Commentary: Big Tent Ideas

BETSY MCCAUGHEY: Yes, The Invasion Is Real

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Across the globe, hostile nations like Russia are using migration as a weapon of war. War is being waged with migrants, instead of tanks, to destabilize and even bankrupt a country and facilitate terrorists attacks from within.

Migration is being used to attack Finland, Italy, France, Poland and — no surprise — America. But the Biden administration is asleep at the switch, oblivious to the threat.

Though most of the migrants crossing the U.S. southern border are in search of economic opportunity, some are used as tools by our enemies.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott is rightly sounding the alarm about what he calls an “invasion.”

So are 10 top-ranking former FBI executives, who sent a warning letter to Congress on Jan. 17 about a “new and unfamiliar” type of warfare. Heed their words.

The letter points to the danger of a large number of military-age men “who could begin attacking gatherings of unarmed citizens,” duplicating the horrors of the Oct. 7 Hamas attack.

The letter also warns that some of the migrants are on the terror watchlist or are from countries designated as state sponsors of terrorism.

Europe gets it. French Minister of the Interior Gerald Darmanin cautioned back in October that failing to expel illegal immigrants has led to past terrorist incidents, and will again.

The Left claims it’s “racist” to refer to migration as an “invasion.” Nonsense. Ask Finland.

Finland locked its eastern border in November, after Russia flooded the country with migrants from as far away as Afghanistan, Somalia and Syria, likely in retaliation for Finland joining NATO.

In the Western Hemisphere, the anti-American government of Nicaragua is doing what it can, welcoming charter flights of Haitians and Cubans heading to the U.S. border. The Ortega government uses migration as a way to attack the U.S., reports the Associated Press.

Texas is on the receiving end. Abbott has laid miles of razor wire along the Rio Grande to deter border crossers.

Last fall, Customs and Border Protection officials, on order from President Joe Biden, began cutting Texas’ wire to let migrants in. Biden has made the CBP into a concierge service for migrants.

On Oct. 26, when the CBP spotted several hundred migrants waiting on the Mexico side of the Rio Grande, it used a forklift to pull Texas’ fencing out of the ground and hold the wire high enough to allow 300 migrants to walk into Texas. That’s when Abbott went to federal court to sue.

The Biden administration insists that under the Constitution, immigration is exclusively a federal matter. But a federal district court, though declining to halt the wire cutting, found that the feds are “flouting their duties at the border,” enticing people to cross and causing “irreparable harm.” All true.

On appeal, the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals ordered Biden’s Border Patrol to stop cutting wire.

Then Biden leapfrogged over the 5th Circuit, going directly to the Supreme Court. The justices have yet to rule on the merits, but on Jan. 22, they lifted the restraining order to temporarily allow the Border Patrol to resume cutting Texas’ wire.

Even so, the justices did not bar Abbott from laying more wire. And he’s doing just that, vowing to protect his state from what literally is an “invasion.”

Liberal critics mock Abbott for invoking the Invasion Clause of the Constitution, which says that if a state is “invaded,” it can defend itself in the absence of federal help.

A federal appeals court ruled in the 1996 case Padavan v. U.S. that “for a state to be afforded the protections of the Invasion Clause,” it must be under attack by “another state or foreign country that is intending to overthrow the state’s government.” But that 20th-century definition of invasion is outdated. Now, war is being waged with migrants, not just missiles.

The letter to Congress warns an “invasion of the homeland is unfolding now.” Military-age men from Russia and China pose “an alarming and perilous” threat.

Attorneys general from 26 states — all Republicans sent a strong message supporting Abbott and condemning Biden’s open-border policy. Several of these states have also dispatched state troopers or National Guard troops to help Abbott.

“If the Biden Administration won’t do its job to secure our border and keep Americans safe,” said Iowa Attorney General Brenna Bird, “it should step aside and let the States do the job for them.”

Amen.

Betsy McCaughey is a former lieutenant governor of New York and chairman of the Committee to Reduce Infection Deaths. Follow her on Twitter @Betsy_McCaughey. To find out more about Betsy McCaughey and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.

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