Fareed Zakaria, one of the scions of DC punditry, has finally faced the facts that current Biden policies on immigration are completely wrong. More remarkably, he has taken that indubitable reality to its logical conclusion–Zakaria calls for closing the border to asylum applicants while the system attempts to absorb the millions already in the pipeline:
“There is only one solution to this crisis, as Nolan Rappaport, a longtime congressional expert on the issue, has suggested: The president must use the power he has in existing law to suspend entirely the admission of asylum seekers while the system digests the millions of immigration cases already pending. The British government has passed a law to this effect.”
Notably, and logically, Zakaria does not mention automatic employment authorization as a solution to this deepening and ever more damaging crisis. Democrats and the business community are clinging more and more to the idea that the real problem is that we are not granting enough benefits at a quick enough pace for those who are clearing gaming the asylum system. In their view, if we granted the benefit for fraudulently seeking asylum faster, then the problem of the overwhelmed asylum system would disappear.
Of course, granting employment authorization would not only encourage more fraudulent asylum claims, but it is also a pie-in-sky solution. Authorizing employment is not the same as giving these aliens a job, much less a job that could provide housing. In New York City, it is not altogether clear that there are good paying jobs available for migrants even if they were authorized to work. From the New York Times recently:
“Construction is one of the few industries that’s hiring, which may explain why increasing numbers of women are being drawn to the field.
“It could simply be that there’s nothing out there for them.”
So follow the logic, such as it is, that the real problem is the flood of migrants destroying New York City resources and the solution is simply authorizing them to work. What if there are not enough available jobs? More importantly, what about the American workers in New York that also need those jobs to cover their food and shelter (both of which are increasing under inflation)? Also, let us not forget the fact that the numbers are not slowing down and will increase under any expansion of employment authorization. Unless you believe there are unlimited good paying jobs in New York City, Chicago, and other large cities, then logically there is a number beyond which peak employment will be reached. In that case, you can authorize employment, but you cannot draw blood from the stone.
This is why Zakaria is undeniably correct to point to reducing the number of asylum applicants at the border. He calls for closing the border completely, which may well be the only way currently to stabilize the asylum system and local communities that are being crushed under the weight of ceaseless immigration.
The Biden Administration, and its defenders, seem to be operating under a delusion that there is no resource scarcity in the United States. The belief that immigration causes no harm and extracts no costs is defended with religious zeal. Even in the face of reality across the country with states of emergency and cities collapsing, President Biden continually chooses the course of denial. His policy of providing benefits to those who enter illegally and will not receive asylum is not the cause. Millions of recent arrivals are an economic benefit, and any rational consideration of supply and demand in labor, housing, education, and food is simply “nativist” and “anti-immigrant.”
No matter what you think the proposed solutions should be, there can be zero doubt that denial is the worst possible reaction to what is going on at the border and across the country. Denying the problem exists guarantees escalation of pain for those the problem affects. Luckily, there is a current government spending fight where Congress can push past denial and reach solutions. To pass a spending bill that does not include real legislative fixes to the problems we face at the border (H.R. 2 being the best solution) is to use taxpayer money to fund President Biden’s continued denial of reality. Congress can choose to join Biden in denial as the problem spreads or they can have a fight for sanity.
JARED CULVER is a Legal Analyst for NumbersUSA
