Introduction
I found this essay in my archive of unnamed Word documents. It was dated September 29, 2025—almost exactly a year ago—and apparently I never got around to publishing it.
I obviously felt very strongly about the subject.
Reading it again, I understand why. I did not want Democrats to walk away from the border crisis as though it had simply happened on their watch. My argument then, and now, was that their policies created the incentives that produced it: millions of illegal crossings, enormous pressure on public services, increased costs, crime, and all the other consequences that followed.
And I believed there was another calculation underneath it. They assumed that even if a Republican returned to the White House, nobody would seriously attempt to find and remove large numbers of people who had entered the country illegally. The task would be declared too large, too complicated, too expensive, too politically difficult.
Then Trump decided to try.
At first, the argument was that mass enforcement was impossible: you cannot possibly locate millions of illegal immigrants, process them, and remove them. When it became clear that the administration intended to make the attempt anyway, the argument changed. Suddenly ICE agents enforcing immigration law were being portrayed as the villains.
That is what still bothers me.
ICE did not create the problem it was being asked to clean up. The people enforcing the law did not create the policies that encouraged millions of people to cross the border. Yet once enforcement began, much of the political and predictable media energy shifted toward attacking the people doing the enforcement rather than holding accountable the people whose policies helped create the situation in the first place.
I thought that was extraordinarily cynical a year ago.
Reading this again, I still do.
I no longer remember exactly what prompted me to write it. Reading it now, it would not surprise me if the original spark came from something James Howard Kunstler wrote. But the argument and the fury are unmistakably mine.
So here it is, essentially as I wrote it then.
The Pattern That Wasn’t a Mistake
Incentives Explain Everything
By Jim Reynolds | www.reynolds.com
September 29,2025
I. The Great Open Border Lie: How They Justified It
For four years, Democrats told us the border crisis was everything but what it really was: intentional.
They called it a humanitarian issue.
They called it a broken system.
They called it a problem Trump created.
They called it seasonal.
They called it complicated.
But here’s what they never called it: the predictable result of their own policies, incentives, and political hunger for power.
Let’s review what they actually said—and what they actually did.
II. Their Words, Their Lies: The Receipts
Joe Biden:
“I’ve done all I can do at the border. Congress needs to act.” (Jan 2024)
(After spending years dismantling every Trump-era enforcement tool by executive order.)
Alejandro Mayorkas (DHS Secretary):
“The border is closed.” (March 2021)
(While over 200,000 illegal crossings were happening every month.)
“We inherited a broken system.” (2021 testimony)
(While he was actively breaking it further.)
Jen Psaki (Press Secretary):
“This isn’t a crisis.” (March 2021)
(While border facilities overflowed with unaccompanied minors.)
Chuck Schumer:
“We need immigrants because Americans aren’t reproducing enough.” (Nov 2022)
(Translation: We need new voters.)
Kamala Harris:
“We will not turn our back on those seeking help.” (2021)
(Unless they’re Cuban or speak favorably about Trump.)
Gavin Newsom (California Governor):
“California will always be a sanctuary... and a safe place for those seeking help.” (2022)
(While handing out free healthcare, education, and driver’s licenses to illegals.)
The New York Times (April 2022):
“Border crossings surge, but experts urge compassion over enforcement.”
CNN Headlines:
“A Seasonal Surge, Not a Crisis.”
III. The Pattern They Can’t Explain Away
Let’s be blunt: Democrats didn’t stumble into this. They engineered it.
When you step back, the pattern is undeniable:
They opened the border because their power depends on dependency.
And as Trump’s economy lifted Americans off government programs, they needed a new class of victims to keep the machine running.
IV. Trump Proved the Lie
For four years, Biden said he was helpless without Congress.
But when Trump returned in 2025, he secured the border in less than a month—without a single new law.
He reinstated Remain in Mexico.
He revived Title 42-style removals using new legal authority.
He flooded the border with National Guard and ICE coordination teams.
He launched deportation flights before the press could invent a new hashtag.
Trump didn’t beg Congress.
He used executive authority—the same tools Biden claimed didn’t exist.
“Turns out the border crisis wasn’t about laws. It was about will.
Trump had it. They didn’t.”
V. The Real Reason They Did It
Why did they finally go all-in on open borders?
Because this time they thought they could get away with it.
They installed a non-president who wouldn’t fight them.
They had a compliant, narrative-driven press ready to launder every lie.
They were running out of dependents as Trump’s first term shrank welfare rolls.
They needed new clients—fast.
And they’re the Party of Chaos. They do their best work inside a crisis.
They didn’t just ignore the law.
They leveraged the lawlessness—turning it into a pipeline for NGO money, federal contracts, and long-term demographic change.
Every overdose victim.
Every trafficked child.
Every wage-suppressed American worker.
All collateral damage on the way to their political endgame.
VI. The Closing Argument: The Most Anti-American Presidency in History
Historians will debate a lot about the Biden presidency.
But on this, there should be no debate:
It was the most anti-American administration in our nation’s history.
Not because of foreign wars.
Not because of inflation.
But because of what they did—deliberately and unapologetically—to the very idea of American citizenship.
They devalued the border.
They erased the meaning of sovereignty.
They turned every small town into a sanctuary—whether the people wanted it or not.
They spent taxpayer dollars housing, feeding, and funding non-citizens while American veterans slept on sidewalks.
They empowered cartels, flooded our cities with crime, and insulted anyone who dared ask for basic security.
And when called out, they lied about it. For years.
This wasn’t incompetence.
It was vandalism—by design.
Now they want to pivot. Forget. Rewrite the narrative.
No.
Not this time.
This time, they own it.
Every policy. Every quote. Every overdose. Every empty promise. Every town they broke.
“They opened the gates.
They flooded the country.
And now they answer for it.”
