John Oliver discusses the things Biden has promised to fix about our southern border, what he has and hasn’t done, and a magnificent pile of gators. 

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-♪ ♪ -♪ ♪ Our main story tonight concerns immigration.

Well, the reason I'm in this country, not the reason I exist.

A tax accountant fucked a stork, and voila, here I am.

Specifically, we're gonna talk about the situation on our southern border.

And I know what you're thinking, you're thinking, finally, someone is gonna address the magnificent statue in El Paso known as Pile-a-Gators, featuring what looks like a bunch of horny reptiles engaging in a sloppy swamp orgy.

But while that is certainly a situation on the border.

It is sadly not the situation, which refers to what's going on with migrants down there.

And if you ask politicians on the right, that situation can best be summed up like this.

Our border is wide open and out of control, and Americans are dying because of it.

The truth is that there is an invasion happening at our southern border.

Migrants are absolutely invading this country.

Okay, let's first acknowledge the irony of cowardly freaking out about migrants in front of a sign that reads, Mr.

Never before has a nameplate felt so intensely sarcastic.

But also, setting aside the blatant xenophobia there, are the 2 of you wearing matching outfits?

Because it sure feels like you met up at men's warehouse, made a beeline for the Caucasian collection, picked out the exact same suit, and then wore it like Tweedledum and Tweedledeportation.

The right has been fear-mongering about immigration even more than usual lately.

And to be fair, actually, I don't have to be fair, fuck them.

But to be fairer than they actually deserve, there is a lot happening at the border right now.

The number of migrant encounters there, which was rising before Biden came into office, reached a record high last year.

Now, that has happened for a number of reasons, including that we're coming out of a global pandemic, and multiple countries from Haiti to Venezuela to Ukraine are in crisis right now.

So there's a high number of people forced to flee their homes.

Plus, some asylum seekers may understandably have been encouraged by Biden's rhetoric on the campaign trail, which was notably different than his opponents.

Look, I can't only imagine what it's like to see someone in your family deported.

That's not gonna happen in my administration.

The idea you can't even seek asylum on American soil?

Yeah, it's all about family, beginning, middle, and end.

A pretty empty phrase from a presidential candidate, but to be honest, a pretty good tagline for Fast 10.

It's only mildly less comprehensible than, -"The End of the Road Begins." -$5, 000.

But at the time, that promise sounded good.

It is worth remembering that even if Biden wasn't your favorite candidate, even if he was your least favorite candidate, after 4 years of Trump, That was pretty refreshing.

It's like wandering through the Sahara Desert for 4 years and all of a sudden, seeing a Panera.

I mean, it's not necessarily paradise in its own right, but compared with what you just went through, you would kill for an Asiago turkey sandwich and a lemonade, No question.

Promises like that are why we cited Biden's potential to undo Trump's damage on immigration as a key reason to vote for him just a week before the election.

Unfortunately, though, When it comes to the southern border, Biden has disappointed in a lot of ways.

But it is not because he's opened up the country to an invasion.

It's actually, in many ways, the opposite.

Many migrants, including asylum seekers, are finding it impossible to access this country through our ports of entry.

And the conditions that they're facing are dire.

In many border cities, shelters and detention centers are reportedly near capacity, with the director of 1 of them saying, every day, I turn away at least 10 families with children.

And just last month, at least 40 people died when a migrant center caught fire.

And frustratingly, a lot of this has been exacerbated by U.S.

Policies that are well within Biden's power to remedy, and yet, he hasn't.

And that is basically what our story is about tonight.

It's about what Biden promised to do, what he has and hasn't done, and how his latest efforts to fix things might actually make them worse.

And first, let's acknowledge it is impossible to assess what Biden has done at the border without looking at what he inherited.

Trump campaigned on high-octane xenophobia, and his policies reflected that, from large-scale family separation, to attacking DACA, to his so-called Remain-in-Mexico policy, which led to massive encampments of would-be asylum seekers south of the border.

