The White House statement comes after a week of frantic negotiations in the Senate.
President Joe Biden on Friday urged Congress to pass a bipartisan bill to address the immigration crisis at the nation’s southern border, saying he would shut down the border the day the bill became law.
“What’s been negotiated would — if passed into law — be the toughest and fairest set of reforms to secure the border we’ve ever had in our country,” Biden said in a statement. “It would give me, as President, a new emergency authority to shut down the border when it becomes overwhelmed. And if given that authority, I would use it the day I sign the bill into law.”
Biden’s Friday evening statement resembles a ramping up in rhetoric for the administration, placing the president philosophically in the camp arguing that the border may hit a point where closure is needed. The White House’s decision to have Biden weigh in also speaks to the delicate nature of the dealmaking, and the urgency facing his administration to take action on the border — particularly during an election year, when Republicans have used the issue to rally their base.
The president is also daring Republicans to reject the deal as it faces a make-or-break moment amid GOP fissures.
On Lemmy, absolutely.
And, I mean look at the comments in general. Whenever this topic comes up people call it a non-issue, people say the issue doesn’t exist, people say who cares if people are coming over the border, you have people citing studies showing illegal immigrant populations are generally less violent than citizens. People want to justify the relative inaction of Biden. Now, I voted for the man, but this is absolutely disgusting.
Now he’s claiming he doesn’t have authority to act. I’m sorry, but at this point I’ve seen more than enough in the way of arguments for the White House already having the necessary powers to secure the border. There has never been a point in Biden’s presidency where he did not have the authority to take the necessary action in securing the border.
So yes, I do not believe we should have a wide open border that is a literal free-for-all like we have at this exact moment. I agree, we should be devoting proper resources to screen, process, and take care of the people that want to come into the country. We should be doing this the right way.