GOP Responds to Biden's Plan to Give Cash to Corrupt Central American Countries
A month after the Biden administration released its ridiculous plan to send foreign aid to Central America, House Republicans questioned the strategy in a letter released Monday.
Republican Reps. James Comer and Jason Smith, of Kentucky and Missouri respectively, addressed their letter to acting Director of the United States Office of Management and Budget, Shalanda Young, expressing their concern over a “conditional cash transfer program” directed towards residents of El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras.
As Comer and Smith wrote, “the purpose of such a program would be to discourage illegal immigration from these Northern Triangle countries.”
Former southern border coordinator for the Biden administration, Roberta Jackson, described the plan last month to Reuters, explaining the plan came as a result of the administration “looking at all of the productive options to address both the economic reasons people may be migrating, as well as the protection and security reasons.”
In other words, the idea is essentially to pay potential migrants to stay in their own countries.
Comer and Smith wrote, “In the midst of a border crisis propelled by the Biden Administration reversing successful deterrent policies, it is worrisome that the Administration’s solution isn’t to reinstate those policies or replace them with workable solutions, but instead to funnel more money to pay countries to dissuade their citizens to break U.S. laws, particularly countries with corruption concerns.”
This corruption is a true threat to potential foreign aid. In one declassified State Department report, over 50 former or current senior government officials working in the Northern Triangle countries are “credibly accused” of various acts of corruption, including money laundering and embezzlement.
Rather than admit that they could have possibly done wrong in the way of policy decisions, Biden and his team are determined to shrug off responsibility and keep their woke policy in place while wasting the money of taxpayers on government officials who will, most likely, use their money to aid themselves or drug cartels.
While Jackson did assure Reuters that the Biden administration “isn’t gonna be handing money or checks to people,” Comer and Smith were seemingly unfazed. They continued in their letter, “The President’s fiscal year (FY) 2022 discretionary budget request includes $861 million in financial assistance to Central America ‘to address the root causes of irregular migration from Central America to the United States.’
“That request — which is much higher than current funding levels which already stand at around half a billion dollars — is couched as merely ‘ first step toward a four-year commitment of $4 billion’ of the region.”
$4 billion dollars of American money, meant to improve poverty in Central America and stem immigration to the southern border, going directly to some of the most corrupt men and women on the continent.
They might as well throw our money in paper shredders.
Even the Trump administration used foreign aid to its advantage. As the letter reads, “Unlike the Trump Administration, which leveraged the use of aid to secure actual cooperation from Northern Triangle countries on migration issues, the Biden administration has simply announced this ‘commitment’ with apparently no strings attached.”
The Trump administration cut off foreign aid to Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras in June 2019, after former President Donald Trump slammed the countries for not doing more to stop their citizens from storming America’s southern border.
Just four months after the cut-off, though, aid was reinstated by Trump as the three countries had “signed historic Asylum Cooperation Agreements and are working to end the scourge of human smuggling.” As a result, the administration began to give aid to the countries in order to assist them in the process.
Trump used foreign aid in order to get a better deal for Americans. Now, the Biden plan will seemingly give billions of dollars to those same countries for doing absolutely nothing.
Comer and Smith also slammed the Biden administration for refusing to take responsibility for their border crisis, writing that the “root causes of the current border crisis” are, in fact, the administration’s policy and rhetoric which has catalyzed one of the largest illegal immigration surges in recent history.
Biden’s role in pulling immigrants to the border isn’t in question, either. Immigrants along the border have repeatedly told news outlets and authorities that they wouldn’t have come to the country if not for Biden being elected, while some even wave the president’s campaign flag.
Unfortunately for the wallets and livelihoods of millions of Americans, though, the Biden administration refuses to admit as much.
Comer and Smith continued, “The strategy of sending cash payments to foreign countries to stem the tide of illegal immigration caused by Biden Administration policies is naïve and misguided.”
“Moreover, the countries identified as potential recipients include some of the most corrupt countries in the world, with El Salvador and Guatemala ranking in the top ten. This raises further concerns that such aid would simply be wasted on corrupt politicians and organizations serving their own interests, and not those of the interests of the American people.”
The representatives capped off the letter with multiple requests for information from Young, including “documents and communications” revolving around the Biden plan, seemingly aiming to expose whether the plan is in action or not.
It’s unclear whether the Biden administration will go through with the plan, and to what scale it will be implemented. Thankfully, though, Republicans are keeping an eye on the president and will call out the insanity of the Biden administration as long as it continues.
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