Sen. Marshall Raises Alarm Over Spike in Chinese Illegal Immigrants

Sen. Roger Marshall (R-Kan.) speaks with reporters during a press conference in the U.S. Capitol in Washington on July 11, 2023. Madalina Vasiliu/The Epoch Times

Sen. Roger Marshall (R-Kansas) raised concerns about a significant surge in Chinese immigrants crossing into the United States illegally over the past year.

In September 2023, he sent a letter to Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas expressing concerns about the surge in Chinese illegal immigrants and the potential national security threat they pose. In an interview with NTD, Mr. Marshall said he still has not received any response from the secretary.

“What we simply asked of DHS was: Where are these people? Who are they? What’s their background? And as we’re seeing fentanyl poisoning continue to explode, we’re starting to see human trafficking explode as well,” Mr. Marshall said.

He noted that he and his colleagues still demand answers regarding the role of the Chinese illegal immigrants in the current surge of human trafficking.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) encountered more than 52,000 Chinese nationals along the U.S. northern and southern border in fiscal year 2023, which ended on Sept. 30, 2023. This was nearly twice the number in the prior fiscal year.

The number of encounters has been steadily rising, with 30,000 already recorded in the first four months of 2024, according to the CBP data.

In his letter to Mr. Mayorkas, the Kansas senator noted that most of the Chinese nationals are single adults, with some of them having ties to China’s People’s Liberation Army.

Last year, Mr. Marshall co-sponsored the “No Asylum for CCP Spies Act” to prohibit members of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) from being granted asylum in the United States.

“If you’re having 10,000 people cross the border in a day, there is no way the Border Patrol has the opportunity to vet who this person is or their background, let alone what their intentions are,” he said.

“Are they on a terrorist watch list? Are they working hand in glove with the CCP? Why are they in this country?”

Illegal immigrants who passed through a gap in the U.S. border wall await processing by Border Patrol agents in Jacumba, Calif., on Dec. 7, 2023. John Fredricks/The Epoch Times

Mr. Marshall is among 13 Senate Republicans who recently urged the Senate Republican leadership to hold a “proper” impeachment trial against Mr. Mayorkas.

In a recent letter, they asked Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) to join their efforts to oppose what they see as Democratic attempts to “shirk their Constitutional duty.”

The House recently voted to impeach Mr. Mayorkas, the first impeachment of a Cabinet secretary in almost 150 years.

Mr. Mayorkas, who was appointed by President Joe Biden and confirmed by the Democratic Senate in 2021, faced impeachment on two counts regarding his handling of the border crisis by a vote of 214–213.

“The house has done its job. Now, it’s the Senate’s job,” Mr. Marshall said.

“The American public wants somebody to be held accountable for these 300 deaths that we’re having every day from fentanyl poisoning. So, we’re asking our leadership to step up and be vocal as well. We’re asking Leader McConnell and the other people in our leadership to be vocal and say, ‘Look, we demand a public trial.' That’s what the next step of impeachment is.”

According to Pew Research, 80 percent of Americans, including 73 percent of Democrats, think the U.S. government has done a bad job handling the illegal immigrant influx, the highest share recorded since President Biden was inaugurated.

Illegal crossings have surpassed 8.8 million nationwide since President Biden assumed office, according to U.S. CBP data.