Georgia’s state government has recommitted itself to Texas and its efforts to secure the southern border without the help of President Joe Biden and Washington, D.C.
Gov. Brian Kemp announced on Feb. 13 that an estimated 15-20 more National Guardsmen would be deployed to Texas to set up a forward operating base and further assist Gov. Greg Abbott after both chambers of the Georgia Legislature passed resolutions condemning the Biden Administration for its handling of the southern border.
“The crisis on the border is a national problem, and it demands a national solution,” Mr. Kemp said during a press conference. “But if the Biden Administration continues to fail the American people, then we have no choice, no choice but to step in.”
After a Senate Resolution passed 31-15 on Feb. 12, the House of Representatives passed its own, identically-worded resolution 96-71 on Feb. 13.
That vote came after more than 80 minutes of debate in what has become an increasingly divided chamber, with Republicans losing five seats in 2022 alone.
Rep. Steven Sainz, who sponsored the legislation, said it was “a simple bill that makes clear that Georgia is leading where our federal government is failing.”
Democrats Cry ‘Trump’
Nearly all of the opposition speakers in the House took a broader stance to antagonize the Republican Party for failing to secure the border and fix immigration at the federal level last week and several years prior. They also argued that former President Donald Trump was behind the Senate’s latest failure to pass a border security bill.“Every time a border solution has come up before Congress over the last 25 years, it’s the republican party that has stood in the way,” said House Minority Whip Rep. Sam Park in his Minority Report.
He also said, “Rather than focusing on tangible, actionable bipartisan solutions, Republicans would rather bow down to reelect a twice impeached man and Donald Trump who says he will be dictator only on day one.”
Rep. Jesse Petrea rebuked both of these claims.
“My friends, the president of the United States already, today, right now, has absolute authority to restrict or suspend entry into the United States by proclamation,” he said.
He also said Republicans in the Senate were right to ignore the latest bill.
“What it did was expand the authority and allow bureaucrats to award asylum without even using judges,” he said, adding that it had very little to do with immigration and “moreover about the borders of other nations across the globe.”
False Narratives
Both sides also cried false narratives in terms of the perception of those crossing into the country illegally, who those people are and how many, and the fentanyl crisis associated with them.Rep Lisa Campbell accused Republicans of “fearmongering” and said in 2021, more than 86 percent of convicted Fentanyl drug traffickers were U.S. citizens, not illegal immigrants.
Rep. Becky Evans said Georgia had “no jurisdiction over the American border with Mexico or with Canada for that matter” and that “10 million people are not flooding across our borders. It’s physically not possible. Literally not possible.”
In an attempt to pander to the Hispanic community, Rep. Park Cannon gave her comments completely in Spanish and ended by asking in English, “Did anyone understand what I just said?”
“For those of you who did not understand, I asked you to vote no because you do not understand of which you are putting forward this measure today,” she said.
Rep. Rey Martinez, born in Puerto Rico to Cuban immigrants, denounced her speech, saying, “I’m not going to pander to my community. I respect this body. I respect the state. And in this country, we speak English.”
“Some of these are not my Latino friends that are the only ones that are coming in that border,” he said, highlighting 24,000 encounters with Chinese border crossers in 2023 and 9,000 so far in 2024. Of that combined total, 29,000 were single adults.
Rep. Will Wade pointed out that “169 people on the terror watch list were encountered at the southern border” in 2023, as well as thousands of points of fentanyl.
“The current administration has turned a blind eye to what these illegal immigrants might do to our country,” said Rep. Rick Jasperse. “I can foresee untold sleeper cells that will attack our country, create new gangs in our state, and further push drugs into our community.
Not a Political Issue
While the vote fell on Party lines, Georgia’s Speaker of the House, John Burns, and Mr. Kemp said the issue goes beyond partisanship.“The simplest fact of the matter is that the massive increase in illegal immigration we have seen in this country is not a red state issue,” Mr. Burns said. “It’s not a blue state issue. It is an every-state issue.”
Georgia has been sending members of its National Guard to Texas since 2019, with 29 guard members currently deployed. Mr. Kemp was also one of the 13 Republican governors who joined Mr. Abbott at Eagle Pass on Feb. 4.
This recommitment also follows a commitment by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis to send a full battalion (1,000 guard members) on Feb. 1. Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry promised to send 150 members on Feb. 8, and Indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb promised to send 50 National Guard members on Feb. 9.
