The announcement that a federal judge has temporarily blocked President Joe Biden and his administration from lifting a Title 42 public health order at the Mexico border on May 23 was welcomed news to the communities and law enforcement agencies still reeling from the ongoing influx of undocumented migrants which started after Biden was sworn in.
Federal officials admitted to Judge Robert Summerhays with the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Louisiana that once Title 42 is fully lifted, the number of border crossings are expected to “increase significantly” to as many as 18,000 migrants each day. As a result, last Friday the judge granted a request by 21 states for a preliminary injunction which forces the White House to comply with various federal rules before making any more changes to Title 42 enforcement.
In March 2020, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) under President Donald Trump invoked Title 42, which is part of the Public Health Services Act of 1944 aimed at preventing the spread of communicable diseases in the country. Title 42 allows federal officials to suspend the right to introduce migrants -including those seeking asylum- by sealing the land borders into the United States and expelling crossers back into Mexico or return them to their home countries.
Biden later loosened Title 42 to no longer apply to unaccompanied children or to certain migrants who can show a “significant law enforcement, officer and public safety, humanitarian, or public health” interest.
For the month of April 2022, only 42 percent of crossers were expelled under Title 42, according to a report issued by Rep. John Katko of New York. By then, the CDC had announced Title 42 would end May 23, to be replaced by unspecified plans to control COVID-19 in other ways.
Arizona is among the states named as plaintiffs in the lawsuit, which contends the end of Title 42 will bring “much greater numbers of paroled aliens with non-meritorious asylum claims who were induced to enter the United States because of the Termination Order.”
Summerhays was assigned the states’ lawsuit and issued a temporary restraining order against Biden, the CDC, and federal immigration officials to keep Title 42 in place until the legal challenge is complete.
Part of that challenge involves ensuring the U.S. Department of Homeland Security has a workable a plan ready to implement for border operations once Title 42 is lifted. The Administrative Procedures Act (APA) requires a public notice period, with sufficient time for comment, before the CDC’s Title 42 order can be ended. And there is a requirement that the CDC show its proposed change is not “arbitrary and capricious.”
The lawsuit contends keeping Title 42 in place until an APA-compliant plan is in place will prevent “an imminent, man-made, self-inflicted calamity: the abrupt elimination of the only safety valve preventing this administration’s disastrous border policies from devolving into an unmitigated catastrophe.”
Summerhays was asked to change the temporary order into a permanent injunction, which he considered last week. His May 20 ruling notes the states provided sufficient evidence to support their argument that the CDC’s announced termination of Title 42 will increase community and state costs for healthcare, education, and public safety as a result of “increased border crossings and that, based on the government’s estimates, the increase may be as high as three-fold.”
Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich called Summerhays’ ruling “a significant win,” and noted that maintaining Title 42 for now is vital.
“I’m grateful to the court for upholding the rule of law and helping maintain some level of sanity as we continue to battle the Biden-made border crisis,” Brnovich said.
In the meantime, U.S. Border Patrol Chief John Modlin of the Tucson Sector continues to tweet about the never-ending group of undocumented migrants and deadly fentanyl coming across the southwest border.
Modlin announced earlier this month that Tucson Sector agents hosted a binational training for immigration officers assigned to the Instituto Nacional de Migración. The training held at the Nogales Station included first aid and fentanyl exposure. It will enhance the handling of emergencies along the shared border, Modlin noted.
Modlin also recently hosted a delegation from Poland and the Baltic states to discuss border security best practices. And he shared information about that two large groups of had been encountered by USBP agents near Lukeville.
Those taken into custody were citizens of Brazil, Chile, Cuba, Guatemala, and Peru.
In one night, Ajo Station agents encountered two large groups near Lukeville, AZ.
Of the 119 migrants taken into custody, 95 were citizens of Cuba or Peru. The remainder of the group consisted of Brazilian, Guatemalan, and Chilean citizens. pic.twitter.com/S5FKptMeBo
Arizona House Minority Leader Reginald Bolding (D-Laveen) claimed Republican secretary of state candidate Mark Finchem would have rigged the 2020 election in favor of former President Donald Trump if he had been in office.
Bolding made the statement during Wednesday’s debate for Arizona’s secretary of state candidates as a response to Arizona Horizon host Ted Simons’ question about preventing politicization of the secretary of state’s office.
“The reality is, is that in 2020 if Mark Finchem was our secretary of state, Donald Trump would’ve stolen the election. How do we know? Because he told us,” said Bolding.
After the debate, Bolding tweeted that voters needed to “move past the 2020 elections” in order to “change the tone” of the upcoming elections.
If we ever to change the tone of this year's elections, we have to move past the 2020 elections. We're going to use the leadership of the office to make sure we improve the system and fight for safe and secure elections.
Bolding’s remark elicited an incredulous expression from his debate opponent, fellow Democratic candidate and former Maricopa County Recorder Adrian Fontes.
Simons didn’t respond to Bolding’s accusation. Instead, he addressed a separate question to Fontes about the importance of Democratic voters to select a winning candidate.
Several critical water infrastructure projects will move forward across Arizona, funded through the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, referred to as the Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill.
Nearly a dozen projects throughout the state will be funded as part of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ 2022 Spend Plan. The $18.5 million in funding was signed into law last November by President Joe Biden, although the authority for the water infrastructure projects in Arizona tracks back to the Water Resources Development Act of 2020 signed by then-President Donald Trump.
