Biden Pumps $1 Billion Taxpayer Money into Making Borders More ‘Climate-Friendly’ amid Illegal Migrant Crisis
Democrat President Joe Biden’s administration is pumping $1 billion in taxpayer money into efforts to make the U.S. borders more “climate-friendly.”
The news comes as the United States battles a historic nationwide illegal border crossing crisis.
Thousands of foreign nationals are currently illegally entering the country every single day due to Biden’s open border policies.
The ongoing surge of illegal aliens is putting unprecedented strains on federal and local resources.
Nevertheless, the General Services Administration (GSA) announced it would direct Inflation Reduction Act funds to support the “climate initiatives” at the border.
GSA Administrator Robin Carnahan and Andrew Mayock, President Biden’s Federal Buy Clean Task Force co-chair, said the action would reduce “harmful emissions.”
However, the move was slammed by Republicans and experts.
“As usual, the Biden administration is refusing to address a problem of their own making,” House Natural Resources Committee Chairman Bruce Westerman (R-AR) said in a statement.
“Instead, they’re touting a billion-dollar investment in green technology at the border while Biden’s border crisis continues to wreak havoc on local communities and federal lands.
“Talk about fiddling while Rome burns.”
“Time and time again, the House Committee on Natural Resources has spotlighted these issues and recently held a field hearing in one of the hardest-hit areas of southern Arizona, yet this administration refuses to address the crisis they’ve created,” he continued.
The top Republican lawmaker has repeatedly called attention to both the border crisis and environmental degradation indirectly wrought by migrants poring over the U.S.-Mexico border.
“Spending a billion dollars to build a so-called ‘environmentally friendly’ port of entry feels like a slap in the face to Americans watching our open border policies trash our beautiful public lands day in and day out,” said Westerman.
According to the GSA, the funding will help illegal migrant handling efforts align with the “Net Zero” targets of teh World Economic Forum (WEF).
The GSA says the tax dollars will be used to support reduced overall operational emissions of federal activities at the border, the development of 23 all-electric buildings, projects ensuring four land ports of entry coply with “Net Zero” targets, and modernization and paving projects involving “embodied carbon avoidance.”
For example, $200 million will be used to renovate the Bridge of the Americas port in El Paso, Texas.
The renovations will involve installing solar panels, electric vehicle chargers, and other energy efficiency installations.
Another $135 million will be used to make the Douglas Commercial Port in Cochise County, Arizona, all-electric.
$100 million will also be blown on making Arizona’s San Luis land port the first “Net Zero” port of entry.
In addition to hundreds of millions of dollars spent on southern border ports in California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas, GSA is also earmarking millions more for so-called “decarbonization” projects along the U.S.-Canada border in Washington, Idaho, North Dakota, Minnesota, New York, Vermont and Maine.
NumbersUSA CEO James Massa blasted the move in s statement, saying:
“The Biden Administration has made it abundantly clear that it will take no effective action to stop the flow of illegal immigration into the United States, only attempt to process faster the intake of inadmissible aliens.
“The long-term effects of the administration’s clear aim of adding as many people to the U.S. population by circumventing immigration restrictions put in place by Congress means that our nation’s carbon footprint will increase markedly, which is at odds with President Biden’s stated goal,” he added.
Massa highlighted that, while the administration seeks to implement “sustainable technologies” at the border, the migrant crisis simultaneously strains the “limited local resources such as water, destroys sensitive environmental sanctuaries for birds and other species, reduces farmland, and creates unsustainable dynamics that weakens the conservation of the nation’s natural resources.”
“In addition to endangering those millions of people by encouraging them to travel at the hands of cartels, these journeys across Central America to the U.S. southern border are devastating to croplands and wildlife habitat along the way,” Massa added.
Meanwhile, in January, the federal government reported more than 156,000 migrant encounters at the U.S. southern border.
The figure is a slight year-over-year uptick, but a decrease compared to the month prior.
In December, more than 302,000 migrants were encountered crossing the border, by far the largest single-month figure ever recorded.
The December figures brought the fiscal 2024 first-quarter level to 785,000 encounters, the highest number ever recorded.
