In six executive orders on his first day in office, President Donald Trump declared a national emergency at the southwest border and ordered his Cabinet officials to seal it and mobilize the armed forces to defend it.
Trump also designated the drug cartels operating at the border as terrorist organizations and ordered an overhaul of the federal refugee program.
And in an order to protect the states, Trump suspended the entry of aliens into the United States.
The millions of Hispanic “migrants” who entered the country during the Biden administration also got a clear message. Trump killed the “La Casa Blanca” Spanish page for the White House.
His goal: Stop the illegal-alien invasion of the United States that his predecessor invited and subsidized.
National Emergency
The most important of the wide-ranging package of immigration orders is Trump’s declaration of a national emergency because of the Biden “migrant” and illegal-alien invasion.
“America’s sovereignty is under attack,” the order says:
Our southern border is overrun by cartels, criminal gangs, known terrorists, human traffickers, smugglers, unvetted military-age males from foreign adversaries, and illicit narcotics that harm Americans, including America.
Those young, military-age males inspired 10 FBI officials to warn top leaders on Capitol Hill that the United States was undergoing a “soft invasion.”
Trump likely didn’t think the invasion was all that soft, but in any event he declared that it has “caused widespread chaos and suffering in our country over the last 4 years,” not least the “the horrific and inexcusable murders of many innocent American citizens, including women and children, at the hands of illegal aliens.”
“Migrant” gangs have seized “control of parts of cities,” and the drug and human smuggling “cartels control vast territories just south of our southern border, effectively controlling who can and cannot travel to the United States from Mexico.”
Noting that the cartels have murdered hundreds of thousands of Americans with illegal drugs, the order says the “migrant” invasion is “a grave threat to our nation.”
Trump ordered the “armed forces to take all appropriate action to assist the Department of Homeland Security in obtaining full operational control of the southern border” and the secretaries of defense and homeland security to begin building a border wall.
Trump also ordered officials to waive flight regulations that restrict drone surveillance of the border.
Terrorist Organizations
Separately, Trump declared that the cartels are terrorist organizations that “have engaged in a campaign of violence and terror throughout the Western Hemisphere that has not only destabilized countries with significant importance for our national interests but also flooded the United States with deadly drugs, violent criminals, and vicious gangs.”
The president included the vicious MS-13 and Tren de Aragua gangs that operate with impunity nationwide, and ordered the attorney general and homeland security secretary to prepare to use the Alien Enemies Act to remove the criminals from the country. When Trump vowed mass deportations, he said the act would be one means of deporting illegal alien criminals.
In a companion order, Trump directed the attorney general, homeland security secretary, and director of national intelligence to vet and stop terrorists from entering the country.
All aliens who seek to enter the nation must be “vetted and screened to the maximum degree,” and must be determined not to be a public-safety or national security threat.
Another guarantees the safety of the states from foreign invasion, as prescribed in the federal Constitution.
Ineffective Screening
The Immigration and Nationality Act, the order says, is “ineffective” at the southwest border, “where access to necessary information is limited for aliens who have traveled from countries around the world to enter the United States illegally, or when the system is overwhelmed, leading to the unauthorized entry of innumerable illegal aliens into the United States.”
“Federal officials do not have the ability to verify with certainty the criminal record or national-security risks” an alien represents, and aliens typically don’t offer background information to the immigration authorities at the border.
The cartels greatly exacerbate that situation.
As well, immigration officials cannot adequately screen aliens for communicable diseases as required by law.
“Over the last 4 years, at least 8 million illegal aliens were encountered along the southern border of the United States, and countless millions more evaded detection and illegally entered the United States,” the order explains:
The sheer number of aliens entering the United States has overwhelmed the system and rendered many of the INA’s provisions ineffective, including those previously described that are intended to prevent aliens posing threats to public health, safety, and national security from entering the United States. As a result, millions of aliens who potentially pose significant threats to health, safety, and national security have moved into communities nationwide.
Until Trump declares that the invasion has ended, the entry of aliens is suspended, and they cannot invoke federal law to stay in the United States if they have entered illegally.
The order blocks aliens who do not provide criminal and medical background information, and compels Cabinet officials to deport aliens who are here illegally.
Military Role
Noting the national emergency, a fifth order, “Clarifying the Military’s Role in Protecting the territorial Integrity of the United States,” says that “unchecked unlawful mass migration and the unimpeded flow of opiates across our borders continue to endanger the safety and security of the American people and encourage further lawlessness.”
Thus, Trump directed the military’s U.S. Northern Command to “to seal the borders and maintain the sovereignty, territorial integrity, and security of the United States by repelling forms of invasion including unlawful mass migration, narcotics trafficking, human smuggling and trafficking, and other criminal activities.”
Refugee Program Suspended
The sixth order calls for “realigning” the nation’s refugee admittance program.
“Charleroi, Pennsylvania, and Springfield, Ohio, to Whitewater, Wisconsin, have seen significant influxes of migrants,” Trump said. Biden “migrants” have deluged major cities such as Chicago and New York. But “the United States lacks the ability to absorb” the “migrants” and the “refugees.”
Thus does the order suspend the refugee program until admitting them serves the interests of the United States.
When Trump scrapped Biden’s “La Casa Blanca” page, X users noted, the home button read “Go Home.”
The White House apparently removed that and replaced it with “go to home page.”