Gov. Greg Abbott (R-TX): There Is No Difference Between Joe Biden And Beto O’Rourke With Regard To Open Border Policies

Listen To The Full Interview Below:

Governor Greg Abbott (R-TX) joined the Guy Benson Show to react to the breaking news that the body of a missing Texas National Guard soldier has been recovered after trying to save illegal migrants from drowning.

Governor Abbott reacted to the news that the body of a missing Texas National Guard soldier had been recovered by saying,

“Well, listen, obviously it’s a tragedy and it — but — but it demonstrates the sense of heroism, the sense of valor that the — these National Guard members have. They are willing to put their lives on the line, even when it looks like somebody else is losing their life and they — they knowingly put themselves in danger to try to save somebody else’s life. And that’s exactly what this National Guard soldier did. And so I consider them to be both a Texas and American hero.”

Governor Abbott blasted his opponent Beto O’Rourke on border policies by saying,

“Beto would have implemented the exact same open border policies that Joe Biden is implementing. There is no difference between Joe Biden and Beto O’Rourke with regard to these open border policies. And let me tell you, Guy, something that I think is going to result from this, not only are Texans going to be angry about Beto’s position on the open border policy, Hispanics in particular, especially those who live on the border, they are tired of their communities being overrun by these open border policies. And we have a good chance this election for Republicans to win not only counties along the border but also win a majority of Hispanic votes in the state of Texas. Hispanics are for safe communities, not open border policies that lead to unsafe communities.”

FULL TRANSCRIPT BELOW:
GUY BENSON, HOST, FOX RADIO: From Del Rio, Texas in Base Camp Alpha embedded with Operation Lone Star, it is the Guy Benson Show on this Monday. I’m Guy Benson. Thank you very much for listening. Guybensonshow.com, that’s our website. Podcast is always free. And joining us now in a Guy Benson show exclusive is the Governor of the great state of Texas, Greg Abbott, a Republican governor. Welcome back to the show. Thanks for joining us.

GOV. GREG ABBOTT, (R-TX): Great. It’s great to be back. Welcome to Texas.

BENSON: It’s great to be back in Texas although clearly a very somber day, here especially with the Texas National Guard as the body of Specialist Bishop Evans has been found. That was confirmed earlier today. I know you put out a statement a few hours ago, Governor. Just an extremely sad development in this broader context of this border crisis that you’re trying to do something about down here in the Lone Star state. Just your reaction to today’s news.

ABBOTT: Well, listen, obviously it’s a tragedy and it — but — but it demonstrates the sense of heroism, the sense of valor that the — these National Guard members have. They are willing to put their lives on the line, even when it looks like somebody else is losing their life and they — they knowingly put themselves in danger to try to save somebody else’s life. And that’s exactly what this National Guard soldier did. And so I consider them to be both a Texas and American hero. At — at — at the same time it’s a travesty that we as a state have to deploy National Guard as well as Texas Department of Public Safety officers to the border and we have to do so because of the Biden administrations mid-handling of border security. As you know and your — and your listeners need to know, there is an inadequate number of border patrol officers on the border. ICE has been basically decimated by the Biden administration. Of the border patrol members who are down there, they don’t really get to patrol the border like they’re supposed to be doing because they’re doing paper processing work and for all these people that are arriving across the border. And so basically border patrol officers had been reduced to paper pushers. And Texas is having to stand up and put soldiers on the border to secure the border as much as we possibly can.

BENSON: Governor, I know some of the officials in this state said that the migrants who seem to be drowning, who were in fact saved by Specialist Evans as he lost his own life, they’ve said that those migrants are believed to be drug smugglers. Can you confirm that?

ABBOTT: That’s what I was told by the director of the Texas Department of Public Safety. It is also my understanding that they had been arrested. And bottom line is if they were drug smugglers they — they either have been or will be arrested and they’re going to be prosecuted. And so it — it shows something that the public needs to understand and that is the people who are coming across the border, they are not the benign migrant worker who wants to come work in the agriculture field just because they’re from Mexico. We’ve got people coming from more than 150 different countries across the globe. Everyone or almost everyone getting across the border with the assistance of the drug cartels and many of whom are carrying drugs like these individuals that the National Guard member was trying to save. And so it’s an extraordinary problem. And you know I — I don’t want to prolong this answer too long, Guy, but — but the fact of the matter is many of the drgus going across the border are these fentanyl drugs that are deadly dangerous and they’re killing people across the country in Harris County, which is where Houston is located. There’s been a reported — at least one person dying per day because of fentanyl that’s made in China and imported illegally across the border from Mexico. And so this is a extraordinarily dangerous what the cartels are doing along our border with regard to importing deadly drugs like fentanyl into the United States.

BENSON: And you made reference to this just a moment ago in our conversation, Specialist Evans really shouldn’t have had to been at the border deployed as part of Operation Lone Star. Operation Lone Star shouldn’t have to exist at all. The federal government should do be doing it’s job in a way that they are not. So he was put in this position by those failures. Is it too harsh to say that the Biden administrations at least shoulders some responsibility for this young man’s death.

ABBOTT: That’s 100 percent correct. So Texas is coming out of pocket from our taxpayers almost $4 billion to pay for things like Operation Lone Star, to pay for the National Guard who are on the border, to pay for the BPS officers on the border, to pay for the border wall that Texas is building, to pay for the boat blockades we’re putting up. And maybe where you’re located you’re seeing us build a razor wire that put mile after mile of razor wire up (ph).

