Griff Jenkins & Bill Melugin on covering the border crisis for FOX News

Hi everyone, this is Brian Kilmeade. The new year is here, and there's no better time than now to eliminate your personal or business tax issues. Now, when it comes to handling tax issues, you deserve the best advice, especially when dealing with unpaid back taxes, unfiled tax returns, catch-up bookkeeping. This is where Tax Hardship Center steps in. With years of experience and an impeccable record, Tax Hardship Center has become a beacon of hope for those struggling with tax burdens. Choosing the wrong tax relief firm can escalate your problems, risking not just your finances, but potentially affecting your loved ones and your business.

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Tax Hardship Center is here to lift that burden. Let me just digress and shift here. Pivot, if you will, to the dogs that I most encounter are dogs on the border that pursue the migrants that are running through the bush trying to evade apprehension because they don't want to be caught in it. But for those canines that stop millions of dollars and thousands of pounds of deadly narcotics like fentanyl, methamphetamine, cocaine, and, of course, captured the criminal migrants that are crossing our borders with their Border Patrol, and there's nobody better to talk to you about what's happening at our border than my colleague and my great friend, one of the most talented reporters I've ever met, Bill Malusian, who covers the border with me. He's out in Hakumba right now where I was last week.

He's there now joining us. Bill, I know the signal's rough there. I witnessed that firsthand, but thanks. I think we've got a connection with you for a moment, and I just want to get your insight on what are we seeing today? What's going on out there, man? Hey, Griff.

Yeah, thanks for having me, man. As you know well, we just came out of that Jewel Valley Road area to get some better cell service to talk to you, but it's an area where we saw people from all over the planet arriving illegally just like you saw last week. We talked to some guys from China and Georgia yesterday, and the big question we have is, like, how are they getting here, right, because you and I always get questions.

Why aren't these people's clothes dirty? How are they getting here from halfway around the world? It was interesting. We used a translator app with the Chinese group, and he told us they first flew into Turkey, then they flew into Mexico, and then they bussed their way up here to the border. Then we talked to a guy from Georgia who told us the same thing. He flew into Turkey, then flew into Guatemala, then took a car into Mexico, and then bussed his way up to the northern border in Tijuana. You know, we often hear the stories about, oh, these people are walking through the jungle and the Darien Gap. That's true for some demographics, but these people coming from Asia, for the most part, they're just flying their way into some of these Central American countries, skipping all that and walking their way up to the border.

You talked to a few guys from Syria last week. I'd be curious how they got here. Yeah, they're flying in, and it's such a great point, such an important point that you're pointing out, Bill, is that, you know, these migrants, and I interviewed a few of them as well, a guy from Ecuador that said he flew from Ecuador ultimately into Cancun, Cancun to Mexico City, Mexico City, into Tijuana, then paid, according to him, $1,000 to be taken by the cartel to Jacumba, an hour east of Tijuana, to cross into Ecuador. And you really have to wonder if these migrants that are illegally crossing have what is undoubtedly thousands of dollars to make this trip, but then turn around and tell you and I, Bill, that they're coming from oppression and they're coming because they don't have a job and they're living in poverty in their countries.

Why aren't they using that money to try and better their situation in their home countries? That's a fantastic question, and I'll point out something funny that happened yesterday. While we were using Google Translate to talk to the Chinese guy who was telling us he wants a job here, my producer looked down and noticed he was wearing Louis Vuitton shoes, and they were not knockoffs.

They were real ones. As you know, the Chinese are considered like exotics by the cartel, and they've got to pay tens of thousands of dollars to cross in this area, and the cartels love moving them here because they're making bank with all these Chinese nationals coming. You and I just got that CBP data which shows more Chinese nationals have crossed the border illegally in the San Diego sector than Mexican nationals since October 1st.

That is an insane stat. Think about that. Chinese from all around the world crossing the border more here than Mexican nationals, and the cartels love it because they have to spend tens of thousands of dollars to get the green light to cross here. Yeah, it's a great point. A lot of these people will ultimately claim asylum because they know that's their ticket in the U.S., but they're telling you and I on camera, no, no, no, we're here for work. We want a job. And then typically when you ask them, well, how much did you pay to get here, they go, oh, no, no, no, we didn't pay anything. You and I both know that's not true.

Nobody crosses here without pay. You're listening to Bill Illusion out there in Akuma, California on the Brian Kilmeade Show. I'm Griff Jenkins, and I'm a little biased here, Bill, because you and I have been covering this border crisis which we didn't choose to cover, but for it grew into what it is now. And, you know, I often have members of Congress, viewers, others that come up and say, hey, if it weren't for you and Bill showing this, would anybody actually know that it's going on?

And, you know, the answer, to be fair, is probably not. And, you know, I often trace back that when we first started using the drone, I was using it in McAllen, but then we got to the Haitian crisis in Del Rio that you put up and you got it up there. And they tried to take our drone down and you got in a helicopter with TEX TPS and showed them. I think that really opened their eyes. And now here we are with really countries from all over the world, many of them dangerous countries, showing up in California. And it's just you and I, friend, showing this and trying to sound the alarm.

