It was a demoralizing and lonely moment for a president who promised to cast his draconian immigration policy into the dustbin of history.Instead, the Biden administration continues to deport people who illegally crossed the border amid record numbers of arrests — Move to Center If he asks, he could threaten support from liberal groups a Second term. The plan drew immediate ire from Democrats and Republicans, who have failed to build a functioning immigration system for decades.
Mr Biden said on Thursday that “there is only one option left – to act on your own”.
Biden, Harris and Mayorcas have built their careers in Democratic politics by pitching their families’ immigration stories. It’s a way of embracing the country’s diversity, closing borders, and rejecting calls by some to deport millions of people.
Daniel Tichenor, a political scientist at the University of Oregon who has tracked the changing immigration debate in the United States, said Thursday’s speech was an “inflection point” for Biden. Presidency.
“Contemporary Democratic presidents—Carter, Clinton, Obama, and now Biden—all recognize that immigration is a political minefield,” Tichenor said.
“On the one hand, for generations the Democratic Party’s identity has been framed as pro-immigration, and its base is largely made up of Asians, Latinos and other voters who support the newcomers. On the other hand, his administration is under pressure to assert more control at the border — political vulnerabilities for democrats, among independent voters and in battleground states like Arizona.
Biden initially appeared to be one of the most liberal Democratic presidents ever on immigration, breaking several of Trump’s immigration policies on his enthusiastic first day at the White House. Republicans fought back in court, seizing control of the public narrative amid growing border insecurity. While Biden avoided visiting the border, Republican governors transported immigrants by bus and plane to northern cities, including Washington and New York, and city leaders declared a state of emergency.
Some of these Republicans are among those expected to run for president Like Trump, they make immigration a core issue.his second Inauguration Tuesday, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, a Republican, said the federal government “recklessly promotes open borders and mocks the rule of law.”
Two days later, the Biden administration rolled out new restrictions at the southern border to significantly reduce illegal border crossings by expanding the use of Trump’s pandemic-era policy known as Title 42. Guarantees the opportunity for asylum seekers to file claims in the United States.
Biden’s reliance on emergency public health officials as a tool for border control is a stark example of his tangle of conflicting needs and policies. Administration officials resisted ending Title 42 until Biden’s second year in office.Republican state officials fought him It lasted until the Supreme Court, where a 5-4 ruling last month upheld Title 42 for the time being.
Now Biden is expanding his use of the same policies the administration was trying to lift. This serves as a stick in his new system of incentives and deterrents for immigrants trying to reach the mainland United States.
Under these new measures, up to 30,000 immigrants from Venezuela, Nicaragua, Cuba and Haiti will be allowed to enter the U.S. on “parole” each month if they have U.S. funders and pass background checks. will be Separately, migrants can schedule appointments to seek asylum at official border crossings via an app called “CBP One” instead of attempting to enter the country illegally.
Despite humanitarian exceptions, as many as 30,000 migrants a month are deported to Mexico under Title 42 for entering the United States illegally or entering Mexico or Panama without a permit, officials said. rice field.
Immigration advocates say continuing Trump’s deportation violates principles adopted by the United States after World War II. This country, and no other country, will take asylum seekers out to countries where they may face persecution.
Attorney Melissa Crow end the fight in court Outcasts said at an advocacy press conference on Friday that Biden’s proposal for asylum seekers to stay where they are to seek humanitarian protection could prevent migrants deported to Mexico and other countries from becoming targets of violence. He said he was “cold” in the midst of ample evidence that it was being done.
“People arriving at our borders are often fleeing immediate threats to their lives, not to mention they may not have mobile phones or reliable internet access,” said a government app. Crow, the center’s chief litigator, has a doctorate in gender and refugee studies from the University of California, Hastings School of Law.
Biden said he sympathized with asylum seekers.he How his father, a “righteous Christian,” taught him about the Holocaust at dinner, and “how wrong he was for not turning back the St. Louis, a ship full of Jewish refugees from Europe.” I often talk about. Many went home and died.
But the president said this week that “the other side of this” is that Americans deserve border security. The United States has “the strongest economy in the world” and many new arrivals are looking for work, but this is not a reason for exile.
“You can’t blame them for wanting to do that,” Biden said. Like many families, “They are chasing their American dream in the greatest country in the world. So is my family.”
