This is the Cato Daily Podcast for Tuesday, January 30th, 2024.

I'm Caleb Brown.

The fight over the U.S. border has intensified with many Republicans quick to defend the actions of Texas Governor Greg Abbott

there but for all the bluster and posturing over the problems posed by

illegal immigration.

Edo's David Beer says there seems to be precious little interest among those same Republicans

about creating a rational welcoming and cost effective immigration policy.

I have friends who are Republicans, Dave.

So do I.

And they are up in arms about the border

and have done their best to defend Texas Governor Greg Abbott and his actions related to the

border and meanwhile in the US Senate there is this attempt to put together a

border deal and meanwhile on the

campaign trail there is a Republican candidate leading Republican

candidate for President Donald Trump who seems if you look beyond his public statements, seems perfectly satisfied to maintain

the current level of chaos as it's described at the U.S. border. Is that

reasonably fair? Yeah, everybody wants to use this as you would expect for

their political goals. That's the point of politics. So no surprises there.

But we're getting into some pretty novel territory with this conflict between Abbott and President Biden.

And it's interesting to watch because even notable federal Republicans, people who have the constitutional and legal authority to set the rules at the U.S. border.

They do not seem interested in fundamentally addressing the core of the problem, which of course you get into in your New York Times piece.

Would you mind characterizing your view of where that sits and what your

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