Secure our border and help our European allies do the same

Every nation has a right and a duty to secure its borders. And when democratic nations do this well, it promotes stability, reduces conflict and diminishes opportunities for adversaries to undermine free societies. 

This is just one reason congressional Republicans are right to support Ukraine against the threat of Russian aggression while simultaneously demanding that the government secure the U.S. border.  

Too often, people view these as separate issues. Securing America’s borders is considered a "domestic issue," while geopolitical threats posed by a country like Russia fall into the "foreign policy" category. Yet the two challenges have always been intertwined. 

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Decades back, it was mostly citizens of Mexico looking for work that eluded the U.S. Border Patrol. Today, people from all over the world – from China to Brazil to India to Russia – are slipping through due to our weak enforcement policies. 

Illegal immigrants from Venezuela walk towards a U.S. Border Patrol transit center after crossing the Rio Grande into the United States on January 08, 2024, in Eagle Pass, Texas.  (Photo by John Moore/Getty Images)

This wide variety of nationalities reminds us not to overlook the geopolitical aspect. Russia, a top-tier enemy of the United States, has long exploited the generosity of the West by weaponizing refugees and migrants against NATO members. Arkansas Republican Senator Tom Cotton and I (Mike Pompeo) wrote in 2016 about how we can apply hard lessons by observing the outcomes of border approaches of Nordic allies. 

In recent years, NATO members have alleged Russia is ushering migrants to their borders to overwhelm, weaken, and punish them. The facts back them up. The number of people trying to enter Finland and Estonia illegally spiked suddenly in November 2023, just six months after Finland joined the alliance.  

This deluge of illegal immigrants caused Finland to close its border with Russia entirely in late November, and again in mid-December, just hours after reopening numerous crossing points. 

Estonian Defense Minister Hanno Pevkur described the influx as "fully state-orchestrated" by Moscow. Latvian Defense Minister Andris Spruds accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of being the "puppet master" behind it all. 

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In 2021, Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko  invited migrants primarily from Iraq to fly into Belarus, and then sent them to the borders of Poland and Lithuania. Polish officials also called Russia the orchestrator of the surge and believed the surge was in retaliation for Warsaw’s giving refuge to Krystsina Tsimanouskaya, a Belarusian athlete who refused to return home from the Tokyo Olympics. Since mid-2021, Lithuania has refused entry to a total of 20,000 migrants from Belarus. In 2022, 16,000 migrants tried to enter Poland from Belarus; and in 2023, over 19,000 were refused entry. 

More recently, in August 2023, the Polish deputy interior minister accused Russia and Belarus of organizing another migrant influx in Europe. Multiple Polish officials have implied that Belarus, with the help of Syrian and Turkish criminal groups, is acting as an international criminal organization to carry out Putin’s work and destabilize European borders. 

In 2016, Supreme Allied Commander in Europe, U.S. Air Force General Philip Breedlove, told the Senate Armed Services Committee: "Together, Russia and the Assad regime are deliberately weaponizing migration in an attempt to overwhelm European structures and break European resolve." 

Weaponized migration can be used against the United States just as it has in Finland, Ukraine and other European allies. Our rivals are eager to take advantage of any opening – and our border is an obvious weak point. 

Polish border guards near the new fence on the Polish-Belarusian border near the village of Nowdziel. Then-Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki appeared on the Polish-Belarusian border at the border wall, which the Polish government called a 'physical barrier.' The border wall on the Polish-Belarusian border was built with the use of 50,000 tons of steel. It is 5.5 meters high,  topped with razor wire, and it stretches for 186.25 km. (Photo by Artur Widak/NurPhoto via Getty Images)

The surge of illegal crossings into our country is staggering. In December, some days saw upwards of 10,000 illegal border crossings a day from all corners of the globe. In each of the last two years, for the first time in history, there were more than 2 million illegal crossings.  

What Russia uses as a weapon against our allies, the Biden administration is effectively facilitating against our own nation. Policies that incentivize violating U.S. sovereignty create the conditions for migrant smuggling, just another name for human trafficking.  

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And during Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, nearly 22,000 Russians tried to enter the U.S. through the open southern border, many understandably fleeing Putin’s war draft. And, concerningly, thousands of Chinese nationals have crossed the southern border illegally in just a few months. 

The United States must remain a beacon of hope to those who were "born American but in the wrong place," as the late political philosopher Peter Schramm described.  But we must do so prudently. 

Estonian Defense Minister Hanno Pevkur described the influx as "fully state-orchestrated" by Moscow. Latvian Defense Minister Andris Spruds accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of being the "puppet master" behind it all. 

Politicians cannot be so foolish as to usher in our own demise by permitting a flood of individuals into our country who have no affection for our country and many who wish us great harm. This is especially true during a time of global unrest and when Xi’s China and Putin’s Russia are in pursuit of weakening the United States and replacing the U.S.-led global order. 

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The United States would be wise to learn from our East and Northern European allies, and in addition to aiding Ukraine in its noble defense against Russian aggression, secure our national border.  

By working to support Ukraine’s fight to defend its sovereignty while demanding the government defend the sovereignty of the United States, congressional Republicans warrant the support from Democrats in the Congress and the White House.  

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Rebeccah Heinrichs is a fellow at the Hudson Institute where she provides research and commentary on a range of security issues and specializes in missile defense and nuclear deterrence. Follow her on Twitter, @RLHeinrichs.