The border: Biden’s immigration dilemma
President Biden is facing a “new border crisis,” said Miriam Jordan and Max Rivlin-Nadler in The New York Times. Spurred by promises that his administration would relax draconian restrictions imposed by former President Trump, thousands of migrant families are arriving each day. Activists report that Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has already released at least 1,000 migrants into Texas, as well as hundreds more into San Diego in a renewal of the practice known as “catch and release.” Across the border from Brownsville, Texas, a new boomtown of migrants is arising. “This is the busiest we have been in a long time,” said Kate Clark, whose social service agency provides food and personal-hygiene items to migrants. The new arrivals are joining 25,000 asylum seekers whom the Trump administration turned back at the border under a policy known as “Remain in Mexico,” said Nicole Narea in Vox.com. At the rate of 300 a day, the earlier asylum seekers will now be tested for Covid-19 and then released into the U.S. pending a court date— usually under the supervision of a social worker.
Biden should have seen this mess coming, said David Ray in TheHill.com. During the campaign and since taking office, he’s talked up a pro-immigration agenda and ordered a complete review of the Trump administration’s asylum policies. The new president shouldn’t be surprised when thousands of people take his words to heart and start coming sooner rather than later. The flood has just begun, said Mark Morgan in WashingtonTimes.com. Now that Biden has taken “a wrecking ball” to border security—including halting construction of President Trump’s border wall—CBP reported 78,000 arrests in January, a 10-year high for that month.
Biden is walking a “tightrope,” said Ted Hesson and Steve Holland in Reuters.com. The Democrats’ progressive base is demanding a rapid overhaul of Trump’s harsh border policies. But the president faces a flood of illegal immigration if he moves too quickly. So far, he’s taken “a wary approach,” ordering “a dizzying array of reviews and reports” before new policies are established. As Biden well knows, a major surge in illegal immigration “could give ammunition to Republicans in the 2022 congressional elections.” That could cost Democrats their control of Congress— and severely constrain the Biden presidency.