It was another rough day for White House Press Secretary Karine Jean Pierre, as she was pressed by Fox News Whtie House Correspondent Peter Doocy over her claim that illegal immigration has plummeted by 90%.
For reference, KJP claimed during her May 1st press briefing that “[President Biden] has asked Congress to take action — Republicans in Congress to take action and to take — and to work on this in a con- — in a bipartisan way. He’s going to continue to do that. In the meantime, he’s put forth some — he has tools that he’s used to — to make sure that we do this — we actually deal with the immigration system in a humane way, and in a — in a way that is that — that actually deals with what we’re seeing at the border. And that’s why you’ve seen the parolee program be so successful. It has — it has — it has — when it comes to illegal migration, you’ve seen it come down by more than 90 percent, and that’s because of this act- — the actions that this President has taken. But we know that more action needs to be taken. So it has to be legislative action. We’re going to continue to call Congress to do that. And so, this is important to this President. On day one — on day one, he put forth in — a legislation to move forward on this.”
Well, Doocy pushed back on that, demanding answers and not letting her dodge the question. Watch him spar with her here:
As you can hear in the video, Doocy asked if the border is really that secure went the administration is sending 1500 troops to it, saying, “Thank you. If the border is secure, as the administration has said, then why would we need to send 1,500 active-duty U.S. troops down there?”
KJP, in response, said, “Because we need more work. We need — more work needs to be done, Peter. We put forth a comprehensive immigration legislation, and Congress — Republicans in Congress refuse to act. And so, the President has used the tools that he has in front of him to — to prepare ahead of Title 42 lifting. As you know, that is happening in the next couple of days. And so we are putting — DHS, Department of State is putting forth process — processes to deal — to deal with the changes that are going to be ahead of us. And so that is what’s important here, and that’s what you’ve been seeing for the past several months. You’ve heard from DHS, you’ve heard from the State Department on what we’re putting in place to deal with — to deal with the border once Title 42 lifts.”
That’s when Doocy jumped in to demand an answer on the infamous “90 percent” claim, asking, “You said yesterday that, when it comes to illegal migration, you’ve seen it come down by more than 90 percent. Where did that number come from? Because —”
"*" indicates required fields
The two then had a back-and-forth before she finally gave something of an answer, saying, “So I was speaking to the parolee program. As you know, the President put in place a parolee program to deal with — to deal with certain countries on — on ways that we can limit illegal migration. And we have seen — the data has shown us that it has gone down by more than 90 percent. That was what I was speaking to.”
Though the Biden Administration might have reclassified illegal immigrants as parolees, the truth of the matter is that, in March, Border Patrol reported 191,899 encounters with immigrants along the southern border. That’s compared to 35,000 reported encounters in February. So, there was a 548% increase, not a 90% decrease, in border crossings.
Featured image credit: screengrab from the embedded video