President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump visited the southern border in Texas this week, drawing national attention. Biden traveled to Brownsville to discuss the pressing necessity of passing the bipartisan border security agreement in the Senate.
“President Biden has repeatedly said he is willing to work in a bipartisan way to secure the border and fix our broken immigration system,” said the White House.
“Over several months, his Administration negotiated with a bipartisan group of Senators to release a bill that includes the toughest and fairest reforms to secure the border we have had in decades. It would make our country safer, make our border more secure, and treat people fairly and humanely while preserving legal immigration, consistent with our nation’s values.”
Speaker Mike Johnson criticized Biden for only visiting the border twice in three years, and accused the president of not wanting to “see the reality” of the current border crisis as he chose to go to Brownsville, the “29th ranked hotspot”, instead of a more critical location.
The Biden administration has accused Johnson and House Republicans of playing politics “at the expense of border security.” Biden asked that House Republicans pass his border bill for $20 billion for border security.
The bill would add more than 1,500 new Customs and Border Protection personnel, add an additional 4,300 Asylum Officers, increase detention beds to a total of 50,000 at ICE detention facilities, provide funding for an additional 100 immigration judges and their associated staff, and fund the installation of 100 cutting-edge inspection machines to help detect fentanyl at our Southwest Border ports of entry.
“In order to truly tackle this problem and support the more than four thousand border and immigration officials who work in the Rio Grande Valley – which includes Brownsville – with the additional personnel and resources they need to secure our border, Congress must act,” according to the White House.
Trump visited Eagle Pass during his campaign, and criticized the Biden Administration for how they’ve handled the border situation. He spoke to Border Patrol agents and state and local law enforcement to discuss the border crisis.
Biden: We can do this together
Both Trump and Biden could not be farther away on how to handle the border crisis leading up to the 2024 presidential election.
Biden did extend an olive branch to Trump during his speech at Brownsville.
“Join me – or I’ll join you – in telling Congress to pass this bipartisan border security bill,” Biden said, addressing Trump directly. “We can do this together.”
This seems unlikely as Trump continued to blame Biden for the current crisis at the border calling it “Biden migrant crime” and during his speech at Eagle Pass he directly blamed the president for current crimes sweeping the nation. Trump told stories like the recent killing of a Georgia nursing student by an alleged Venezuelan migrant. The former president would expand his crackdown on migrants from his first term and issue mass deportations.
Biden might invoke executive authority to attempt to mitigate the situation at the border, as Trump did during his presidential administration if he is left with no choice considering his border legislation is having a difficult time passing due to GOP pushback in the House. This may cause backlash from his progressive voter base involved with or who are supporting immigration activism. No final decision has been made on this matter.
A February Gallup poll reveals that 19% of American voters are dissatisfied with how Biden is handling the immigration crisis, showing that many may want to vote for Trump in the 2024 election because of his strict border policies.
