“US Senator Roger Wicker, R-Miss., joined Senator Marco Rubio, R-Fla., and his Republican colleagues in introducing a bill to extend Title 42 authority until February 2025. The bill comes in response to President Joe Biden’s decision to rescind Title 42 authority, which the Biden Administration warned would result in a massive surge of illegal immigration across the southern border,” the press release said on Thursday.
The Centers for Disease and Control and Prevention (CDC) announced it will terminate the Title 42 public health policy on May 23. The policy has been in effect since March 2020 and was used by the Trump and Biden administrations to turn away thousands of illegal immigrants in an effort to prevent communicable diseases from spreading in the United States.
Republicans and others have criticized the Biden administration for keeping the southern US border effectively open and allowing for more than 2 million illegal immigrants to enter the country.
The Biden administration said the Homeland Security Department has contingency plans to respond to the possible arrival of 12,000 to 18,000 illegal migrants per day at the southern border after the Title 42 policy is terminated, according to US media reports.
However, the senators said in the release that rescinding Title 42 would invite a massive surge of illegal immigration that will inflict a lasting crisis on the United States and put communities in harm’s way.
Other co-sponsors of the legislation include Senators Thom Tillis, Jim Risch, Steve Daines and Tim Scott, according to the press release.