Peach Tree Times

Marc Thiessen, an opinion columnist for The Washington Post, recently attributed the surge in U.S. crime and drug abuse to President Joe Biden's open border policy.

This comes as drug abuse and crime are on the rise in Georgia and across the nation.

Citing U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) statistics, Thiessen said the flood of migrants who entered the country illegally over the past year forced U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents to shift resources and manpower away from drug interdiction and toward processing migrants.

"One major reason we are facing a surge in crime is the disaster Biden unleashed on our southern border," Thiessen said in his opinion piece. 

Numbers show that non-citizen arrests in the U.S. increased since 2020. CBP data showed that the number of criminal non-citizen arrests during Fiscal Year 2021 was 10,763 – a 341% increase from Fiscal Year 2020, when President Donald Trump was in office. The total then was 2,438. The number of criminal non-citizen arrests so far for Fiscal Year 2022, which goes from Oct. 1, 2021, to Sept. 30, 2022, is 5,985.

The Georgia Department of Public Health (DPH) reported in March that fentanyl-related overdose deaths increased in Georgia since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. Between May 1, 2020, and April 30, 2021, fentanyl-involved overdose deaths increased 106.2% when compared to the same time period the previous year. Between early February and mid-March of this year, at least 66 Emergency Department visits involved the use of fentanyl-laced drugs such as cocaine, methamphetamine, crack, heroin, painkillers, and cannabis.

"Overdose deaths from fentanyl coming across the border hit record levels in 2021, claiming a new victim every five minutes," Thiessen said.

The New York Times recently reported on the drastic rise in fentanyl deaths from drug use, claiming "supplies of tainted pills, crudely pressed by Mexican cartels with chemicals from China and India, have escalated commensurately." The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) seized 20.4 million counterfeit pills in 2021; experts said this represents a small fraction of the number of pills produced. 

This number also represents enough fentanyl to provide a lethal dose to every American, according to a DEA press release.

Scientists estimated that approximately four in 10 pills contain lethal doses of fentanyl, according to The New York Times. In 2021, there were nearly 108,000 drug fatalities in the U.S.

Biden in recent months expressed his intention to lift Title 42, a health code used by the Trump administration during the pandemic to prevent migrants from entering the U.S. If this regulation is lifted, Border Patrol agents predict a major surge in illegal border crossings, according to a CBP press release. 

U.S. District Judge Robert Summerhays of Louisiana on Friday granted a preliminary injunction to stop the Biden administration from lifting Title 42. Twenty-one states sued to block the lifting of the regulation.

Lifting Title 42 would "open the floodgates for the cartels to traffic illegal drugs into the United States," Thiessen said, as more Border Patrol agents "will be pulled off the front line to process and care for migrants."

The Center Square reported that Georgia's violent crime rose at a rate of 17.4% from 2019 to 2020. The current rate stands at 400 incidents per 100,000 people, which is higher than in most states. The majority of violent crimes reported in the state during that year – 73.4% – were cases of aggravated assault. The increase in violent crime rates in Georgia was led by a surge in homicide cases. In 2020, 943 murders were reported in Georgia, representing a 44.2% increase from 654 murders in 2019.