The funds are intended for projects to help small, rural, and tribal communities across the state meet their water and wastewater infrastructure needs. Under the authority, federal funds cover 75 percent of a project’s total cost and go towards assisting with design and construction.
The first project to be funded under the authority is already under way—a critical water pipeline for the Pascua Yaqui Tribe. The $578,000 pipeline project will boost water security for the community and support future growth in the area, according to supporters.
Other projects in Arizona to be funded under the Corps’ 2022 Spend Plan include:
$3.5 million for construction of a waterline in the city of Maricopa
$3 million for construction of a new wastewater treatment system for the Middle Verde District of the Yavapai-Apache Nation
$2.25 million to make wastewater treatment plant improvements in Buckeye
$2.25 million to install backup generators for Pima County’s water reclamation facility
$2.25 million to install reclaimed water pipeline and rehabilitate existing infiltration gallery at the Queen Creek Restoration Project in Superior
$1.5 million to construct the WF Killip Elementary School Regional Flood Detention basin in Flagstaff to mitigate post-fire flooding
$1.2 million to continue construction of Flagstaff Downtown Flood Lateral Tunnel to provide flood protection
$1.155 million to make improvements to the water filtration treatment plant in Kearny
$772,500 for water system improvements in Quartzite
A separate water infrastructure plan being funded through the Corps will provide $65.7 million to complete a flood control project for the Little Colorado River. The project consists of new and reconstructed levees which will protect the community of Winslow and other areas of Navajo County.
The current levee system is in danger of overtopping or failing in a 100-year flood event. This places nearly 1,600 structures—including almost all of the community’s critical public facilities such as hospitals, schools, nursing homes, and utilities—at risk.
These are fraught days for Americans. History is said to be cyclical but there is widespread concern that we are in inexorable decline.
Our leadership role in the world which seemed secure three decades ago is under serious threat. Polls show that confidence and love of country are in decline, especially among the young. Traditional American values like freedom of speech, free-market economics and responsible fiscal policy are openly attacked.
Meanwhile, e pluribus unum is facing replacement by a culture obsessed with racial identity. MLK’s dream of a society where skin color doesn’t determine our judgments of each other is now itself deemed racist.
America, though, is the longest running liberal democracy in history for a reason: our Constitution. Our great freedom document connects us to our roots, the sources of our strength. It can direct us away from hyperpartisanship toward mutual respect and agreement on shared principles – if we respect its authority.
But the Constitution has been repeatedly ignored and abused in our recent history. Many argue it is an 18th-century construct unsuited to governance in the 21st-century. Others claim it should be seen as a “living” document that means whatever someone says it means without regard to its actual content.
Since the Constitution prescribes limits on governmental powers, it particularly vexes Big Government types wishing to centralize power and enlarge their span of control. For example, a century ago President Woodrow Wilson was an early leader of the Progressive movement, which held that modern government should be guided by administrative agency experts.
Wilson thus opposed the separation of powers doctrine. He cautioned against “the error of trying to do too much by vote“, given the ignorance of the common man.
His legacy of disdain for the Constitution is reflected in today’s administrative state, in which unelected bureaucrats make binding rules (laws), direct the enforcement of those rules and adjudicate violations.
FDR later also regarded the Constitution as a problematic document requiring workarounds for him to be successful in establishing the social welfare programs and regulations thought necessary to rescue America from the Great Depression. He was so frustrated by the Supreme Court striking down his unconstitutional power grabs that he infamously tried to expand the court to15 members.
Roosevelt was temporarily rebuffed but eventually was able to secure so much of his agenda that the role of government in Americans’ everyday lives changed dramatically. Safeguards to liberty like enumerated powers and federalism suffered permanent damage.
Recent presidents have taken the constitutionally curious position that they should be permitted to exceed their normal powers when Congress won’t act as they prescribe. Barack Obama, a former constitutional law professor, correctly stated many times that he wasn’t authorized to suspend DACA deportations through executive order. There were “laws on the books“ and “I am not king“, he pointed out.
But he eventually caved, unilaterally granting work permits and legal status to first millions of illegal immigrants who entered as minors, then later to adults (later struck down). The legal fate of DACA is still pending, despite its continuing unconstitutional status.
Joe Biden used the same logic when confronted with the need for extension of the eviction moratorium passed as an emergency pandemic measure by the Trump administration. Biden acknowledged that the Supreme Court had already ruled that an extension would require congressional approval. But to appease his party’s lefties, he did it anyway, expressly ignoring the Constitution.
Donald Trump was also loathe to let the constitution interfere with what he wanted to do anyway. His most egregious transgression was pressuring Vice President Pence to reject the electoral ballots lawfully submitted by the states in the 2020 presidential election.
Pence, clearly lacking the constitutional authority to do so, refused. Fortunately, unlike previous miscreants, Trump was so thoroughly rebuked that no precedent for similar actions was created.
Part of the reason America is in trouble is because we are not protective of our Constitution, not outraged when it is abused. Judicial nominees, charged with upholding the Constitution, are vetted instead based on their political agenda.
We demean our constitution at our considerable risk. It is our bulwark against the corruption and chaos that plague impoverished nations around the world.
Dr. Thomas Patterson, former Chairman of the Goldwater Institute, is a retired emergency physician. He served as an Arizona State senator for 10 years in the 1990s, and as Majority Leader from 93-96. He is the author of Arizona’s original charter schools bill.
