Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) is at it again, hitting Biden's Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) with a subpoena.
Specifically, Jordan wants data on illegal immigrants who have been charged with violent crimes.
Talking Points…
- Immigration numbers
- Jordan hits HHS with subpoena
- Analysis
During the Trump years, and Obama years for that matter, our average crossings per year were about 400,000 to 600,000 illegal immigrant encounters at the southern border. Trump got hit with a surge in 2019, but that leveled off again in 2020, and then the numbers went through the roof when Biden took office.
The latest reporting on this has 7.3 million illegal encounters since Joe Biden took office. On top of that, there have already been nearly one million encounters this fiscal year, which would again put us on pace to hit about two million by the end of the fiscal year. There are 36 states in this country that have a population less than the 7.3 million migrants that have crossed our border illegally, so that is something to digest regarding how this is impacting our entitlement programs.
That number does not include legal immigration and gotaways, so the overall number is probably more like 11 or 12 million all in. In cities where we are seeing larger numbers of migrants settle, there have also been reports of more violent crimes involving migrants, which leads us to the reports about Jordan's subpoena.
Rep. Jordan, the chair of the House Judiciary Committee, has issued a subpoena to HHS for data on such crimes. At first, he sent a letter to HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra requesting the information, but the HHS declined to provide that information, where he challenged that the committee had "a legitimate oversight purpose to obtain the case files."
Jordan responded:
"HHS's attempt to unilaterally limit or in any way dictate how a Congressional committee lawfully uses materials to inform potential legislative reforms constitutes unacceptable interference with the workings of a coordinate branch of government and cannot be considered a good faith accommodation."
Jordan continued:
"Across multiple case files, HHS redacted information about whether specific UACs [unaccompanied alien children] had 'identifying scars, marks, or tattoos' — information that can be indicative of gang affiliation. Worse, HHS went so far as to redact information explicitly requested by the Committee, including information shared with HHS by other agencies and immigration case history information.
"By unilaterally redacting the case files, HHS rendered the requested materials provided for in camera review all but useless, frustrating and impeding the Committee's constitutional oversight obligations."
Jordan then issued the subpoena for all documents, accompanied by the claim that this committee has broad oversight and it is not up to HHS to decide what information is and is not relevant to its investigations.
This is one of the hottest topics for the election right now, and there is no way that Jordan is going to let up on this. Joe Biden knows he is in trouble here, with there being recent reports that Biden may pivot on the border to try to save himself in the 2024 cycle. That will not take away, however, from the crimes that have been committed by migrants released into the country by this administration.
Now we get to see if we really do have an unbiased DOJ. If Becerra does not supply the information, will there be referred charges for contempt of Congress? And will the DOJ follow through and issue charges like it did against the Trump operatives who refused to honor subpoenas?
