Ingraham Angle
The Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday that from October 2020 through August, nearly 300,000 migrants from countries other than Mexico came to the border.
In the entirety of the pandemic-riddled 2020, the figure was nearly 44,000.
In July and August, immigrants from Mexico or individual countries from the Northern Triangle (Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador) were outnumbered by those from Latin America and the Caribbean for the first time.
The Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday that from October 2020 through August, nearly 300,000 migrants from countries other than Mexico came to the border
Thousands of migrants continue to converge in a makeshift camp under the bridge that connects Del Rio, Texas and Mexico's Ciudad Acuña, in the latest border emergency and humanitarian crisis facing President Biden.
The camp had swelled to some 15,000 migrants at one point, with thousands seen wading across the Rio Grande River daily. Many are Haitians who were granted asylum in Chile, with some Cubans, Venezuelans and Nicaraguans also present.
About 3,000 remained by late Thursday, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said. The number peaked Saturday as migrants driven by confusion over the Biden administration´s policies and misinformation on social media converged at the border crossing trying to seek asylum.
And DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas admitted Thursday that as many as 2,000 Haitians have been released into the interior of the US.
The revelation came after the DHS revealed that of the 15,000 total; 1,401 were sent back to Haiti on 12 flights, 3,206 remain in custody, and 5,000 are still camped out beneath the International Bridge in Del Rio, Texas.
This left 5,000 unaccounted for. Now Mayorkas appears to have addressed where 2,000 of them are, but that still leaves 3,000 missing from official figures.
Amid the surge of the highly infectious Delta variant, the crowded conditions of the camp also raised concerns about the possibility of COVID-19 outbreaks endangering the health of the migrants.
Food and water has been scarce in the makeshift camp, around 20 migrants told Reuters, and temperatures have risen to around 99 Fahrenheit. Reporters witnessed hundreds of migrants wading through the Rio Grande river and back into Mexico to stock up on essentials they say they are not receiving on the American side.
Haitian migrants take shelter along the Del Rio International Bridge at sunset as they await to be processed after crossing the Rio Grande river into the U.S. from Ciudad Acuna in Del Rio, Texas on September 19
On Thursday, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas told CNN that as many as 2,000 Haitians had been released into the US pending hearings
In July and August, immigrants from Mexico or individual countries from the Northern Triangle (Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador) were outnumbered by those from Latin America and the Caribbean for the first time
'We avoided a humanitarian crisis at the border and they ripped that plan up too,' Pompeo added. 'Now they're trying to get back to it, I'm confident they'll try and blame our administration for what's happening as well, the same way they did with Afghanistan.'
Recently Biden has tried to reboot Trump's 'remain in Mexico' policy.
'But I think the American people can see,' Pompeo added. 'These folks have implemented their ideas poorly. The humanitarian crisis is very significant.'
Sources told the Washington Examiner that the Biden administration had set a deadline of Friday night to have the camp completely cleared.
The order from the West Wing reportedly came amid concerns over a Black Lives Matter protest scheduled to take place near the bridge this weekend.
'They don't want them all riled up,' an official told the paper, referring to U.S. authorities and the Haitian migrants respectively.
An official also said the order to clear the camp was partly to resolve an 'optics' problem.
They want those people out from under that bridge so they can't be seen anymore,' they said. 'It's an optics thing. They are moving them around for process and release. They're going to have everyone at the bridge gone in the next two days.'
Migrants seeking asylum in the U.S. cross the Rio Grande river into the U.S. after leaving a makeshift migrant camp
The ex-secretary of state believes there's now a 'green light' for migrants to come to America
A migrant seeking refuge in the United States is pictured with members of Mexico's National Institute of Migration before crossing the Rio Grande river into Texas
The ex-secretary of state believes there's now a 'green light' for migrants to come to America.
'Every person who's thinking, 'Maybe I should come,' will all see that these Haitians -- who often came from Central and South America, and they've been there quite a while, they didn't just flee Haiti in the last week or two weeks after the earthquake -- every single person who's been thinking about coming to the United States illegally now will see that there's a green light, that they're gonna be released inside the United States,' he said.
