President Joe Biden called on former President Donald Trump to “join” him in urging Congress to pass new border legislation during a speech in Brownsville, Texas.
During his remarks, Biden cast blame on Trump for tanking a bipartisan border security bill in the Senate earlier this month, and called on House Republicans to “show a little spine,” on the issue.
“Instead of telling members of Congress to block this legislation, join me, or I’ll join you, in telling the Congress to pass this bipartisan border security bill, ” Biden said, addressing Trump directly. “We can do it together. You know and I know it’s the toughest, most efficient, most effective border security bill this country’s ever seen.”
Biden also claimed a majority of Republicans and Democrats in both chambers of Congress supported the legislation, “until someone came along and said, ‘don’t do that, it’ll benefit the incumbent.’”
Biden and Trump hosted dueling border stops Thursday, with both speaking in the afternoon and blaming the other for the crisis.
While Trump spoke in Eagle Pass, one of the hottest crossing spots, Republicans have dinged Biden for speaking in Brownsville, some 300 miles away in a city that rarely sees immigrants.
“In the month of February, [Brownsville] averaged, I think, 17 illegal crossings a day for a little more than 450 in the month,” a Fox News reporter noted during Wednesday’s White House press briefing. “The number one sector had more than 14,000 in the same time period.”
Press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre responded by saying that House Republicans have not helped the border situation and implying that Trump killed the bipartisan border security bill.
Biden made that case himself in the Brownsville speech, saying “[border patrol] desperately needs more resources, they need more agents, more officers, more judges, more equipment in order to secure our border. Folks, it’s time for us to move on this.”
Blaming Trump for the bill’s failure and thus the ongoing crisis is now a top message for Democrats when it comes to the immigration issue. However, Republicans have pointed to various issues they had with the bill in outlining their opposition.
The top four House Republicans issued a joint statement on Feb. 5 saying the bill “fails in every policy area” and “would actually incentivize more illegal immigration.”
“Among its many flaws, the bill expands work authorizations for illegal aliens while failing to include critical asylum reforms,” the statement reads. “Even worse, its language allowing illegals to be ‘released from physical custody’ would effectively endorse the Biden ‘catch and release’ policy.”
Another squabble is over how much power Biden has to control immigration via executive order. He took dozens of immigration-related executive orders upon taking office, ending the “remain in Mexico” policy that saw migrants await asylum hearings in that country, and stopping deportations for 100 days, among other actions.
Record levels of border crossings have occurred each year Biden has been president, and GOPers say he could reverse course to stem the tide. The president says that is not the case, and that Congress has to act in order to secure the border.
“The bipartisan border security deal is a win for the American people,” Biden said. “It’s a win for the people of Texas, and it’s fair for those who legitimately have a right to come here to begin with.”
The president did not make any new policy or executive order announcements Thursday, and his Homeland Security Secretary, Alejandro Mayorkas, said earlier in the day that “the only enduring solution is legislation.”
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Aboard Air Force One en route to Texas, White House deputy press secretary Olivia Dalton said that the U.S. has the same number of border patrol agents it had four years ago, even though migration has surged 250%.
Biden also stressed that point, saying that more asylum officers could shorten the time frame to process claims from five to seven years all the way down to six months, which he predicted would deter crossings.
“[The bill] would have a serious deterrent effect on those coming north,” he said.