We, I think we just lost him. Now that, by the way, and thank you if you're out there listening, Bill Malusian, for calling in, that is the realities of what it is to cover stories like this. It is so remote out there in Hakumba, California. There's no signal. It's difficult. It's hard to get there. We have to drive an hour every morning at two, three in the morning to get in position to start reporting out there.

You're in cold conditions. It's windy and it's just a part of of the challenge of bringing the story. But as I was pointing out with my colleague, Bill, it's it's so critical that we do tell the story.

Hi, everyone, this is Brian Kilmeade. The new year is here and there's no better time than now to eliminate your personal or business tax issues. Now, when it comes to handling tax issues, you deserve the best advice, especially when dealing with unpaid back taxes, unfiled tax returns, catch up bookkeeping. This is where Tax Hardship Center steps in with years of experience and an impeccable record. Tax Hardship Center has become a beacon of hope for those struggling with tax burdens. Choosing the wrong tax relief firm can escalate your problems, risking not just your finances, but potentially affecting your loved ones and your business.

Don't fall for pretenders. They offer a free IRS consultation to start. This means they'll honestly assess your situation and will only agree to take on your case if they are confident they can assist you. Experts are available now. Find out if you qualify for tax relief within minutes.

Their phone lines are open. I advise you to call now. Eight four four seven zero eight four four three zero.

That's eight four four seven zero eight four four three zero. Or go to Tax Hardship Center dot com. Don't let tax issues weigh you down.

Tax Hardship Center is here to lift that burden. In doing so, we've we've earned the respect of many of the border officials who are not allowed because they're they're muzzled by this administration. Under the Trump administration, they made the border officials, DHS, CBP and Border Patrol chiefs wide open.

We could ride along with them. They could talk freely about the situation and we could try and cover it and allow the American people to know in the name of transparency what the heck was going on in their border. Now, this administration has absolutely been muzzling these officials in the Border Patrol, and it is but for our conversations off camera that we're able to tell the story. And the number one thing that they say they're worried about is the national security risk. And when Bill Mollusion is running into people from Kazakhstan and I'm running into people from Syria, countries that we don't have repatriation agreements, countries that our government doesn't regularly have communication with, let alone share any national security risk.

We have very little way of actually finding out who exactly the person is. And yet with the sheer volume of numbers and one border patrol agent told me, he said, you know, Griff, you guys have done a great job showing the size of the flow of illegal immigration. And this was shortly after I had broken the news that there was more than three hundred thousand illegal crossings, migrant encounters in the month of December.

But he said for officials like us, we worry sometimes not so much about the size of the flow, although that's stunning. We worry about what's in the flow and it is what's in the flow that could potentially pose that national security risk. And in the case of the three individuals I interviewed that said they wanted a nice life, wanted a nice job from from Syria, a state sponsor of terror. It's going to be very difficult to know whether or not this individual is here for nefarious reasons or whether he should be granted asylum. But at the same time, we have a hard time sending them back to Syria because they don't accept them when we send them back. And when you compound the number of individuals, single adult males coming from places like that, you cannot arrive setting all politics aside at any conclusion other than that is a vulnerability, that is a risk, that is a threat.

And one that should be very soberly and seriously considered in something should be done about it. And yet you hear the platitudes from this current administration saying that they're going to increase deportations, although they may not be able to do so now because they're going to have a budget windfall because House Republicans won't pass any sort of legislation. And the Senate bill died.

So there's no money so they can't do it. But they're still saying they're going to increase deportations somehow, some way they'll find a will, they'll find a way. But you look at the fact that under President Joe Biden, more than seven million people have illegally crossed the border and have been released into the U.S. under a policy of mass releasing seven million plus to go out and round them up. If I said to you, I'm going to grab some buses and go round up the entire state populations, entire state populations of Wyoming, Vermont, Alaska and North Dakota, Wyoming, Vermont, Alaska and North Dakota. The total state population combined of those four states is less than the number that have been released into the U.S. with the notice to appear with a court date years down the road that the migrant may or may not choose to even bother to show it might even lose the notice to appear because the data is so far in the future. More people have been released than the populations of those four states. You're going to round them up, pop them on a bus and pop them on a plane. There aren't enough buses and planes in the country to do that, let alone owned by the government. And why am I harping on this?

Well, because it leaves holes and risks and threats fall through the cracks. I just did an exclusive interview a few weeks ago with the acting director of ICE, Patrick Lechleitner. And he told me about an individual that crossed in the San Diego sector where Bill Maloujian and I were from Somalia. He gave a fake name in Border Patrol, released him into the country for nearly a year. He roamed the country, a known terrorist belonging to Al-Shabaab. And it wasn't until in Minnesota he gave his real name to qualify for government benefits that was recently afforded to non-citizens that they were able to run a crossmatch that just happened to pop up. And he was a confirmed Al-Shabaab known terrorist from Somalia. And within 48 hours, hats off, kudos to ICE, within 48 hours, they were able to go out and apprehend that individual. But when you put the dots together and you look at the risk and you look at the numbers and you look at the way things fall through the cracks, you have to put yourself in the shoes of senior border officials and think, how does that guy or gal sleep at night? Knowing how bad the situation is, what little is being done, and what great vulnerability and threat it ultimately poses, and you realize how they get to that conclusion, it feels like we're not worried about if we're more worried about when. Listen to the show ad-free on Fox News Podcast Plus, on Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music with your prime membership, or subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.