Alabama GOP Governor Kay Ivey will send 275 National Guard troops to the southern border.
Numerous other GOP governors have sent National Guard troops to the border, starting with Ohio, which sent 185 troops in 2021. Florida Governor Ron DeSantis sent 800 National Guardsmen to Texas’ border with Mexico in May 2023. Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin, South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster, and South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem followed at the end of that month and in early June. At the end of July, the GOP governors of Oklahoma, West Virginia, and Nebraska joined the move.
“Every state has become a border state under the current policies, and Alabama remains committed to being an integral part of the mission to protect our Southern Border,” Ivey said. “The Alabama National Guard always stands ready to protect our citizens, and I thank our 275 troops, as well as their families, for their important service to our country.”
On September 19, 25 GOP governors sent a stinging letter to President Biden addressing the situation at the southern border.
“The crisis at the southern border extends to every state,” they wrote. “As a result of your policies which incentivize illegal immigration, our states are carrying the burden of both the years-long surge in illegal border crossings and cartels’ coordinated trafficking of drugs and human beings. States are on the front lines, working around-the-clock responding to the effects of this crisis: shelters are full, food pantries empty, law enforcement strained, and aid workers exhausted. As governors, we call on you to provide honest, accurate, detailed information on where the migrants admitted at the southern border are being relocated in the United States, in addition to comprehensive data on asylum claim timelines and qualification rates, and successful deportations.”
“Your administration can no longer ignore simple facts that threaten our citizens’ public safety and strain their public resources,” they continued. “Since you have taken office, there have been over 5.8 million illegal crossings at the southern border. In addition, your Customs and Border Protection agency estimates 1.6 million crossers have evaded apprehension. Even illegal crossings at the northern border have increased exponentially under your administration, in some areas by nearly 850%. In the past two years, 244 people on the terrorist watchlist were stopped trying to cross the southern border—an all-time record. Absent transparency from your administration, though, we cannot know how many terrorists have evaded capture and are now freely moving about the country.”