'I think we're at the very front end of what will be a significant tidal wave of illegal immigration,' Pompeo added. 'We've seen it for the first eight months of the Biden administration, I suspect the next eight will only increase that.'
'I think we're at the very front end of what will be a significant tidal wave of illegal immigration,' Pompeo added. 'We've seen it for the first eight months of the Biden administration, I suspect the next eight will only increase that.'
The White House has faced sharp bipartisan condemnation over the situation at the border.
Republicans say Biden administration policies led Haitians to believe they would get asylum.
Democrats are expressing outrage after images went viral this week of Border Patrol agents on horseback using aggressive tactics against the migrants.
DHS responded to the outcry by banning Border Agents from riding horses.
Some accused the agents of using either the reins or a lariat as a whip on the migrants. Images show a rope-like tool being thrown in the direction of some migrants who were running from the officers.
Agents insist they were using their reins as a whip on the horse, as they always do, while Mayorkas says those pictured with the ropes have been reassigned to administrative duties pending a full investigation into the incident.
Many of the thousands who remain at the camp have resorted to fashioning makeshift tents using discarded clothing and tree branches in order to provide at least some shelter from the elements.
The heat has been punishing over the last week with temperatures soaring into the high 90s. Families have resorted to bathing in the grimy water of the Rio Grande river to cool off.
The heat has been punishing over the last week with temperatures soaring into the high 90s. Families have resorted to bathing in the grimy water of the Rio Grande river to cool off
Officials said the U.S. State Department is in talks with Brazil and Chile to allow some Haitians who previously resided there to return, but it's complicated because some no longer have legal status there.
Meanwhile, the U.S. special envoy to Haiti, Daniel Foote, submitted a letter of resignation protesting the 'inhumane' large-scale expulsions of Haitian migrants.
Foote, who was appointed in July, wrote to Secretary of State Antony Blinken, saying he was stepping down immediately 'with deep disappointment and apologies to those seeking crucial changes.'
'I will not be associated with the United States inhumane, counterproductive decision to deport thousands of Haitian refugees and illegal immigrants to Haiti, a country where American officials are confined to secure compounds because of the danger posed by armed gangs to daily life,' he wrote. 'Our policy approach to Haiti remains deeply flawed, and my policy recommendations have been ignored and dismissed, when not edited to project a narrative different from my own.'
The career diplomat was known to be deeply frustrated with what he considered a lack of urgency in Washington and a glacial pace on efforts to improve conditions in Haiti.
State Department spokesman Ned Price disputed Foote´s assertions, saying his proposals had been 'fully considered in a rigorous and transparent policy process.'
'Some of those proposals were determined to be harmful to our commitment to the promotion of democracy in Haiti and were rejected during the policy process. For him to say his proposals were ignored is simply false,' Price said.
Mayorkas responded on CNN: 'What I what I wish the individual had done is stayed with the cause of addressing the needs of individuals, all throughout the Western Hemisphere and dedicating the resources and the talent and the energies of the men and women in the United States government to rebuild our humanitarian relief capabilities – just as we are doing now in the Biden-Harris administration.'
Foote blamed Biden for making things worse in Haiti by backing the 'unelected' leader after the coup, claiming that 'picking the winner' will produce 'catastrophic results'.
'Last week, the U.S. and other embassies in Port-au-Prince issued another public statement of support for the unelected, de facto Prime Minister Dr. Ariel Henry as interim leader of Haiti, and have continued to tout his 'political agreement' over another broader, earlier accord shepherded by civil society,' he wrote.
Foote added: 'The hubris that makes us believe we should pick the winner – again – is impressive.'
'This cycle of international political interventions in Haiti has consistently produced catastrophic results,' he said. 'The negative impact to Haiti will have calamitous consequences not only in Haiti, but in the U.S. and our neighbors in the hemisphere.'
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