Pompeo says Biden already gone further than Obama in creating ‘completely open borders’

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'Enormous crisis' at border after Trump administration stemmed flow: Mike Pompeo

Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo tells ‘America’s Newsroom’ President Biden is incentivizing traffickers amid the border crisis.

Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Thursday said that the Biden administration is going further than the Obama administration in creating "completely open borders" as numbers continue to surge at the border.

Pompeo, who served in the previous administration, defended Trump-era policies like the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP) and criticized the new administration for reversals that he said were incentivizing illegal immigration to the border and helping coyotes.

ICE ARRESTS PLUMMET IN FEBRUARY AS BIDEN ADMINISTRATION TIGHTENS RULES

"It is not humane to create this false set of incentives for these folks to come across and make this arduous travel across their own country, then across Mexico and try to get into the United States of America," he said. "We had these policies right. We worked hard. I worked diligently to convince the Mexican government to allow us to have these asylum seekers remain in Mexico."

"It was working, and now this administration has abandoned it," he said.

The Biden administration has reversed not only MPP -- which kept migrants in Mexico for their hearings -- but also halted wall construction, ended agreements with Northern Triangle countries, and has moved to narrow the number of migrants targeted by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

The administration has denied there is a crisis at the border, although it has admitted that the numbers it faces are "overwhelming." Pompeo contrasted the Trump and Biden moves and echoed the sentiments of other Republicans, who have accused the Biden administration of embracing a far-left agenda on the border and immigration.

"We demanded that the Mexican government not allow these traffic flows to continue in from Guatemala and from El Salvador and from Honduras. They put National Guardsmen on the border. This created the right incentives for these governments to take care of their own people and not try and transfer these problems to the United States of America," he said.

ICE ARRESTS PLUMMET IN FEBRUARY AS BIDEN ADMINISTRATION TIGHTENS RULES

"It was the right thing for American sovereignty and for the American people. And I regret that the Biden administration has moved, frankly, farther than even the Obama administration did with respect to creating completely open borders on our southern border," he said.

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His remarks come a day after Customs and Border Protection (CBP) announced it had encountered 100,441 individuals in February, a 28% increase over January, the agency said. Of those, 19,246 individuals were in family units; 9,457 were unaccompanied children (UACs) and 71,598 were single adults.

So far, encounters in FY 2021 to date are 97% higher than FY 2020 and 24% higher than FY 2019.