Time and time again, Donald Trump has deflected and passed the blame to distract from a harsh reality: he failed to secure the southern border
Trump baselessly claimed that “we had the most secure border” during his first administration.
Border crossings were higher under most of Donald Trump’s first term than they were at any time during President Obama’s presidency. And the problem continued to worsen under Trump’s failed leadership. Border crossings were nearly 15% higher in 2019 than before Trump was inaugurated.
Trump has repeatedly falsely accused the Biden-Harris Administration of inaction on the southern border.
The Biden-Harris Administration negotiated a bipartisan border deal which would have implemented the toughest and fairest reforms in decades to secure the border. But then Donald Trump got involved – directing his allies in Congress to abandon the compromise deal for his own personal, political gain. Why? Because Donald Trump doesn't want a solution, he wants a campaign slogan.
Trump claims migrants were "coming from prisons, they’re coming from jails, they're coming from mental institutions and insane asylums."
There is no evidence to support Trump’s claims that jails ‘throughout the world’ are being emptied out so that prisoners can travel to the U.S. as migrants, nor for his claim that foreign leaders are also emptying out mental health facilities for this purpose. These claims have been investigated and disproven repeatedly by numerous experts and media outlets.
Trump has claimed, without evidence, that there is a surge of terrorists crossing the southern border.
Encounters with individuals on the Terrorist Screening Dataset, also known as the “terrorist watch list” are extremely rare – and occurred at roughly the same rate under the Biden-Harris Administration as they did throughout Donald Trump’s first term.
Trump has repeatedly suggested that deadly drugs like fentanyl have been smuggled into the United States by migrants.
There is no evidence to support this claim. In fact, data shows that most illicit fentanyl smuggled into the country is done by U.S. citizens at official ports of entry. There is also no evidence to suggest that the crisis worsened under the Biden-Harris Administration. The opioid epidemic actually surged to crisis levels under Donald Trump’s failed leadership. In reality, fentanyl overdose deaths spiked under Trump and decreased in 2023 under the Biden-Harris Administration.
Published: July 2024
Updated: November 2024