President Biden effectively shut down the U.S. southern border Tuesday, using executive and regulatory restrictions to immediately expel migrants following years of congressional battles over immigration and border crossings described as at crisis levels.
“Congress’s failure to deliver meaningful policy reforms and adequate funding, despite repeated requests that they do so, is a core cause of this problem,” Biden stated in a proclamation. “I must exercise my executive authorities to meet the moment … by suspending entry of noncitizens across the southern border during this time of high border crossings.”
The president’s new thresholds took effect this morning, allowing border agents to return migrants across the border into Mexico or to their home countries within hours or days. Biden’s new course, to many Democrats, is a harrowing reminder of immigration restrictions imposed by former President Trump.
The Washington Post: Democrats are divided over Biden’s immigration executive order.
Trump has consistently been leading Biden in swing-state polls at a time when independents and moderate Democratic voters identify border issues as among the president’s political vulnerabilities, along with the economy. Trump’s campaign messages mix dire warnings about a crisis at the border and illegal immigration with blanket assertions about terrorism, crime and drugs, all of which show up as important issues on voters’ minds.
The American Civil Liberties Union plans to contest Biden’s edict in court. ACLU attorney Lee Gelernt told NBC News, “I‘m hoping that we can convince the administration, if not the courts, that this is misguided and illegal, and maybe the administration can pull it back or mitigate it.”
If judicial challenges fail and the administration’s crackdown proceeds, the border shuts down when the seven-day average for daily illegal crossings hits 2,500 — commonplace these days. The border would be allowed to reopen when crossings drop to 1,500 for seven days in a row and hover there for two weeks.
The threshold of 2,500 was determined based on similar numbers negotiated by Republicans and Democrats in the Senate as part of a border security deal that stalled early this year and was opposed by Trump and House conservatives.
The president’s long-debated decision to use unilateral action on an issue that has weakened his standing with voters since 2021 prompted criticism from all sides. Biden left the controversy in his wake Tuesday as he flew to France to spend several days commemorating the 80th anniversary of D-Day, hoping to contrast his perspective on democracy with that of Trump.
Jennie Murray, president and CEO of the nonpartisan immigrant advocacy group National Immigration Forum, told NewsNation her organization doesn’t support executive actions and that she believes capping asylum-seekers places a “Band-Aid” on the problem.
n executive order, while it looks on the surface as if it would be a solution, it will compound the issue, we will have more of the asylum-seekers,” she predicted.
Laredo, Texas, Mayor Victor Treviño, who was at the White House Tuesday with Biden and other officials, told MSNBC that the president’s action “will definitely help” by shifting asylum petitions outside the U.S. He called it “a first step of immigration reform.”
The Hill: Here’s The Hill’s view of what Biden’s order limiting asylum-seekers at the southern border will do.