Press Releases

Today, Rep. Jack Bergman and 18of his Republican House colleagues sent a letter to the Biden Administration condemning its plans for massive payouts to illegal immigrants and instead requesting compensation for Angel Families and other American victims of the federal government’s failure to enforce our Nation’s immigration laws.

Earlier this month, the Wall Street Journal reported on the U.S. Departments of Justice (DOJ), Homeland Security (DHS), and Health and Human Services (HHS) considering payments of $450,000 per person, or close to $1 million per family, to those who illegally crossed the U.S. southern border and were being prosecuted under the law.

Such policies only incentivize increased border crossings and more instances of dangerous criminals being released into our local communities – and it is American citizens who pay the consequences.

Rep. Bergman and his colleagues condemned the administration’s plans and urged President Biden to instead compensate Americans harmed by these failed border policies.

Advocates for Victims of Illegal Alien Crime (AVIAC) President Don Rosenberg said, "Our families have been destroyed. We will never see our loved ones again, and if we speak out, we’re either ignored or called racists and white supremacists. Illegal aliens are legally separated from their children for a brief time, and they are rewarded with settlements in the hundreds of thousands of dollars. That is obscene."

You can read the full letter here and below.

This effort has been supported by NumbersUSA and Advocates for Victims of Illegal Alien Crime (AVIAC).

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Dear Attorney General Garland, Secretary Mayorkas, and Secretary Becerra:

In the wake of reports regarding your three agencies’ plans for $450,000 per person payouts to illegal immigrants, we urge you to condemn this idea and instead consider a way to compensate Angel Families and other victims for their suffering and loss of loved ones due to reckless open border policies, such as those advanced by the Biden Administration and its neglect of our nation’s border laws.

Crossing the border illegally should never be rewarded, but the Biden Administration has incessantly pursued border policies that incentivize mass illegal immigration. We’re experiencing record illegal crossings due to the President’s open borders rhetoric, pursuit of mass amnesty, and attacks on successful policies like construction of the border wall or “Remain-in-Mexico.”  But your proposed payments to those who willfully break our laws represents the most radical, morally bankrupt, and wasteful idea of them all. In fact, it is a slap in the face to Angel Families.

Angel Families are those that have lost family members to illegal immigrants, and they’re becoming all too common due to the gravely mishandled border crisis.  When you welcome a border surge and simultaneously withhold the resources and authorities to manage and vet illegal immigrants, you also allow dangerous criminals into our communities.  Many of these deadly acts were entirely avoidable because they were committed by deportable immigrants and immigrants who were released from federal custody into the interior.

Illegal immigrants ignored the law and you seek to pay them. Your agencies ignored the law and innocent Americans died. Instead of massive payments for “lasting psychological trauma” to illegal immigrants who knowingly committed a crime and were being prosecuted by the previous administration under the law, we urge you to compensate Americans victimized by the federal government’s failure to enforce immigration law, especially the families of those who were killed by illegal immigrants.

Please respond to this letter with your intentions to establish a pathway for Angel Families and other American victims to be compensated for their losses caused by the federal government’s blatant refusal to defend our border. Should a pathway already exist, such as through the Federal Tort Claims Act, we request additional information on this process and your intentions to publicize opportunities for compensation. Should a pathway not exist and not be feasible to establish by regulation, we request additional information on what legislative authorities you may be lacking to create one.

While no amount of compensation will ever make these victims and their families whole again, we stand ready to lessen their burden in any way and work with you to end the border crisis. Thank you for your consideration of this important request.