Centrist Democrats are trying to run away from President Joe Biden’s decision to stop using Title 42 as fast as possible.
Before the decision was even announced, Arizona Sens. Mark Kelly and Kyrsten Sinema wrote a letter to Biden asking him not to stop using Title 42.
Then, West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin said he was also against removing Title 42. “If anything, we’d be looking at permanency for Title 42,” Manchin told Burgess Everett. “Maybe that would spur us to get a good immigration policy that works for the borders. The borders have to be secure.”
On Friday, New Hampshire Sen. Maggie Hassan came out against ending Title 42, too, predicting the policy change “will likely lead to a migrant surge.”
The problem for these Democrats is that, at best, Title 42 was always a temporary stop-gap measure to maintain a semblance of control at the southern border. When President Donald Trump rightly used it at the height of COVID, he applied it equally to all migrants. And it worked.
From day one, Biden has used Title 42 selectively, allowing children and most families to ignore the order but applying it strictly to single adults. The loopholes Biden created in Title 42 enforcement caused last year’s record number of arrests on the southern border.
The only way to bring order back to the southern border is to stop the “catch and release” policies that are causing it. Trump did this with his Remain in Mexico policy.
Until centrist Democrats embrace Remain in Mexico, their border security positions will be every bit as incoherent as Biden’s.
