This is the Cato Daily Podcast for Wednesday, April 3rd, 2019.

I'm Caleb Brown.

The President is threatening to shut down the border between the US and Mexico,

despite the fact that many people cross the border between the US and Mexico, despite the fact that many people

cross the border every day for tourism, work, business, and more than a billion

dollars in goods cross the US-Mexican border every day.

Cato's Dan Eekinson and David Beer say the U.S. Mexican border every day.

Cato's Dan Eekinson and David Beer say it's not without precedent.

The president has said that he might close the border between the United States and Mexico.

One of his advisors, Kelly Ann Conway,

says this is a threat that should be taken very seriously.

And to his credit, I suppose, as offering that threat seriously, it seems that the

president doesn't necessarily understand exactly how profits work when it comes to international trade.

He was quoted as saying, I'll just close the border and with a deficit like the one we have

with Mexico and have had for many years, closing the border will be a profit-making operation.

If that's actually his view, then we probably should take his notion seriously that closing

the border would fix problems that he sees with cross-border

migration. So to you, Dave Beer, what precisely is the problem that closing the border is supposed to solve?

Right now, people from Central America, primarily Guatemala and Honduras as well as El Salvador, are coming

to the border and asking for asylum.

And they are typically crossing the border illegally

between ports of entry and turning themselves into Border Patrol agents, at which point they are arrested and detained,

...