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The Senate Immigration Deal Would Only Make the Border Crisis Worse

On the heels of the worst month ever recorded at our southern border, a Senate deal is being quietly negotiated by Republican lawmakers.
From what we have learned about this deal, it would make the current border chaos permanent, tying the hands of future administrations to stop it.
This deal would permit up to 150,000 illegal crossings per month (5,000 every day, 1.8 million per year) before a new “shutdown” authority could be invoked.
The deal also contains deceptive provisions that appear to toughen enforcement, but would actually have the opposite effect. For example, the deal claims to make detention mandatory for single adult males, even though current law already provides for the mandatory detention of all individuals who enter illegally, which the Biden administration of course refuses to execute.
The proposal would also provide billions in taxpayer dollars to bail out sanctuary cities and states that continue to provide social services to illegal immigrants.
The negotiated deal, as reported, is a backroom political ploy that would make permanent Biden’s tools for causing chaos and an open border.

Schedule an Interview: Mark Morgan and Lora Ries

The Houthi Are a Foreign Terrorist Organization, and Here’s What Biden-Blinken Team Should Do About It

In February 2021, Secretary of State Antony Blinken delisted the Yemeni Houthi as both a Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTO) and as Specially Designated Global Terrorists (SDGT). Now, almost exactly three years later, it’s obvious this was a huge mistake.
This unfortunate error needs to be reversed.
Delisting the Houthi only encouraged their Iran-sponsored terrorist violence against Saudi Arabia and UAE, with almost no response from the United States. 
Terrorist designations are not messaging devices; they involve a serious interagency process with significant consequences for the groups on the lists. 
President Biden’s hopes of a diplomatic victory going into the election year in the form of a Yemen peace deal is reportedly why the administration is reluctant to retaliate directly against the Houthi despite their repeated and outrageous provocations. 
Rather than prioritize an elusive Saudi-Houthi deal, the Biden administration should recognize what inaction against the Houthi could cost Americans here at home, and so re-designate them as both a FTO and a SDGT, and take the necessary actions to deter them from further violence.
If they fail to do so, voters may well decide to hold them accountable.

Schedule an Interview: Victoria Coates

Lawmakers Should Weaponize State Budgets to Rein in Rogue Public Colleges

There is a lot that the people holding the budget pen can do to rein in colleges beholden to critical theory and diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) ideologues.
As many legislators already know, just about any policy idea can be translated into budget language. The language could be, “No public institution of higher education may spend funds to,” or “provided that no public college may receive funds unless it,” and then finish the paragraph with the policy idea.
Perhaps the easiest and most significant reform, though, does not even require such language. Simply reduce the line items for four-year colleges and move much of this funding to career colleges.
In the case of a discipline hopelessly captured by DEI or critical theory, a college may not spend any state dollars on that discipline at all.
As for implementing a high-quality curriculum — there are good options, including that no college may receive funding unless it requires a minimum level of economic literacy, civic literacy (think U.S. Constitution), and cultural literacy (back to Socrates and Shakespeare) for graduation. Second, the core general education curriculum should be limited to serious, content-rich courses, and colleges must redistribute faculty teaching loads into such courses.
State budget makers are responsible for making good bets on student outcomes, holding public institutions accountable, and spending taxpayer dollars in alignment with state policies that serve and protect our democracy.

Schedule an Interview: Adam Kissel

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