(American Thinker) Joe Biden’s border policies are disastrous for communities nationwide, including cities that are nowhere near United States borders. There have been at least 10.8 million encounters with illegal aliens nationwide since the start of Fiscal Year 2021 (FY2021), according to Rep. Mark Green’s September “Startling Stats” report on the border crisis. The same report indicates that 2 million more aliens have entered as “known gotaways.” According to former chief of Border Patrol Raul Ortiz, the total number of gotaways “could be underreported by as much as 20 percent.”
The devastating numbers fail to tell the whole story, however. Embedded in those historic numbers are criminal gangs like Tren de Aragua, whose members have taken root in communities nationwide. Tren de Aragua is terrorizing communities, forcing the Biden administration’s U.S. Treasury to label the gang as a U.S.-designated transnational criminal organization (TCO).
The Treasury’s announcement states that the gang has “opportunistically infiltrated local criminal economies.”
Tren de Aragua “engages in particularly vicious activity in victimizing populations and maintaining sources of income, such as sex and migrant trafficking and the distribution of illegal drugs,” according to a September 20,2024 letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland from members of Congress who put pressure on the administration to put sanctions on Tren de Aragua and designate the dangerous gang as a TCO.
Primarily Venezuelans, members of Tren de Aragua control many migration routes to our borders, thereby victimizing many migrant children and families who pay gang members for passage.
Even more alarming is the foothold Tren de Aragua is gaining in American cities. The same group that has terrorized parts of Latin America is now menacing American cities like Chicago and New York City. The gang has even “resurfaced” in Tennessee, according to TBI director David Rausch.
