A viral Facebook post claims the U.S. has a “border that is wide open,” even though the country is “locked down.” The full text of the post reads as follows:
The claims in this post are false.
Despite some reversals in Trump-era policy and the decision not to expel “young vulnerable children,” U.S. Customs and Border Patrol has reported a number of expulsions under Title 42. For context, Title 42 allows for the U.S. Customs and Border Patrol to quickly expel migrants at the Mexican border as a public health measure. Title 42 was instituted by Trump at the start of the coronavirus pandemic in March 2020.
In February 2021, authorities at the border expelled more than 70,000 people trying to cross the border under Title 42. The key difference, though, between Trump’s use of the policy and Biden’s use is that under the Biden administration, migrant children are being admitted into the country.
So, while there have been changes in Biden’s immigration policy from the Trump Administration, it’s inaccurate to claim that the U.S. border is now “wide open.”
The second part of the Facebook post’s claim that “the country is locked down,” is also untrue.
As of March 30, only four states are advising people to stay at home, but are not enforcing a curfew. These states include: California, New Mexico, Wisconsin, and Kentucky, according to the New York Times. In California, bars are the only type of establishment that is not yet open. Retail, indoor dining (for the most part), hair salons, gyms (for the most part), as well as some entertainment venues, are open in all these states, per the New York Times.
Furthermore, the majority of the country has allowed for businesses to be mostly open. Only California, New Mexico, Colorado, Arizona, Oregon, and Connecticut are states where some businesses are still closed.
If you have a claim you would like to see us fact check, please send us an email at factcheck@thedispatch.com. If you would like to suggest a correction to this piece or any other Dispatch article, please email corrections@thedispatch.com.
This is a very problematic fact-check, the sort that Jonah Goldberg has complained about from other outfits.
It takes an opinion - that the administration is more worried about the activities of its own citizens than illegal immigration - and applies (in my opinion) inappropriate standards of judgement to the rhetorical segments.
For instance, it says that unless a state has a "stay at home" order, it's not "locked down". But is that an appropriate standard of judgement? Most states have had sweeping impositions into public life for over a year, restricting the activities of citizens either directly or indirectly by threatening businesses to enforce their desired modes of behavior. Why does that not qualify as "locked down"?
Additionally, we've seen a massive increase in immigration across the border. By all accounts, a significant number of these are minors - a point conservatives have been making for some time. Because of the way US immigration law evolved, it created incentives for minors and those seeing asylum. Under Trump, a hard line was being taken on those issues to reduce the incentives that were causing the increases in immigration dating back to the Obama administration. The reversal in policy of the Biden administration effectively "throws open" the door to those incentives again, which is why the Biden administration is having a scandal with overcrowding of detention facilities even worse than Trump saw.
The fact check basically creates an unreasonable standard of judgement on the use of rhetorical language to express an opinion. Reasonable people can disagree on whether the country is "locked down" and whether the Biden administration policies have made the border "wide open", and what those two things together indicate about current US politics and policies. This never should have been subject to a fact-check, and it's inappropriate to mark it as "false".
It's kind of silly to "fact check" a meme that is obviously a rhetorical exaggeration.
But if you are going to do it, I don't think it's debunked by saying that "authorities at the border expelled more than 70,000 people trying to cross the border." The question is how many people *got in.* Besides, under catch-and-release, they can just turn around and re-cross until they finally get in. Maybe all those 70,000 people still got in after a couple tries.