Mayorkas Dodges Reporter’s Question Over Record Migrant Surge

Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas apparently does not care to be questioned about his agency’s failure to secure the nation’s southern border. He recently brushed aside a question about the porous border with Mexico.

A reporter with the Daily Caller on Tuesday approached the Biden administration official. She asked about the record number of migrants passing into the U.S. through ports of entry, and the response from Mayorkas was telling.

All he said in reply was, “I’m sorry?”

According to Customs and Border Protection data, agents had 99,495 illegal migrant encounters at the southern border in June. There was also a surge at entry points as the Biden administration increased entry appointments scheduled through the CBP One app.

After recording 35,000 appointments in May, the points of entry total soared to 45,026 last month — an all-time high.

Reporter Jennie Taer asked Mayorkas specifically about the new numbers. “The illegal encounters are low, but you’re bringing people through ports of entry, do you have an answer to that? Do you have any explanation?”

After the Biden official walked away, Taer encountered him a short time later and asked why he did not give a response. “Mr. Secretary, I asked you a question earlier about the southern border and you refused to answer. Are you sure you don’t have anything to say?”

There is apparently not much to say about a plan by the Biden administration that House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Mark Green (R-TN) termed a “shell game.”

Green noted “there’s the lying to Congress, there’s the CBP One app, which is just this big shell game to produce automatic mass parole in violation of laws passed by Congress.”

The Republican further called it a blatant “disregard” for the principle of separation of powers and the Constitution. 

There is little that can be said in defense of an administration whose open border policies led to a staggering 2.7 million illegal migrant encounters last year. The fiscal year 2022 total is easily the most in U.S. history, far surpassing the 1.9 million in fiscal year 2021.

That number set the previous record for border encounters.