And Trump approached all of it with his signature clarity.

We're doing a record-breaking job, but we have bad laws.

You know, when you have bad laws, you can do good, but you can do a lot better if you had good laws.

I mean, that is total gibberish, but if you look at what he's saying closely there, you'll find it's also, and this is true, a haiku.

-♪♪ I'm kidding, it absolutely isn't, but wouldn't it be great if it was?

If that buffoon was capable of accidental beauty, but it's not, and he isn't, so we're back to square 1.

Now, to Biden's credit, he created a task force to reunify the separated families, he strengthened protections around DACA, and he suspended the Remain in Mexico policy.

And yet, there remain huge numbers of people stuck just south of the border in camps that look an awful lot like the ones that were there during Trump.

And a significant reason for that has to do with a policy called Title 42, which allows the U.S.

To kick migrants out of the country with shocking ease.

Now, we've talked about it before, but just as a refresher, it's not actually an immigration law at all.

It is an arcane public health order aimed at preventing the spread of communicable diseases.

The Trump administration implemented it in March of 2020, invoking it as a safety precaution intended to prevent COVID-19 from spreading through Border Patrol stations.

But the truth is, long before COVID, its use had been floated by Stephen Miller, a child's answer to the prompt, -"Draw Squidward from memory." -$25, 000.

In fact, the invocation of Title 42 was referred to as a Stephen Miller special.

He was all over that, a sentence I truly hope no 1 has to speak or hear ever again.

And Miller has bragged about Title 42's sweeping powers.

The principle of it is very simple, which is that during a pandemic, If you come into this country, your very presence here, if you enter unlawfully, is a threat to our public health.

Okay, first, I'm pretty sure if you played the sound of Stephen Miller's voice in a maternity ward.

A newborn infant would instinctively say, despite not having any knowledge of the English language, -"Shut the fuck up!" -$HUFFING AND LAUGHING Because that threat to our public health line was bullshit.

While Trump claimed that the order originated with the CDC.

1 former health official said that they were effectively forced to implement it, adding it was either do it or get fired.

In fact, the CDC scientist said there was no evidence Title 42 would actually slow the spread of coronavirus.

But the reason Trump seized on it is pretty obvious.

Under normal circumstances, migrants have the legal right to ask for asylum no matter where they cross the border.

But like Incel Caillou said, Title 42 gave the government the power to rapidly expel any migrant without giving them an opportunity to make a case for staying in the country legally, including to seek asylum.

And you would hope that upon taking office, Biden would move as fast as possible to get rid of it.

But instead, his administration has been all over the place.

Just a few months into his presidency, his Secretary of Homeland Security sent this message to potential migrants.

The border is closed, the border is secure.

We are expelling, families, we are expelling single adults under, the CDC's authority, under Title 42 of the United States Code, because we are in the midst of a pandemic, and that is a public health imperative.

Except it wasn't a public health imperative, and everyone knew it.

And look, if you're gonna parrot Trump's harmful talking points, at least throw in some of the funny ones as well.

Every time you do a press conference to bolster some bullshit xenophobic policy like Title 42, you also have to go off on a tangent about how Robert Pattinson should have dumped Christine Stewart.

For months afterward, the Biden administration let the policy stand, and even at 1 point, defended it in court.

Then, to be fair, they did try to end it, only for a federal judge to block those efforts, with the reporting at the time indicating that the ruling was met with a sigh of relief inside the White House.

Moreover, Biden actually expanded who could be expelled to Mexico under Title 42, because while the order initially allowed the U.S.

To do that with migrants from these 4 countries.

He chose to broaden it, first to include Venezuelan migrants, and later to those from Cuba, Haiti, and Nicaragua.

And the administration will point out, and not wrongly, that they have issued humanitarian exemptions to Title 42.