Federal officials want to discourage immigrants from paying smugglers or showing up at the border without notice.
In the White House, the move was seen as a win for a presidential adviser with a national security background over more liberal immigration advocates who were also part of Biden’s team.
Emilio T. Gonzalez, a Cuban immigrant and director of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service under President George W. Bush (Republican), accused Biden of allowing them. According to Gonzalez, this created hopes that those who illegally entered the United States and sought asylum would not be deported.
The number of such immigrant arrests surged from 1.7 million in Mr. Biden’s first year in office to about 2.4 million last year, the highest total ever recorded at the southern border. About half were exiled, some more than once. Others were allowed to admit their claims, but could face deportation if refused.
“I think whoever he entrusted this matter with has gone too far and too quickly without really analyzing the consequences of what’s to come,” Gonzalez said.
Gonzalez denied Biden’s claims that Republicans didn’t want to negotiate immigration, but said they wanted an orderly process, not a “sea of humanity” at the border. is one of the process, it is one of the law,” he said.
Conservative groups calling for tougher borders have denounced Biden’s use of presidential powers to allow up to 360,000 additional immigrants a year through parole powers. Reserved for exceptional circumstances. They likened the move to creating a parallel immigration system to take in immigrants without legal immigration status.
Polls consistently show immigration as one of Biden’s weakest issues, with a majority of independent voters disapproving of Biden’s border control. The Republican candidate used the issue as a campaign cry for his November midterm elections, but it wasn’t enough to run them in key elections in states, including Arizona. .
Andrea Flores, a former Biden adviser, said it’s understandable that the president’s team is still “intimidated by the border” as the president considers the possibility of re-election in 2024. said he left the White House disgruntled after the administration sent a plane of desperate Haitian immigrants home after a massive crossing in Del Rio, Texas, in September 2021.
“This is an incredibly difficult problem,” she said. “We care about the rise of democracy and fascism, how unregulated immigration fosters harmful political movements, and we care about getting it right.”
“But there is no solution in the policies they have deployed,” Flores said. Flores currently serves as an immigration adviser to Senator Robert Menendez, DN.J., a prominent critic of Biden’s enforcement actions.
She said the new policy could have the opposite effect of what Biden intended. , immigrants with ties to the United States can use a smartphone app.
“Who’s paroled?” Flores said. “Are they going to be asylum seekers?”
“Otherwise, we are accepting people who are not eligible under our asylum laws through the parole process,” she said.
Leon Rodriguez, who ran the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service during President Barack Obama’s second term, said “operational and political realities” limit what Democratic administrations can do. . of ideals and intentions.
After record numbers of immigrant parents with children started traveling in 2014, President Obama has accused immigrants of carrying out record numbers of deportations and creating a network of detention centers for families. condemned by its advocates. Nearly one million “Dreamers,” illegal immigrants brought to the United States as minors.
As a board member of HIAS, one of the country’s official refugee resettlement bodies, Rodriguez, whose family arrived as refugees from Cuba, said, “I am very aware of the tensions that led to the decisions made by Commissioner Mayorcas, the President and the Vice President. there is,” he said. make. “
“I would like to believe that we have a core humanitarian value of providing shelter and other protection to victims of persecution wherever possible,” he said. “But there are good reasons to discourage people from making the dangerous journey to the U.S. border, which is particularly vulnerable to exploitation by criminal elements.”
To Rodriguez, critics who say Biden’s approach is no different than Trump’s are unfair.
“Trump’s approach has been law enforcement only,” he said, but Biden is “trying to find a balance” between compassion and the government’s “finite capacity” at the border.
Officials said fears at the border for the group dropped sharply after a program that gave Venezuelans a way to enter the country legally on parole began in October. , Nicaragua and Cuba. In all four countries, large numbers of citizens have fled repressive governments and unstable social conditions.
In early December, a sudden influx of Nicaraguans and Cubans overwhelmed the El Paso shelter where Biden will be visiting the border on Sunday.Texas Governor Greg Abbott (Republican) responds to rising numbers Deployed the National Guard to line the banks of the Rio Grande with razor wire.
Border officials say border crossings have eased significantly over the holidays.
By the time the president lands in Texas, the most visible signs of crisis will have been wiped out.
