Republican lawmakers hold hearing on border during Vance visit to San Diego

Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee held a hearing Friday to get local perspectives on what they have dubbed the “Biden-Harris border crisis in San Diego” — just as the party’s vice presidential nominee, Sen. J.D. Vance, was visiting the U.S.-Mexico border near San Ysidro.

Vance was joined at the border by County Supervisor Jim Desmond and Border Patrol agents before attending a planned fundraiser in Rancho Santa Fe.

“Our Border Patrol agents want nothing more than to do their jobs,” Vance wrote on X, sharing a video of his visit. He said the Biden administration “made that impossible” by ending Trump administration programs that restricted access to asylum and forced migrants to wait in Mexico for asylum hearings.

Meanwhile, Rep. Darrell Issa organized the congressional hearing in the Santee City Council chambers. He said it was one of several held across the country over the past two years to allow the committee to try to get perspective on the “growing crisis” at the border by talking to people “who will understand it and who are affected by it,” the congressman said.

Speakers included the mayors of Vista and Santee, a local border security advocate, a Dulzura resident, and the Riverside County district attorney and deputy sheriff — all people who live in or represent areas of Issa’s district in eastern San Diego County and parts of southern Riverside County.

Testimonies ranged from concerns about the increasing amount of fentanyl being smuggled across the border to challenges related to illegal migration.

“There are people who are lawfully seeking asylum. There are people who have lawfully, over a million a year, gone through the process of coming to America legally,” Issa said. “Our goal is to restore the rule of law and to basically recognize that we can have immigration into our country, we can have prosperity for everyone, but we can only do that if we can control our borders.”

Riverside County District Attorney Michael Hestrin pointed to the large amounts of fentanyl coming across the border, which are contributing to a deadly overdose epidemic across the country.

According to data from U.S. Customs and Border Protection, about 26,700 pounds of fentanyl were seized along the southwest border in fiscal year 2023, an increase of about 150 percent from 2021.

“We urgently need comprehensive and strong federal action and robust initiatives to effectively address this problem,” Hestrin said.

Hestrin said several major highways in his county “have become known drug trafficking corridors, providing direct routes from the border to Southern California and beyond.”

“The state’s southern border has become a major entry point for fentanyl coming into the U.S., driven largely by the Sinaloa and Jalisco New Generation cartels, which dominate the Mexican states bordering California,” he said. “While we know the amount of fentanyl seized, we don’t know how much is coming in, but we can only assume those numbers are incredibly large.”

According to Riverside Undersheriff Don Sharp, Border Patrol agents have had to abandon their normal duties of protecting the border from smuggling due to the large numbers of migrants arriving at the border.

“When our Border Patrol agents are distracted from their core duties and the border is wide open, there will always be greater quantities of drugs and people being smuggled,” he said. “The risk of detection and loss of illegal contraband is reduced, and the reduced risk far outweighs the rewards for cartels and criminals.”

The number of migrant encounters at the San Diego sector fell nearly 40 percent in July from the previous month, according to CBP data — a decline attributed in part to President Joe Biden’s recent executive order restricting asylum access. Still, the San Diego sector remained the busiest along the U.S.-Mexico border last month.

Despite the drop in border crossings, San Diego County is still working to set up a migrant transition center, and negotiations with an operator were in the final stages, officials said. The county plans to use $19.6 million it received from the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s Shelter and Services Program.

Santee Mayor John Minto pointed to the large number of recently arrived migrants who were released onto the streets of San Diego after being processed by Border Patrol from September to May of last year: a whopping 154,000.

“The situation underscores the urgent need for a comprehensive, long-term strategy with enhanced coordination among federal, state and local governments and nonprofit organizations,” Minto said.

The releases on the streets have now stopped, as fewer people have crossed the border. Also, the migrant reception centres in the region have sufficient capacity to accommodate the newly released refugees.

Local agencies such as the San Diego County District Attorney’s Office and the Sheriff’s Office were not represented in the group, nor were any of the organizations that have provided humanitarian assistance to migrants over the past year.

A spokesman for District Attorney Summer Stephan said the office was not invited to testify but that the agency looks forward to the outcome of the hearing. The Sheriff’s Office did not respond to questions about the matter.

Issa said local agencies had been invited to hearings before and that this time the committee “wanted to make sure people understood the unique work of Riverside and their leadership.”

When it was noted during the hearing that there were no Democrats on the committee, Issa said that “all members of the committee were invited and those who could come, showed up.” In addition to Issa, Reps. Andy Biggs of Arizona and Scott Fitzgerald of Wisconsin were also present.

Pedro Ríos, director of the American Friends Service Committee’s U.S.-Mexico Border Program, said Friday that the title of the hearing, “border crisis,” was part of a false narrative about what is happening in border communities. He said the crisis was instead that it is now harder for asylum seekers to present their cases safely.

“The crisis exists because there is no priority given to protecting the human rights of migrants and a failure to recognize the importance of asylum procedures for people who fear returning to their countries,” Ríos said.

Rios is one of the volunteers who regularly provides humanitarian aid to migrants waiting to be picked up by Border Patrol at a section of the fence known as Whiskey 8 near the San Ysidro Port of Entry, the same area Vance visited on Friday.

Volunteers said officials asked them to leave the area for a few hours while the visit took place. No migrants were present at the time, Ríos said.

Originally published: September 6, 2024 at 8:01 PM