Texas Gov. Rick Perry said Sunday he warned the administration for years about the incoming tide of young illegal immigrants and begged for additional resources to deal with it, only to be rebuffed and left with a crisis along his state’s southern border.
“Messages have been sent now for multiple years,” he told ABC’s “This Week” program.
Mr. Perry, a Republican, said he warned about the influx of unaccompanied youths in a letter to the administration in 2012. In 2010, he said he asked for a thousand National Guard troops to protect the border while they trained up to 3,000 Border Patrol agents to augment security there.
The situation at the Mexican border has reached a fevered pitch in recent weeks, as the U.S. government scrambles to process and deal with children who left their families in Mexico or Central America in search of better conditions in the United States.
Although Mr. Obama is telling immigrants not to come to the U.S. illegally, the governor said it is too little, too late.
“The president has sent powerful messages time after time by his policies, by nuances, that it is OK to come to the United States and you can come across and you’ll be accepted in open arms,” Mr. Perry told ABC.
• Tom Howell Jr. can be reached at thowell@washingtontimes.com.
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