White House Plans To End Southern Border COVID Protocols, Republicans Push Back

Republicans in Congress are warning that the Biden administration’s plan to end the use of a policy aimed at restricting the spread of COVID-19 by restricting the influx of undocumented migrants is going to cause a serious problem at the southern border and that the administration isn’t taking it seriously enough.

Administration officials announced last week their intention, in late May, to discontinue the use of what is known as ‘Title 42’, a public health directive invoked by President Trump in March 2020 which allows border control authorities to expel migrants without giving them a chance to apply for asylum, in an effort to limit “the introduction of communicable diseases.”

It’s estimated that, through February, 1.7 million migrants had been denied entry to the U.S. under Title 42, 1.2 million of those since Biden took office.

The administration says the use of Title 42 is at the discretion of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and that the CDC has indicated, with the pandemic winding down and much greater access to vaccines, treatments, and tests, the policy is no longer warranted.

But Republicans like Oklahoma Senator James Lankford said the administration appears not to be taking seriously the massive increase in illegal crossings this change is likely to cause.

“[The administration’s] own numbers estimate a million people will illegally cross the border within six weeks at the moment that they drop Title 42,” Sen. Lankford (R-OK) said at a press conference last week. “They’re aware of what they’re about to release. They have had a year to be able to plan for it, and they’ve chosen not to.”