The new Senate immigration bill won’t become law. Trump came out against it, and enough Senate Republicans and certainly the House Speaker will follow his lead. But it shows where we’re likely headed — a truncated version of an already truncated system and likely a violation of international law.

Republicans like to blame Biden for the situation at the border. But this situation didn’t start until after the Trump administration declared war on immigrants.

Almost unknown outside of immigration law circles, Obama became known as the “Deporter-in-Chief” because of his tough immigration policies. Once Trump declared immigrants to be Public Enemy Number 1, the stakes went up. Now, with the prospect that he’ll be back in 2025, immigrants (and, yes, those who profit from transporting them — possibly the second-oldest profession) know they’d better act now.

That’s a consequence of what Trump put in motion, IMHO. Biden, merely by abiding by U.S. international law commitments toward refugees, found himself in the crosshairs — along with millions of migrants.

And the sad thing is we could end the crisis (at least today’s extreme version) by providing temporary work visas for low-skilled labor — the kind U.S. employers have been struggling since 2020 to fill — and the right to return home and re-enter. More on that another day.