It's estimated that around 187, 000 migrants were granted exemptions from May of last year to just last month.

But not only is that a fraction of those seeking asylum, the administration's been criticized for a lack of clarity and consistency in who is eligible.

And in general, some have argued that there's been a pretty glaring discrepancy in who the country has and hasn't decided to allow in.

At a migrant shelter in Tijuana, Mexico, claims of a double standard.

Special treatment for Ukrainians fleeing the war and being admitted to the U.S.

I love that the government is helping them because they're going through a really hard situation.

But that's not what happens for people here.

How do you guys account for the difference in the treatment between them and you guys?

It's the answer to so many questions like, why are some people treated differently at the border?

And why does your grandpa insist on pronouncing Kamala the way that he does?

And Title 42, including Biden's expanded use of it, has functionally robbed people of their basic right to make an asylum case for themselves, which can be devastating.

Just listen to this Honduran migrant talk about getting all the way to America with his family on the presumption he'd be able to apply for asylum, only to be taken into custody and woken up 1 day with an unpleasant surprise.

We're taking you to a shelter, and you can keep going from there." And that was a lie.

When we got off the bus, we saw the sign that said Tijuana, Baja, California.

That's when we realized we'd been sent back.

So you didn't realize until you were already in Mexico?

Look, that is clearly not how immigration policy should work.

Under no circumstances should people on a bus be lied to about where it's going, unless that is, it's a Bachelorette Party bus, and they're demanding to be taken to another bar even though 1 of them already threw upon a pigeon.

In that case, and that case alone, you say, sure, you swing by CVS for some Pedialyte, and you take them back to their Airbnb.

And because many migrants can't return to the country that they were fleeing, they wind up stuck on our southern border, or trying repeatedly to get back into the country, often at their own peril.

More than 890 migrants died in border crossings last year, making it the deadliest year since the U.S.

Government began tracking border crossing deaths.

And for those stuck in Mexico, the experience can be harrowing.

1 group found that since 2021, there have been over 13, 000 reports of murder, torture, kidnapping, rape, and other violent attacks on migrants and asylum seekers blocked in or expelled to Mexico under Title 42.

Now, the good news is, Title 42 may be about to expire.

And the reason for that is, when the broader COVID public health emergency ends on May 11th, Title 42 is expected to expire with it.

The bad news, though, is that even with over 2 years to plan, Biden's new proposed rule may not be much of an improvement.

For 1 thing, asylum seekers will now be expected to make an appointment at a port of entry through a new government app that Biden proudly announced in January.

If they're seeking asylum, they can use an app on their cell phone called CBP1ONE.

That's to spell it out, not the number 1.

And as you can see, its icon apparently features, and I honestly don't know what else this could be, a border patrol agent with a raging boner.

It has been in use since January as a way for people to request exemptions to Title 42, and the early results aren't great.

Every morning at 9 a.m., women frantically try to refresh the government app, hoping to get an appointment to enter the U.S.

We watch with Karina Braseda, who runs the shelter.

By 9.05, all the appointments and hope were gone.

With people's families, with people's livelihoods, with people's well-being.

We clearly should not be placing people's fate in the hands of a smartphone app.

And don't get me wrong, apps can serve a lot of functions.

For example, this 1 is for messaging your friends.

This 1 is for seeing what your mom is up to.

This 1 is for accidentally turning it on, muttering shit, and finally turning it off after a minimum of 3 tries.

This 1 is for watching democracy crumble while Cher tweets the most baffling series of emojis that you've ever seen.

And this 1 is for looking at photos of pugs who make a better living than you do.

The point here is, we use apps for many purposes, but reserving an appointment to try and secure the safety of your family probably shouldn't be 1 of them.

As of right now, only about 740 people per day can get appointments through the app.

But since there are obviously far more people who need them, a day's appointments can run out within minutes, which is why some have dubbed the app Asylum Ticketmaster.

