Letters

I’m not sure what it is about Westhampton, but we locals certainly enjoy sparring here in the Letters space. My old friend John Neely has returned to make his point at my expense, if he can [“Blatant Politics,” Letters, February 15].

In his rebuttal to my letter of February 8, which was itself a response to an opinion piece by Carlos Sandoval, he takes issue with my claim that President Joe Biden is responsible for the chaos at our southern border. He also attempts to make the rebuke by House Republicans of the woefully inadequate Senate compromise border bill seem a political stunt.

I see it differently. Republicans have been consistently clear on a central issue that never seems to get traction with Democrats and Mr. Neely. Republicans will not compromise on securing the border, period. It is as simple as that. You can dress up your pig anyway you like, but this bill is still an open border, and a pig is still a pig.

This legislation actually suggested a threshold of up to 5,000 arrivals a day for a week could be acceptable before an automatic trigger would shut the border down. My math isn’t great these days, but I think if we use a conservative figure of 30,000 a week as under that limit, and we have this boatload of new migrants coming in for 50 weeks in a year (with two weeks off for holidays), we will have merely 1.5 million new mouths to feed, house and educate. Is that what you would call meaningful legislation, Mr. Neely?

Mr. Trump was called a racist for the closing of our border with Mexico and building a wall. He was vilified for the turning back and discouragement of waves of new people determined to get in legally or otherwise. This policy was, in reality, humanitarian and entirely appropriate. It also was widely believed even then that among the many “gotaways,” a significant danger existed that there could be potential terrorists and criminals entering our country.

Remembering that President Barack Obama had deported 3 million illegals, and that for him a total of 1,000 entrants a day was deemed too many, we got a new president in 2020 who undid the Trump restrictions on immigration. Consequentially, this was the beginning of the migration of 10 million to 12 million people we know of, and an untold number of “gotaways” that we are learning from our FBI may harbor the foreign infiltration of criminally connected organizations.

For this, Mr. Neely, we have President Biden and Alejandro Mayorkas to thank — not Mr. Trump or House Republicans. Secure the border, and then the politics of compromise may be appropriate.

Ed Surgan

Westhampton