How Kim Reynolds and fellow GOP governors could really stick it to Joe Biden

As political crises unfold on islands off the United States’ shore, the Biden administration is issuing a reminder that refugees are not welcome in our country.

"Allow me to be clear: if you take to the sea, you will not come to the United States," Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said this week.

Cubans and Haitians caught at sea will be returned to their home countries. Even those who make it to the U.S. and establish credible asylum claims will be resettled in some other country.

President Joe Biden is overseeing the continuation of his two most recent predecessors’ brutal policies against migrants and refugees. That presents an opportunity for Republican governors, who have been taking a stand to defy Biden on immigration.

Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds and a few other GOP governors have sent state police to the U.S.-Mexico border in an attempt to curb illegal border crossings and drug smuggling. The special project is unlikely to have much impact, but it sends the message that states are unsatisfied with the Biden administration’s border policies.

If conservative leaders really want to undermine Biden and his failing immigration agenda, they should take a different approach.

Welcome Cubans and Haitians to Iowa and dare Joe Biden to stop us.

Reynolds ought to redirect Iowa State Troopers from their enforcement mission to a humanitarian mission. They could seek out refugees near the border or on the water and offer them safe escort away from federal agents. Bring them to Iowa and refuse to cooperate with Biden’s overzealous immigration cops.

Don’t stop there. While Biden flounders on trade policy and embraces some of Donald Trump’s protectionist policy failures, states could try to help manufacturers and agriculture producers sidestep destructive trade restrictions. Send a trade mission to Cuba and set up an exchange of our pork for their cigars.

Iowa in recent years has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on out-of-state advertising campaigns, intended to entice outsiders to come live and work in our dwindling state.

Why not set aside a few bucks for billboards and radio advertisements in Cuba and Haiti? The rates are probably cheaper than the New York City media market. Plus, the Cubans and Haitians are probably better neighbors than those east coast elites, who might bring soy milk into our communities and vote for higher taxes.

At a joint meeting with two neighboring governors this week, Gov. Kim Reynolds heard from area business leaders about their challenges. Population growth was a top concern.

“For 50 years we have not been replacing our population. … We have too few working-age people for all the work that needs to be done and it’s not a temporary condition,” said Mike Wells, president of Wells Enterprises in Le Mars.

It’s a pretty simple math problem: Iowa needs people, and people want to come here. Simply let them in.

To be clear, these suggestions might well be illegal. State governments have very little authority to manage international relations. But at a moment when state governments are pretending to do border enforcement, maybe it’s a good time to test the limits of gubernatorial power.

Welcome Cubans and Haitians to Iowa and dare Joe Biden to stop us.

adam.sullivan@thegazette.com; (319) 339-3156