Dexter Filkins Reports on the Border Crisis

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🗓️ 1 January 2024

⏱️ 25 minutes

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Summary

Dexter Filkins has reported on conflict situations around the world, and recently spent months reporting on the situation at the U.S.-Mexico border. In a piece published earlier this year, Filkins tries to untangle how conditions around the globe, an abrupt change in executive direction from Trump to Biden, and an antiquated immigration system have created a chaotic situation. “It’s difficult to appreciate the scale and the magnitude of what’s happening there unless you see it,” Filkins tells David Remnick. Last year, during a surge at the border, local jurisdictions struggled to provide humanitarian support for thousands of migrants, leading Democratic politicians to openly criticize the Administration. While hard-liners dream of a wall across the two-thousand-mile border, “they can’t build a border wall in the middle of a river,” Filkins notes. “So if you can get across the river, and you can get your foot on American soil, that’s all you need to do.” Migrants surrendering to Border Patrol and requesting asylum then enter a yearslong limbo as their claims work through an overburdened system. The last major overhaul of the immigration system took place in 1986, Filkins explains, and with Republicans and Democrats perpetually at loggerheads, there is no will to fix a system that both sides acknowledge as broken.

This segment originally aired June 16, 2023.

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0:38.6	Your favorite designers, expertly authenticated.
0:42.5	Yeah, eBay. Things people love.
0:49.2	This is the political scene, and I'm David Remnick.
1:07.2	The latest round of military aid for Ukraine and for Israel has been held up in Congress,
1:12.0	not because of spending concerns, but because of border security.
1:17.9	Republicans rejected a spending package earlier this month demanding stricter immigration measures. House Speaker Mike Johnson reportedly told his colleagues that changes to immigration
1:23.0	policy would be their hill to die on. We have to affect real policy change at the border,
1:29.3	and that is a necessary condition to anything we do going forward.
1:33.3	Democrats accuse the Republicans of holding military aid hostage.
1:37.3	Pramila Jaipal, the leader of the Progressive Caucus,
1:41.3	says the sweeping changes that Republicans want would only destroy the country's
1:46.0	asylum system.
1:47.0	I think we need to put our foot down and say, no, vote on the aid package without those
1:53.0	border policy changes and recognize that some of the things that the Biden administration
1:59.0	have been doing have really been working. The border is surely going to be at the center of the presidential race in 2024.
	...

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