Update: CIS has published a backgrounder on this agreement. 

Whatever adjectives can be used to describe our new President, ‘diplomatic’ is not one which springs readily to mind. His phone conversation with Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull merely serves to reinforce a reputation for bluntness that was already solidified within the public imagination. In this case, however, I think his impolitic speech is actually beneficial for American citizens. For the refugee resettlement swap cooked up by his predecessor, which involves the exchange of non-Muslim Central American refugees for Muslim boat people currently being detained at the behest of the Australian government, is another disastrous scheme to further erase our borders.

The ordinary refugee resettlement process is almost completely insulated from the democratic process. Seemingly benefiting everyone from United Nations functionaries, to bureaucrats in the federal government, but especially VOLAGs whose survival depends upon a constant stream of clients, refugee resettlement takes no account of the feelings of ordinary American citizens. The people whose lives could be ruined by the decisions made hundreds, if not thousands, of miles away by unelected officials.

The last-minute decision of President Obama to craft a backroom deal with his Australian counterpart, in large part as a means of papering over his own catastrophic failure to enforce this nation’s immigration laws, merely highlights the lack of accountability and fundamentally anti-democratic nature of this entire process. Naturally, open borders fanatics are using this incident to parade their virtue before the benighted American public, condemning the philistinism of the Australian and American governments, as well as the people who insist that their representatives protect the internal security of their nations.

Nevertheless, this is a reminder that who lives in our country is not a matter for international plebiscites or social justice campaigns. Thousands of Muslim foreigners being transferred to the heart of this country as part of a sleazy quid pro quo is not what what Americans voted for in November, and simply because it has the stamp of approval from our outgoing President and Australia’s current Prime Minister-the sixth in less than a decade-doesn’t mean the American public should sit back and accept it. It is the current year, and the powers that be should get used to it.