In an effort to address the immigration issue head-on as it threatens to become a significant problem for him and his administration, President Biden will make his first journey to the southern border on Sunday since taking office.
Even while Republicans and some Democrats had pushed Biden to go despite the flow of migrants at the U.S.-Mexico border for months, Biden had resisted.
His visit to El Paso highlights the political and humanitarian challenges the situation presents for the Biden administration as it contends with a House GOP majority determined to emphasize the border crisis and a looming 2024 election where the Republican nominee is likely to emphasize immigration.
At the White House on Thursday, Biden stated that it was “obvious” that immigration was a political issue that extremist Republicans would always run on. But now that they have an option, they can either continue to use immigration as a political ploy or contribute to finding a solution. Together, they can work to repair the system’s flaws and solve the issue.
CLICK HERE FOR AN AD FREE EXPERIENCE AND ACCESS TO VIP ARTICLES
The White House launched a variety of initiatives this week to reduce the amount of migrants entering the country, and they used Vice President Biden’s planned trip to demonstrate their seriousness about the issue.
According to the administration, anyone from Cuba, Nicaragua, Venezuela, and Haiti who enter the country illegally will be prevented from requesting asylum in the United States. Additionally, officials announced that they would put out a rule that would prevent migrants from requesting asylum in the United States if they had not first sought refuge in one of the nations they had passed through on their way to the southern border.
Additionally, border guards will keep enforcing Title 42, a Trump-era procedure that has been employed for almost three years to swiftly deport migrants under the pretense that it is a public health measure. Immigration activists have attacked Biden’s continuous use of the strategy as inhumane, seeing it as a migration tool covered up as a public health measure. Its validity will be examined in the upcoming months by the Supreme Court.
While visiting El Paso on Sunday, Biden will personally go to the border. He will consult with front-line representatives to learn more about the migration situation and what else can be done to stop the flow of fentanyl and other drugs across the border.
For a two-day meeting with North American leaders, the president will fly from Texas to Mexico, where migration issues are likely to be among the key subjects of conversation.
One of the most significant attacks by Republicans has been this. The former press secretary for the White House, Jen Psaki, remarked on MSNBC, “You haven’t even been to the border, you haven’t seen what’s happening. He expressed that there was an issue, that it was out of date and broken, and that we needed to fix it. So on his first day, he presented a strategy. As a result, he can assert, “I visited the border and presented a strategy. What are you putting forward that is in your cupboard?”
Republicans have been urging Biden to go to the border for months, highlighting photos of large groups of migrants trying to enter the country as well as border patrol statistics showing that in November 2022, nearly 234,000 migrants were apprehended along the southern border, the highest number ever noted for the month of November.
Republicans’ inability to select a Speaker has delayed the swearing-in of members and the creation of committees, which has left the GOP-controlled House in disarray.
The House has suggested that immigration will be a major area of concentration for its monitoring powers after the House debate is done. Alejandro Mayorkas, the secretary of homeland security, has been criticized by some in the party for the rise in immigration that has put a burden on local infrastructure both at the border and throughout the nation. Some have even suggested impeaching Mayorkas.
Even Democratic politicians, like Mayor of New York City Eric Adams, have occasionally voiced concerns about the influx of immigrants into their states and cities, claiming they lack the means to care for the large number of people who are coming after crossing the border into the United States.
The occasionally polarized criticism of Biden’s border policies emphasizes the fact that it might be a political weakness that the eventual 2024 Republican presidential contender may try to exploit. This week, some of Biden’s prospective rivals gained an advantage in the debate.
A film outlining the former president’s pledge to “fight war” on the drug gangs in Mexico and stop the flow of drugs across the border was produced on Thursday by the only Republican candidate in the 2024 race. The plan calls for using military forces to hunt down cartel leaders and requesting that Congress enact laws that would make drug traffickers and people traffickers subject to the death sentence.
The recorded remark from Trump included the following: “Biden’s open border ideas are a fatal betrayal of our nation.” When I become president, “taking down the cartels will be the policy of the United States, just as we took down ISIS and the ISIS caliphate, and just as, unlike the scenario we’re in right now, we had a very strong border.”
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis (R), who has emerged as the most formidable prospective rival to Trump for the party’s presidential nomination, used his inaugural speech this week to criticize Biden over his immigration policies without specifically mentioning him.
In prepared remarks, DeSantis alleged that the federal government “has recklessly facilitated open borders, making a mockery of the rule of law, allowing massive amounts of narcotics to infest our states, importing criminal aliens, and greenlighting the flow of millions of illegal aliens into our country, burdening communities and taxpayers throughout the land.”
The Florida governor gained notoriety in 2017 when he arranged for migrants to be flown to Martha’s Vineyard, a liberal sanctuary state that has vowed not to turn over illegal immigrants.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM WAYNEDUPREE.COM
While Biden’s activities this week may shield him from some criticism that he hasn’t addressed the border, he has recognized it’s an imperfect solution that won’t satisfy everyone. Numerous humanitarian organizations have already denounced Biden’s actions for making it more difficult for those fleeing violence to find refuge and charged him with reiterating Trump-era policies.
Sens. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.), Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.), Alex Padilla (D-Calif.), and Cory Booker (D-N.J.) released a statement together on Friday criticizing the new Biden measures, saying they “would increase border crossings over time and further enrich human smuggling networks.”
As Democrats and Republicans have struggled to reach a compromise on how to pay for border security and address the influx of immigrants into the country, immigration has been one of Congress’ most difficult problems in recent years.
However, when confronted with the volume of crossings at the southern border, the White House has consistently deferred to Congress, claiming that lawmakers are best suited to fix a problematic system.
In his remarks to reporters on Thursday, Biden reaffirmed that immigration policy will be a long-term problem rather than a quick one.
“Anyone who wants to improve our flawed immigration system in good faith is welcome to sit down with me. And it’s challenging. Even under ideal conditions, it is challenging, Biden added. The only option left to me is to take independent action and try to influence the environment as much as I can if the most radical Republicans continue to stoke the flames of this issue and refuse solutions.
