YUMA, ARIZONA – Republican attorneys general from 11 states visited the U.S.-Mexico border wall in remote Yuma, Arizona, this week touting a more than 90% decrease in illegal crossings since President Donald Trump began his second term.
Their visit came a day before the House narrowly passed Trump’s “big, beautiful bill,” which in part allocates $46.5 billion to revive construction of the wall, which at its current stage covers just a fourth of the approximately 1,900-mile-long stretch separating the United States from Mexico. In Yuma, a city of just 110,000 people, local officials briefed the Republican attorneys general of Kansas, Mississippi, Kentucky, South Carolina, North Dakota, South Dakota, Utah, Alabama, Montana, Iowa and Indiana on how an average of 1,500 people were illegally crossing the border a day during the first six months of the Biden administration. That’s dropped to about four daily illegal crossings since Trump took office.
In addition to the border wall itself, Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach — chairman of the Republican Attorneys General Association – told Fox News Digital the administration needs other “force multipliers,” especially with the task of carrying out the “largest interior removal since the Eisenhower administration.” He announced an additional three GOP states entered into 287(G) agreements with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), which means local and state deputies and officers are trained to exercise federal law enforcement powers, including making immigration-related arrests, initiating removal processes, conducting investigations and tapping into ICE databases.
BIPARTISAN SENATE BILL TARGETS BORDER HUMAN, DRUG TRAFFICKING WITH INNOVATIVE TECHNOLOGY
“The thing the Trump administration needs the most right now is force multipliers,” Kobach said. “Even if we doubled the number of Border Patrol agents at ICE stations, we still wouldn’t have enough. This border wall, which I’m looking at, is one force multiplier at the border. The other big force multiplier is state and local law enforcement signing 287(g) agreements and then helping ICE in the interior. And that’s where the red states are leading the way.”
South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson said 540 kilograms of fentanyl and 850 kilograms of cocaine were trafficked into the Palmetto State originated from Mexican drug cartels. One kilo alone is enough to kill half a million people.
“This is the kind of stuff that keeps me up at night. I have two teenage kids in high school. When you hear about parents losing a kid in an overdose, it really strikes at your core. And so it’s not just about law enforcement, it’s about national security,” Wilson told Fox News Digital. “As a 29-year veteran of the Army, an Iraq war veteran. I think in terms of national security, as well as law enforcement. This right here, what happens here, President Trump’s policies here have empowered local law enforcement and local and state prosecutors like myself to be able to more effectively combat the illicit activity, starting with Mexican drug cartels and gangs like Tren de Aragua.”
Wilson said it’s important to fortify a “digital border,” noting how Mexican drug cartels, Chinese nationals and other illicit criminal organizations launder the proceeds of human and drug trafficking and other crimes using platforms such as WeChat. Wilson has partnered with North Carolina Attorney General Jeff Jackson, a Democrat, and attorneys general from four other states in a bipartisan effort to target the Chinese app allegedly linked to the international fentanyl trade.
The 11 Republican attorneys general in Yuma highlighted the importance of making the trip to the southern border despite their home states not directly bordering Mexico. Under the Biden administration, the Republicans argued that every state became a border state with the trafficking of fentanyl and other deadly drugs, as well as people across the border.
TOM HOMAN APPLAUDS ‘BIG BEAUTIFUL BILL’, SAYS LEGISLATION WOULD ‘SOLIDIFY THE SUCCESS’ AT THE BORDER
“In the dark days of the Biden administration, this part of the border saw 1,500 illegal crossings a day. Today? Just four. That’s leadership,” Kentucky Attorney General Russell Coleman said. “In Kentucky, we lost 1,400 lives last year to drugs coming over this border. That’s not abstract—it’s empty chairs at kitchen tables. I’m here to thank the men and women who wear the badge, who’ve made this border secure again.”
“Alabama may not be a border state, but we’ve seen the cost of an open border – fentanyl deaths, rising crime. The difference now? It’s not the law that changed, it’s the leadership,” Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall said. “Border encounters are down 93%, gotaways down 95%. That’s the result of letting immigration enforcement do their jobs. We’re no longer the last line of defense—we’re partners in restoring the rule of law.”
“When federal officials can’t do their jobs, every state becomes a border state—even Indiana,” Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita said. “We were the first non-border state to sue the Biden administration over its lawless immigration policies. Now, under new leadership, morale at the border has skyrocketed. I’m here not just for our law enforcement, but for the teachers overwhelmed by the fallout, for the parents and professionals caught in a broken system. Enough is enough.”
A stop on the tour included seeing pallets of $2 million worth of border wall supplies paid for under Trump’s first term that the Biden administration prevented federal contractors from erecting – something Kobach categorized as “dereliction of duty” and “deliberate efforts to keep our border open.” The Republican attorneys general also heard from the local hospital system, which incurred $26 million in unreimbursed care costs during a six-month period between December 2021 and May 2022 primarily due to treating migrants. At the peak of the crisis, approximately 350,000 illegal aliens crossed the border through the Yuma sector in a single year under the Biden administration.
The surge caused $1.2 million in losses to three family farms in the region, as migrants camped out and defecated around crops. Local officials underscored the national food security risks given Yuma produces 2,500 semi-loads of leafy greens per day during peak season. The Marine Top Gun School brings thousands more U.S. Marines to Yuma every six months, but live-fire drills had to be shut down due to the surge in illegal crossings near ranges, local officials told the attorneys general, highlighting how military readiness was also impacted due to the Biden border crisis.
Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen, whose state borders the U.S.-Canada border, said he knew many of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents who were called down to the southern border during the Biden administration crisis.
“Many of them were rotated down here to put in pretty lengthy shifts. I heard the challenges. They were very, very frustrated, and a lot put in retirements. We had a lot of agents who just flat quit because they were demoralized,” Knudsen said, noting how Border Patrol agents who briefed the attorneys general in Yuma reported how the “difference is absolutely night and day” since Trump has returned to office with the amount of resources and support at their disposal.
“During the Biden administration, Montana’s fentanyl seizures went up 20,000% – cartel fentanyl piling into Montana up 20,000%. During those same four years, Montana’s official count of overdose fentanyl deaths went up nearly 2,000%,” Knudsen said. “Every state has become a border state. That’s why Montana cares.”
Utah Attorney General Derek Brown stressed how his state was involved in the largest bust in U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) history announced earlier this month. Authorities seized over 400 kilograms of fentanyl.
“We have highways traversing our state and when drugs cross the border here they reach Utah within a matter of hours. I recently met in fact a couple whose son overdosed on fentanyl. The availability of fentanyl that came from here in this area is mind-boggling,” Brown said.
Read the full article here