BENSON: Yes, I saw that today.

ABBOTT: Yes, and then so when people come across the border and they make it all the way to our border and they reach that razor wire they realize they can’t get through that. And so, they have to go upstream to a different location where they can be more easily apprehended and we can better control the border that way. But all these different things we’re doing are a direct consequence of the Biden administration’s failure. And there’s an easy way to fully explain this and that is we didn’t have to do this under the Trump administration because the Trump administration put four policies into place that led to the lowest border crossings we’ve had in decades, and that was Title 42, the remain in Mexico policy, the end of catch of release, and the building the border wall as well as sending the messaging not to come across the border. Well Joe Biden came in and he eliminated all of those things that President Trump had done and immediately he sent a message to the entire world that the border of the United States is open, and guess what? The world heard it, and the world responded by coming to our southern border. All of this –

(CROSSTALK)

BENSON: Yes, and the – and –

ABBOTT: — is a direct consequence of the Biden administration opening up our borders.

BENSON: And the last piece of that puzzle of those big four that you mentioned is Title 42. That’s the last one still in place, and it’s sort of being slowly phased out already, and they’re saying it’s going to be gone as of May 23. That’s, you know, less than a month from right now. We were down by the river, by that razor wire that you were talking about, and one of the commanders told us, you know, he raised it on his own. He said since the Title 42 announcement that they were going to get rid of that policy he has noticed a clear increase in the traffic coming across. He said this information absolutely seeps into Mexico and then down into Central America. The word gets out that it’s going to be easier to come and easier certainly to stay once Title 42 is gone. And even a lot of Democrats I think are now panicking about the political implications of this. They’re saying, you know, hold off. Maybe this shouldn’t happen, this change, but someone who doesn’t believe that, Governor, is your opponent in this gubernatorial election coming up in Texas in November. Beto O’Rourke was just on MSNBC the other day in an interview with Jonathan Capehart. This was Beto O’Rourke on this very issue. Cut 20. Listen to this.

(BEGIN AUDIO TAPE)
JONATHAN CAPEHART, THE SUNDAY SHOW WITH JONATHAN CAPEHART HOST: You don’t think it’s a good idea for the Biden administration to end Title 42. Why?
BETO O’ROURKE, TEXAS GUBERNATORIAL CANDIDATE: No. I think it’s time to end Title 42.
CAPEHART: OK.
O’ROURKE: I don’t think we should have ever implemented it. It’s a very cynical reading of U.S. law.
(END AUDIO CLIP)

BENSON: So Beto O’Rourke, your opponent who wants to be the governor of this state, believes that not only is it now time to get rid of Title 42, he agrees with Biden on that. He disagrees with some of these Democrats who are saying well let’s hold up on that. He went further than that, Governor. He said that Title 42 even during the teeth of the pandemic this public health tool should never have been implemented in the first place. It is – it is difficult to envision or imagine a more reckless or radical position on immigration than what Beto O’Rourke just said on MSNBC. I’d love to hear your thoughts on that.

ABBOTT: Well that segment that he had on MSNBC, the people in Texas are going to hear a lot of that in TV commercials in the days to come because the people of Texas, their number one issue is to secure the border, stop the illegal immigration. And they’re going to know fully not just what Beto said on that clip that you played there but also what Beto said when he ran for the president of the United States but Beto stands for open borders. Beto would have implemented the exact same open border policies that Joe Biden is implementing. There is no difference between Joe Biden and Beto O’Rourke with regard to these open border policies. And let me tell you, Guy, something that I think is going to result from this, not only are Texans going to be angry about Beto’s position on the open border policy, Hispanics in particular, especially those who live on the border, they are tired of their communities being overrun by these open border policies. And we have a good chance this election for Republicans to win not only counties along the border but also win a majority of Hispanic votes in the state of Texas. Hispanics are for safe communities, not open border policies that lead to unsafe communities.

BENSON: Governor Abbott, I want to ask you this, we have about two minutes left, and we’re going to talk to Colonel Nolan about some of this in more detail later in the show. But a few months back now there was a “Wall Street Journal” story that was blowing the whistle, there were a few other reports as well about Operation Lonestar and there were allegations about pay issues, and quality of life issues.The housing for people who were down here, you know, some mismanagement and logistical failures or struggles. Were those fair criticisms and have they been dealt with? Have you been able to turn around some of these issues, Governor?

ABBOTT: Well, first, it’s just factual that the criticisms were overblown. Because were there some pay issues? Yes, but they were extremely small in number. And there was a reason for it, the reason for it let’s go back to the time when, remember, when you saw all those Haitians coming across the border —

BENSON: Right, right here in Del Rio.

ABBOTT: — it — yes, we needed to gear up and have a mass influx of Border Patrol immediately and this was in addition to the fact that there were caravans that were scheduled to come our way. We didn’t have the luxury of time to get organized the way you typically would, and had a slow rollout of the numbers of National Guard deployed. So I said that we cannot have another Haitian process like that ever occur again. We cannot allow these caravans coming through the state of Texas to cross that border and come into the state of Texas. And so there had to be an extraordinarily quick deployment that led to let’s say less efficient rollout than what you would typically see. Now that —

BENSON: That, no, and, look, I get that, and things happen, right. And it was such a massive immediate ramp up, there are going to be problems. And some of the problems were aired very publicly. And you know, I’ve been talking to people down here, they say that (technical difficulty) very top, which is really the problem. Governor Greg Abbott of Texas, sir, thank you so much for your time. We’ll be right back.