A group of immigrants from Honduras and El Salvador who crossed the U.S.-Mexico border illegally are loaded on to a van, Wednesday, June 25, 2014, in Granjeno, Texas. At least six local, state and federal law enforcement agencies patrol the five mile zone which is illegal immigration’s busiest corridor. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)

Better late than never, but this should have done two years ago.

The Border Patrol has been overrun on the southern border and now the White House is making some new moves to combat the situation. They are preparing to target illegal alien remittances, i.e. money sent back to their home countries from their unlawful work within the United States

The White House is planning on targeting remittance payments made by illegal immigrants in the wake of an ongoing migrant flood at the U.S. southern border, a senior administration official told reporters Tuesday…

…The White House plan to go after remittance payments falls in line with a proposal from former Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, who is being considered to replace outgoing DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen.

This is common sense.

If the major draw for illegal immigrants is economic (and it is given most asylum claims are fraudulent), stopping the ability to send cash back to people in Mexico, Honduras, etc. will go a long way tamping down the motivation to illegally enter the country.

Perhaps more importantly, it puts pressure on those countries to do something about the migrant flows. Kris Kobach is hoping to become the new DHS Secretary and has been pushing this idea.

Kobach told Breitbart, “The threat I propose is one that actually helps us if we follow through on it. That is the threat of ending remittances from the majority of people in the United States from Mexico who are here illegally,” adding “they don’t want to risk losing that massive flow of foreign capital. In most years, it’s their second biggest source of foreign capital.”

Whether Kobach has a chance at the position, I’m not sure. He’d supposedly have a hard time in the confirmation process but perhaps it’s time to stop worrying about that and start playing hardball. If he can garner 50 votes, I wouldn’t shy away from him.

To this point, the “pressure” we’ve applied on places like Mexico, Honduras, Guatemala, etc. has been to send them hundreds of millions of dollars in foreign aid. It hasn’t worked. The quickest way to get anybody to jump when you say jump is to hit them in the pocketbook. Trump has sought to cut aid, and that’s a good start, but it’s the billions in remittances that really make things tick.

As I said above, this should have been done a long time ago. I think Trump’s lack of consistency among his border policies has only hurt the situation. He needs to stop paying attention to whether CNN criticizes him and just do what needs to be done. Had he introduced a sweeping package of actions back in 2017 and stuck with them, Republicans could be arguing from a position of strength right now. Instead, we’ve had multiple policies put in place and rescinded, only adding to the chaos narrative used to now attack him.

With all of this said, I give it two weeks after such a policy goes into effect before some Obama appointed Judge in California puts a nationwide injunction in place based on absolutely nothing but his/her political opinions. We are living in an era of pure judicial supremacy, where anything can be used to justify stripping the President of his constitutional powers. Until the Supreme Court stops avoiding the tough issues and puts these lower courts in their place, it will continue.