The Enduring Relevance of National Sovereignty and Borders
“No border, no security.” That simple common-sense point was made by historian Marek Chodakiewicz as he opened up a conference on “U.S. Sovereignty: The Border Challenges” at the Institute of World Politics (IWP) in Washington, D.C., earlier this month. Given that the overarching theme of the conference was the importance of national sovereignty and the manifold security threats posed by open borders, the graduate school of statecraft, national security, and international affairs was an appropriate venue to host such an event. Speakers included Matt O’Brien – current Director of Investigations at the Immigration Reform Law Institute (IRLI) and a former immigration judge and FAIR research director – and Mark Morgan, a one-time senior fellow at FAIR, Border Patrol chief, and Acting Commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection. Below are a few highlights from the conference (with each presentation hyperlinked in the relevant paragraph).
Professor Chodakiewicz, a legal immigrant from Poland, pointed out how essential national borders are for our security. He noted that border security is particularly important in light of communist China’s exploitation of porous borders under the current administration to wage a de facto war on America by working with brutal Mexican cartels to smuggle drugs into the U.S. The fact that the current political establishment allows this to happen and does nothing, he concluded sadly, stems from a disregard for Americans in so-called “flyover country.”
S. Marshall Wilson – a veteran U.S. Army infantry officer, Christian missionary to Peru, and former West Virginia state delegate – stressed how masses of illegal aliens suddenly showing up across the U.S. puts a strain on local communities throughout the American heartland. This is particularly true in economically depressed areas such as Wilson’s native West Virginia.
Matt O’Brien, speaking from his almost three decades of experience within immigration law and policy, reminded attendees that prudent immigration controls have a long history in the U.S. It was only recently that the priorities of our immigration policy became inverted, putting the interests and benefits of American citizens on the back burner while putting the needs and desires of foreign nationals – including those without any legal right to be here – first.
The next speaker, Col. Sergio de la Peña, showed the audience a series of images from both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border demonstrating the true extent of the border crisis. The son of a bracero Mexican farm laborer, de la Peña experienced the “American dream” firsthand, joining the U.S. military and working his way up to U.S. Army Section Chief in Chile, Army Attaché in Venezuela, and, during the Trump administration, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Western Hemisphere Affairs. Given his experience, he pointed out the role of the Marxist left throughout Latin America and the role it plays in encouraging mass illegal migration.
A spirited keynote speech was delivered by Mark Morgan. Morgan explained how Joe Biden’s demolition of his predecessor’s policies turned a border that had been more secure than it had been in a long time into one that is perilously porous and insecure. He emphasized that the current administration’s massive abuse of immigration parole results in the release of hundreds of thousands of effectively unvetted illegal aliens into the country, some of whom, like the Venezuelan gang member charges with murdering Laken Riley in Georgia, are criminals and pose a real threat to Americans. The former CBP Acting Commissioner also took aim at attempts by open-borders apologists to mislead the American public on illegal alien crime. Last but not least, he reminded the attendees that the already sky-high “gotaway” numbers (“the known unknowns”) are likely even higher due to unrecorded “gotaways” (“the unknown unknowns”).