Val Verde County is like a lot of South Texas counties: sparsely populated, rugged, dry, and vast. If you’ve never been there, well, I’m not sure there’s much reason to go. It’s not for everyone, but it’s for me. I happen to think places like this are the best places in the world: places where...
Americans can sigh a sigh of relief. Our Border Czar, Vice President Kamala Harris, finally visited the border and spoke of protecting the men and women and the dignity of work, even calling for “much work that needs to be done in support of Milwaukee,” Sadly, it was the wrong border. We applaud the Vice...
As a candidate, Joe Biden promised amnesty for illegal immigrants already in the United States and expanded asylum for those on the way. Now that he’s become president, Biden formally lifted his predecessor’s pandemic-based prohibition on border crossings for minors from Northern Triangle countries, ostensibly turning away all other would-be immigrants. In February, 59 percent...
It could be argued that, taken one at a time, the Biden Administration’s policy directives regarding immigration are worthy of thoughtful debate. But taken as a whole, and being either already executed or under serious consideration so early in the president’s first term, the mosaic clearly shows that he is standing down the execution of...
When former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo spoke with TPPF’s Kevin Roberts for a livestream event on March 24, he cited a 2019 report from the State Department on the topic of unalienable rights. That report found, in part, that “the American example of freedom, equality, and democratic self-government has long inspired, and continues to...
Engineers and mathematicians would call it an elegant solution. Texas is facing two problems: heavily encumbered “stimulus” dollars coming from the federal government, and a surge of migrants at our southern border that’s reaching crisis proportions. The solution to both is simple. Let’s use stimulus funds to build more wall. President Biden paused construction on...
Imagine a solution to a seemingly intractable problem that is both popular across the political spectrum and effective. It would make us safer, lower unemployment and protect wages. In honor of the start of baseball season, let’s call that solution a low and slow pitch just to the outside, begging to be knocked out of...
In a 2009 episode of HBO‘s Flight of the Conchords, Brian, the fictional prime minister of New Zealand, wants to meet the American president. Unable to convince the White House switchboard operator that New Zealand is a real country, Brian travels to Washington and instead takes a public White House tour hoping for a “chance” meeting with...
In January, police in the Mexican state of Tamaulipas found 19 charred corpses in two burned-out vehicles. The initial investigation showed they had been shot first, then set aflame. They were migrants, many from Central America, on their way to Texas. One of them was Marvin Alberto Tomás — “Lefty” to his friends. He left his family in Guatemala...
“The crisis has already begun,” former U.S. Customs and Border Protection Acting Commissioner Mark Morgan pointed out during the Texas Public Policy Foundation livestream event, “When the Walls Come Tumbling Down: The Coming Border Crisis.” Morgan joined TPPF Senior Fellow in Border Security Josh Jones and TPPF Executive Director Kevin Roberts to discuss the quickly...
When President Biden recently signed executive orders effectively rolling back efforts by the previous administration to reduce the 2019 surge in unlawful crossings at the southern border, he proclaimed, “I’m not making new law. I’m eliminating bad policy.” The obvious intent of the declaration was to dispel any suggestion that the newly elected president was trespassing on...
Do you think France, Canada or Great Britain would be OK if the Americans detained their defense secretary without telling them?” a Mexican official asked rhetorically in the January 2, 2021, issue of The Economist. Anyone versed in the Mexican criminal underworld might respond by noting that cabinet officials in Europe and Canada generally don’t...