Sen. Cotton ridicules 'rambling, incoherent' Pelosi for blaming 'Biden border crisis' on Trump

Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) on Monday quoted the movie "Billy Madison" in response to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's assertion that the Biden administration inherited a humanitarian crisis at the border from former President Donald Trump.

On day one of his presidency, President Joe Biden set out to dismantle President Trump's border policies, issuing an executive order that terminated Trump's declaration of a national emergency at the southern border and defunded construction of the border wall. Now, in a response to a surge of illegal immigration, the Biden administration will deploy the Federal Emergency Management Agency to the border to assist with processing these children, an effort that won Pelosi's praise.

Sunday on ABC News, Pelosi blamed Trump for the growing crisis on the border as more than 4,200 unaccompanied migrant children are in the custody of Customs and Border Protection, with nearly 3,000 kids being held longer than the legally allowed 72-hour period. CBS News reported Sunday that CBP apprehended an average of 565 unaccompanied minors per day last week.

"What the administration has inherited is a broken system at the border, and they are working to correct that in the children's interest," Pelosi told ABC News. "I'm so pleased that the president, as a temporary measure, has sent FEMA to the border in order to help facilitate the children going from one — the 72-hour issue into where they are cared for as they are transferred into family homes or homes that are safe for them to be."

Appearing on "Fox & Friends" Sunday, Cotton reacted to Pelosi's comments and the Biden administration's announcement regarding FEMA, mocking Pelosi for suggesting Trump is to blame for Biden's policies.

"At no point in that rambling, incoherent answer did Nancy Pelosi even come close to expressing a rational thought about what's happening at the border," Cotton said. "What they inherited from the Trump administration was a border that was closed. We were building a wall and we were turning away all migrants who had no right to cross into our country."

He continued: "The Biden border crisis, though, was created by Joe Biden's promises of amnesty and open borders and free health care for illegals during the campaign. That's why border crossings have increased every month since the election. And now the Biden administration is sending FEMA to the border. They are by their own declaration admitting it's a disaster, but remember, they're not deploying FEMA to secure the border, to try to finish the wall, or to stop those migrants from crossing. They're deploying FEMA to expedite them, to wave them in even faster and give them a bus ticket and a plane ticket and send them wherever they want to go in the United States."