Over the past half-year, as the number of asylum seekers has soared at the U.S.-Mexico border, President Donald Trump has at times seemed to believe the problem would vanish if he complained about it strongly enough to top officials in his administration. Trump did so even after Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen repeatedly made the case _ in comments to lawmakers and the media, if not to the president himself _ that the first thing the government needed to do was to dramatically add resources so asylum seekers could be processed much more quickly and so border agents wouldn't be diverted from checking vehicles lawfully entering the United States, creating traffic headaches for cross-border businesses.
Trump's response? Announcing her "resignation" via Twitter on April 7.
Now Nielsen's replacement _ acting Homeland Security chief Kevin McAleenan _ is making the same case she did. Noting that 100,000 migrants were detained in March alone, McAleenan said the White House was readying a request _ finally _ for additional funding. "Simply put, the system is full and we are well beyond our capacity," he told House members. "The status quo is not acceptable."
It hasn't been acceptable for months. But if McAleenan is responsible for getting his boss to realize that jawboning about a desperate situation won't make it any less desperate, then he deserves some credit. Here's hoping that when the White House funding request emerges, it will be treated by Congress with the bipartisan urgency it deserves.
