Pompeo Slams Biden's Immigration Policy, Calls Border Crisis 'National Security Problem'

The Biden administration has faced harsh criticism from Republicans for reversing many of the Trump-era anti-immigration policies – a step which they claim resulted in the highest influx of migrants from Central America in decades.

In an interview he gave to Breitbart News, Trump-era Secretary of State Mike Pompeo harshly criticised the immigration policy of the Biden administration. He pointed out that the White House had failed to deal with the border crisis and now plans to boost the limit of illegal immigrants eligible to stay in the US by 600% compared to the ceiling set by Trump's office in 2020.

The former top diplomat argued that the issue is bigger than just immigration policy and directly affects US security.

"It’s a national security problem, in the same way that the transit of people across our borders who are coming here unlawfully is a national security problem. America’s always a generous place. We welcome those who have real problems and want to come to America and are under threat, under our asylum laws. […] But we need to secure America and America’s borders, and we need to make sure we know who’s coming across," the former secretary of state said.

Pompeo called the number of people entering the US, both legally and illegally, "staggering" and underscored that these people are poorly vetted in terms of whether they pose a danger to Americans.

The Biden administration is planning to increase the number of refugees who are allowed to stay in the US from the 18,000 cap set by Trump's office to 125,000 by 2022: 45,000 more than were allowed into the country under the Obama administration. In addition, on his first day in the Oval Office, Biden repealed Trump's ban on admitting refugees from countries seen as hotbeds of terrorism. This could present an additional national security risk for the US, from Pompeo's standpoint.