Sheriff Daniel Abbott has “seen a drastic change in Van Buren County.”

“Since the Biden-Harris administration came in three and a half years ago, the amount of (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) holds has gone up drastically,” he said during a press conference organized by the Trump campaign in Michigan.

“We’re seeing a lot of (overdoses) on a regular basis,” Abbott said, a consequence of the rise in fentanyl and meth coming through Mexico.

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Just since June, illegal immigrants have been arrested for pouring gas on someone and lighting them on fire, stabbing someone in a fight about food, trafficking cocaine and meth from a drug house, and repeatedly raping an 8-year-old child, he said.

“That’s just the facts,” Abbott said, “what we’re seeing on the streets.”

Livingston County Sheriff Mike Murphy said illegal immigrants in his jurisdiction raped a 16-year-old girl, and caused an accident that put a 20-year-old pregnant woman undergoing chemotherapy in the hospital. Murphy hosted Trump at his sheriff’s department on Tuesday.

In Mason County, authorities recently seized nearly 60 grams of hard pressed fentanyl, a clear sign it came “directly from the southern border,” Sheriff Kim Cole said.

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“It has already made its way to our community,” Cole said of the people and drugs coming in. “We’re recovering kilos of cocaine in our area. That’s just stuff we’re not used to seeing.”

The sheriffs were among several law enforcement officials who joined a virtual press conference with Michigan Republican Senate Leader Aric Nesbit on Thursday to explain what the country’s open southern border means for Michigan.

An average of 5,000 illegal immigrants are released into the U.S. every day. In the 2023 fiscal year, a total of more than 900,000 were caught and released into the U.S. with court dates many never both to attend.

“As Border Czar, Kamala Harris has failed to remove 99.7% of the illegal immigrants released into the interior of the U.S.,” according to a release for the immigration press call.

Nesbit noted a loophole to citizenship approved by the Biden-Harris administration in June shields 500,000 illegal immigrants from deportation, including an estimated 50,000 in Michigan.

The Senate leader contrasted the more than 90 executive orders from the Biden-Harris administration to loosen restrictions on the border with former President Donald Trump’s pledge to deport those here illegally, build a border wall, deploy advanced technology to cut down on illegal crossings, and reinstate his Remain in Mexico policy – all policies he enacted during his first term.

“It can be done today,” Nesbit said of the needed changes, “but the Biden-Harris administration refuses to do it.”

Police Officers Association of Michigan President James Tignanelli pointed to data that shows over 40% of immigrants caught crossing the border and released into the U.S. “have just disappeared.” Millions more are never caught.

“They’re not all hanging around the southern border anymore,” the police union official said.

Instead, they’re flocking to sanctuary cities and counties across the country, including several in Michigan, in Macomb County, Lansing, and other liberal enclaves.

Tignanelli highlighted examples of illegal immigrants who have been deported and returned to commit numerous sex assaults, secured driver’s licenses only to cause fatal accidents, and committed smash and grab crimes and home burglaries.

There’s also other examples of two different illegal immigrants murdering women in Grand Rapids, as well as illegal immigrants arrested for multiple sex assaults in Ann Arbor, a fatal hit-and-run in Grand Rapids, and breaking into a home in Sturgis to molest two girls under the age of 13.

Those crimes come as assaults on police officers have skyrocketed, from 30,000 incidents in 2022 to 70,000 in 2023, Tignanelli said.

In Michigan, 1,000 left the profession last year, in large part due to “a lack of consequences for breaking the law,” he said.

In many cases, police contact ICE when they arrest illegal immigrants for serious crimes, but ultimately release them back into the community.

“The officers are finding themselves doing a lot of work … but there is no consequences for their work,” Tignanelli said.

“The luster and honor that came with the badge has vaporized,” he said. “We’re losing the battle for public safety.

“That didn’t happen in the Trump years.”

“We know what we had with President Trump,” Murphy said. “We know what we’ve had the last three and a half years.”