Americans are increasingly alarmed by people flows across the US-Mexico border, with record numbers now saying the influx of asylum seekers is a ‘crisis’ or a major problem, a new poll shows.
A CBS News survey found that a staggering 93 percent of respondents said the frontier was in a ‘crisis’ or that border guards faced a ‘very serious’ or ‘somewhat serious’ issue of undocumented arrivals.
Only 7 percent of the 2,157 people surveyed said it was ‘not much of a problem.’
The share of Americans who call it a crisis has shot up from 38 percent last May to 45 percent currently.
Fully 93 percent of Americans say the southern border is either in a ‘crisis’ or some type of serious problem
Scenes of asylum seekers like this on the Texas-Mexico border dominate headlines at the start of the 2024 presidential race
Chaos at the southern frontier has become a headache for President Joe Biden, a Democrat, who is repeatedly bashed by Donald Trump and other Republicans over an ‘open border’ in an election year.
Only 32 percent of voters approve of Biden’s handling of immigration, while 68 percent disapprove.
In September, 55 percent of respondents said the Biden administration needs to get tougher on migrants.
That’s risen to 63 percent in just four months.
The southern border has seen ever greater numbers of migrants cross the frontier and ask for asylum since Biden took office in January 2021.
US border agents have since made more than 5 million arrests of migrants making irregular crossings — that is, not through a controlled border station — over the US-Mexico border.
The trend is fueled by ever more people fleeing political chaos in Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela.
Voters increasingly say the Biden administration needs to get tougher on people flows across the southern border
President Joe Biden trails in polls against his most likely 2024 challenger, former president Donald Trump
There were more than 10,000 arrests for illegal crossing per day over several days in December alone.
In cities including Chicago, New York and Denver, migrants who have no access to work permits sleep in police station foyers and in airports.
These scenes dominate the early phase of the 2024 presidential campaign, with Republicans excoriating Biden and weighing whether to impeach his Homeland Security secretary Alejandro Mayorkas.
Republicans want Biden to back more restrictive policies that would dramatically reduce asylum protections, among other things, and they believe they have leverage if the president wants them to authorize tens of billions in aid to Ukraine.
They also say migrants are straining budgets, and even such Democrats as New York Mayor Eric Adams say social services are being overwhelmed by newcomers.
Taxpayers have to front nearly half a trillion dollars each year because the Biden administration is not stopping migrants at the southern border, Republicans said in a report last month.
The cost of providing education, healthcare, law enforcement and other expenditure resulting from millions of extra migrants adds up to as much as $451 billion a year, says the House study.
Growing numbers of voters say scenes at the US-Mexico border amount to a ‘crisis’
Migrants seeking asylum in the US gather near the border wall after crossing a razor wire fence deployed to block their entry
‘Every day, millions of American taxpayer dollars are spent on costs directly associated with illegal immigration and the unprecedented crisis at the Southwest border sparked by … Mayorkas’ policies,’ says the report.
DailyMail.com this month met with migrants who had travelled from as far as Africa in search of a better life in the US.
Hundreds of homeless expats, mostly young and middle-aged African men, were waiting in line outside a church New York City’s East Village last week, hoping to find a place to sleep.
They said they are ‘the victims of the lies in the movies’ after life the Big Apple was not what they expected.
Among them was Landry, 40, from Congo, who told DailyMail.com he spent his life savings of $9,000 traveling to the US, taking the difficult decision to leave his wife and 14-year-old son behind four months ago.
Landry, 40, from Congo, told DailyMail.com he spent his life savings of $9,000 traveling to the United States, taking the difficult decision to leave his wife and 14-year-old son behind four months ago
The huge line outside St. Brigid School in the East Village where migrants wait for shelter and food
The military veteran had been hoping to land a job in construction but he’s been unable to find work in the city and ended up sleeping on the streets in sub-zero temperatures after shelters ran out of space.
Conditions in Congo were ‘terrible’ according to Landry, with frequent fights between ethnic groups and oppressive laws – but he said life in the Big Apple has been ‘even worse.’
‘It’s like prison here,’ he said, speaking in French. ‘It’s negligence. We have no access to food, toilets, or anything. Animals live better here – pets in the street are treated better than us.
‘The UN building is right there to talk about the problems around the world but look at all this on the doorstep… desperation and lack of services.’
‘We were sold a dream in Hollywood films and TV, but the reality of life in New York City is not like the movies,’ he said, adding that he had been bussed over from California.
When asked how he felt thinking of his family back in Congo, Landry said: ‘I cry and think, why did I do this? But it’s too late. I spent my life savings coming here and now I can’t get a job. What can I do?’