And just take a moment to appreciate quite how shitty of a company Ticketmaster is?

People saw vulnerable migrants being robbed of their ability to seek asylum and thought, hey, you know what this reminds me of?

What's more, many asylum seekers have outdated cell phones, if they have them at all, that don't support the CBP-1 app, and often have limited or no access to the internet.

And on top of all of this, it requires people to upload a selfie.

And its facial recognition technology has worked better for some than for others.

Even for digitally savvy migrants, the experience has been a challenge.

They say the app has glitches, and some even claim the facial recognition feature malfunctions for those with darker skin.

I get up to the option to scan my face, but it asks to get closer and closer, but it doesn't do anything.

And that's the problem, that it takes a long time to load, and that's where it fails.

At 1 shelter in Reynosa, they even had to install bright construction lights for people with darker skin to shine on their faces so the app would recognize them.

And I've got to say, given the history of everything that's happened in this country ever, it is hard to think of anything more on brand than a U.S.

Immigration app that scans your face and says, -"Not white enough." -$5, 000.

And none of this is even getting into some of the other issues with the app, like that it's told migrants to report to border stations 1, 500 miles away, and has made it very difficult for families to get appointments together.

And for anyone considering trying to circumvent this process by crossing the border between ports of entry to request asylum, something that again, is completely legal.

Under Biden's proposal, you would be presumed ineligible for asylum unless you've already applied for it and been denied in any country that you've already passed through.

And as many have pointed out, that is eerily similar to a Trump-era policy that made migrants ineligible for asylum if they passed through a third country en route to the U.S.

That forced people into dangerous situations and was completely antithetical to the basic tenets of U.S.

And that is something that Biden himself definitely used to understand, given that, remember, he's the guy who said this.

Now, it's in a rule that you just proposed.

And I know there are a lot of things that we would all like to forget from 2020, like the word, chromosexual, or how everything was cake for a while, or how gonzo my hair got.

I look like I legally have to tell everyone that I just moved into the neighborhood, but your outrage at the treatment of asylum seekers shouldn't be something you're just allowed to forget.

So, If and when Title 42 expires next month, it seems that we're not going back to the way that things were before Trump.

Because with Biden's new proposal, we're just entering a different phase of an immigration dystopia, particularly for asylum seekers, and a lot of people are unhappy with it.

The UN High Commissioner for Refugees has said it's inconsistent with the foundational principles of international refugee law and recommended that the government refrain from adopting it.

Look, it is pretty obvious that Title 42 was never a functional or compassionate model of immigration policy.

But neither is funneling migrants through an app whose boner icon actually makes sense now, given just how thoroughly it fucks people.

Well, restoring the right to asylum would roll back at least some of the harm that's been done here, but that is just the start.

We also have to scale up capacity of our entire immigration system, including our immigration courts, which, as we've talked about on the show before, are massively overloaded.

They're currently estimated to have a backlog of over 2000000 cases.

And beyond that, it is critical that we also expand other legal non-asylum pathways into this country.

Basically, we badly need actual immigration reform, which means congressional action.

But that hasn't happened in decades, and until it does, our immigration system will remain fundamentally broken.

But that is no excuse for making things even worse with bad policy and shitty apps.

And I know this can be hard to hear for some Democrats who are reluctant to hear any criticism of Biden.

They will point out that Trump was absolutely worse on immigration, which he definitely was.

Biden should, at the very least, be held accountable to the promises that he made.

But the problem is, when it comes to asylum seekers in particular, you're talking about a group of people for whom those promises are among the easiest to break.

And the fact is, migrants are gonna keep seeking asylum in this country as they have every legal right to do.

And we need to make a choice in whether we are comfortable to continue leaving so many of them in squalor and danger at the border?

Or whether we're willing to finally fulfill our nation's promise of offering them a safer, more hopeful life in a free country, complete with the single horniest pile of gators in the entire world.

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Biden & The Border: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO)