During a blistering appearance on Fox News’ Hannity, conservative historian Victor Davis Hanson torched President Biden’s border policies, calling them so irrational and damaging that no one can even explain what Biden was trying to accomplish. “It was so egregious, so surreal,” Hanson said. “No one knows why Biden did it.”

Referencing a recent surge in migrant-led crime — including a 12-year-old Venezuelan gang member accused of leading violent assaults in Times Square — Hanson questioned whether Biden’s decisions were about politics, punishment, or pure disregard for national sovereignty. “Was it to get new voters? Was it nihilism? Was it just to punish half the country?” he asked. “It’s the worst thing anybody’s ever done in that White House.”

The latest incident in New York, where a juvenile gang linked to illegal migration assaulted NYPD officers, has fueled a renewed spotlight on the long-term fallout of Biden-era immigration policies. Hanson emphasized that this wasn’t mere negligence. It was deliberate. “It was a deliberate effort to destroy the border and allow 12 million people to come in,” he said. “The first thing they did was break the law when they crossed it. The second thing they did was reside here illegally. Then they enjoyed preferential treatment.”

That treatment, according to Hanson, included avoiding vaccine mandates and security ID checks, privileges denied to U.S. citizens. “They didn’t have to have a real ID to get on a plane. They didn’t have to get COVID shots. And that created entitlement and contempt for law enforcement,” he said.

In contrast, the Trump administration’s first 100 days have now become a benchmark for border enforcement. A White House report touted a 93% drop in daily encounters and the removal of 135,000 illegal aliens — many of them gang members. Trump also dismantled Biden’s CBP One app, which Hanson blamed for turning immigration law into an online booking system for asylum fraud. Over 160 million requests were made through the app in just two years.

Hanson said the damage will take “two generations” to fix, and history will judge the Biden presidency harshly. “Historians are going to look back and say this is the worst thing a president has done in half a century.”

The critique echoed broader concerns that Biden’s immigration policies didn’t just strain social services or frustrate border states — they completely erased the idea of a border altogether. “He dismantled the very concept of a nation-state,” Hanson said.

Critics of Biden’s approach say that once the border was opened under the guise of compassion, chaos followed. Migrant crime spiked, court backlogs exploded, and sanctuary policies allowed repeat offenders to evade consequences. Now, with Trump back in office and restoring enforcement tools, the contrast is sharper than ever.

And voters are noticing.

Hanson’s blunt assessment mirrors a shift in national mood. Polls show Americans ranking immigration as a top concern for 2025 — not just for reasons of security but because of the cultural, political, and economic toll it has taken. The gap between elite dogma and real-world consequences, Hanson said, has never been wider.

“This wasn’t just failure. This was betrayal,” he concluded.

The question now is whether the Biden administration’s legacy on immigration will become a cautionary tale — or a permanent scar. Either way, as Hanson warned, undoing the damage has only just begun.