As the crisis at the southern border continues, the “new arrivals” section of Rep. Alexandria Ocasio Cortez’s online shop features many items that promote the abolishment of Immigration and Customs Enforcement. There are T-shirts, posters and magnets available at the official New York Democrat shop. They feature an ice cooler with “abolish” spray-painted in red above it.
The $27 tee shirt caption reads: “We must be bolder in reimagining the immigration system.” “We must eliminate ICE. This is the only way forward.
Products promoted the Green New Deal and taxing the wealthy, as well as the notion that “housing should be a human right”, are all included in the new arrivals section.
Ocasio-Cortez has been a vocal supporter of abolishing ICE for several years. However, Ocasio-Cortez is selling the merchandise while illegal immigration to the United States is increasing along with law enforcement seizures for fentanyl.
Customs and Border Protection stated that it saw a “substantial rise” in seizures of fentanyl at the southern border in January.
CBP’s monthly operational updates confirmed Fox News’ Wednesday reporting that there were 153,941 encounters during what is usually a slow month of border crossers. This number is almost double that of the Jan 2021 78,414 migrant encounters and more than four times Jan 2020 36,585 encounters.
Fentanyl is an opioid used for pain relief. It’s between 50-100 times more powerful than morphine. CBP seized 10,586 lbs of the deadly drug at its southern border in Fiscal Year 2021. This can prove fatal if taken in small quantities. This is an increase from the 4,558 lbs seized in FY 2020 and 2,633 lbs seized during FY 2019. Agents have so far seized 3,289 pounds in FY 2022.
More than 100,000 Americans were killed by drug overdoses between September 2020 and September 2021. This is a 16% increase on the previous year.
According to the CDC, 78,388 deaths resulted from opioids while 86% were caused by fentanyl.
Ocasio-Cortez argued in 2021 that a solution to the southern border problem is to build Health and Human Services facilities.
