In nearly just one year, since October 2022, the Biden administration has allowed 149 illegal immigrants to cross into the United States border who are listed on the federal government’s Terror Watch List. According to Breitbart, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) encountered the 149 illegal immigrants at both America’s northern and southern border, though a significant majority came through the southern border.
Breitbart reports that there has been a 7,350 percent increase in the encounters with immigrants on the Terror Watch List since Fiscal Year 2017. A report from the House Homeland Security Committee, led by Chairman Mark Green (R-TN) explained that the surge has been drastic, noting that in Fiscal Year 2017 to Fiscal Year 2020, Border Patrol apprehended just 14 individuals who appeared on the Terror Watch List. The report also warned that it is known how many of the 1.5 million got-aways which have evaded Border Patrol are also on the Terror Watch List.
Former Acting Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Director Tom Homan sounded the alarm on having weak border security. He recalled the time shortly after the September 11 attacks in 2001 noting that “after 9/11, we created all these databases so if you want to come to the United States, get a plane ticket or a visa, you gotta go through all this vetting through various databases.”
With weak security at the border, Homan argued that terrorists will seize the opportunity to avoid being checked on the databases. Homan said, “Why would any terrorist put themselves in a position to be vetted through these databases when you can simply get to Mexico, cross the southwest border like 1.3 million others did, and not get arrested?” As of July, House Judiciary Committee, DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas was not able to definitively say where the individuals on the Terror Watch List may have gone within the United States.