Texas Attorney General Republican candidate George P. Bush told Newsmax Friday that the open border policies of President Joe Biden's administration are going to "chip away at law and order" in the border communities.
"This administration has decided (at) every turn they're going to chip away at law and order, especially in border communities that, time and time again, are seeing wave after wave of caravans, and it's eating away at the public treasury of our state," Bush said during "Spicer & Co." "My theory is that when more migrant caravans end up in blue states, suddenly the president is going to get some calls from his fellow Democrats to change their policies."
Bush, the son of former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, grandson of the late former President George H.W. Bush, and nephew to former President George W. Bush, said instead of plans to pay migrants separated from their families under the Trump administration some $450,000 each, the federal government should give Texas the estimated $1 billion the program could cost so the state could engage in its own border law enforcement.
The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday that the administration was in talks to provide the compensation to families that were separated during Trump's presidency.
According to the Journal, the $450,000 paid to each migrant would be for "lasting psychological trauma," and could provide up to $1 million for each family and would settle several lawsuits being brought on the migrants' behalf.
"President Biden has agreed that the family separation policy is a historic moral stain on our nation that must be fully remedied," Lee Gelernt, deputy director of the ACLU's immigrant-rights project and a lead negotiator on one of the lawsuits, told the Journal. "That remedy must include not only meaningful monetary compensation, but a pathway to remain in the country."
Bush said that Customs and Border Protection projects as many as 2 million apprehensions of illegal migrants crossing the border this year, and fear that number could be even higher in 2022 because of Biden's policies.
"The incentive now is to come here illegally. It's easier to come here illegally than (through) the legal process, and it's dangerous, it is chipping away the law and order," he said. "While Congress has decided they're going to pass $3.5 trillion (in) excessive spending, and socialize our country, they're leaving states, like Texas, behind footing the bill, and it's irresponsible."
Bush is currently a land commissioner in the state and is facing off next year against incumbent Ken Paxton who was elected in 2014, and reelected to the post in 2018.
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