Washington – Less than two weeks after taking office, President Biden issued an executive order that halted construction of a border wall, announced a pause in deportations and suspended a rule requiring migrants to wait for their court dates in Mexico, signalling a dramatic shift in US immigration policy.
His administration, Biden promised in that February 2021 order, would “restore and strengthen” the US asylum system and reject the Trump administration’s border policies that “violate our values and cause unnecessary human suffering”.
Nearly three years into his tenure, Mr Biden now finds himself considering drastic and permanent restrictions on asylum – including an extraordinary power first invoked by former President Donald Trump to summarily deport migrants during spikes in illegal crossings – in order to convince congressional Republicans to support more military aid to Ukraine.
In many ways, the president’s willingness to support strict border policies similar to those of his predecessor – and loathed by progressives and human rights advocates – reflects a seismic shift in the politics of immigration in recent years.
It’s a shift driven by a confluence of factors. Record levels of migrant apprehensions along the southern border have strained federal and local resources. Democratic-led cities like New York and Chicago have struggled to accommodate the new arrivals, with local officials vocal about their concerns about overwhelmed services. Public opinion polls show that a majority of Americans view Mr Biden’s immigration agenda unfavourably.
A CBS News poll released this week found that immigration and the border ranked as the second most important issue facing the country, just behind worries about inflation and ahead of concerns about the future of American democracy.
The White House has acknowledged that it’s going to have to compromise some of its positions on immigration policy. “We have to find a bipartisan compromise – that’s what the president has said; that’s what the president believes – to deal with this issue,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said this week.
Senate immigration talks
The administration’s increased engagement in the Senate talks and its openness to sweeping border changes has been welcomed by Republican negotiators, who have described significant progress in negotiations over the past two days. Senators are trying to reach agreement on a roughly $100 billion emergency funding package that includes billions of dollars in foreign aid for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan.
But the talks have also caused rifts among Democrats, with progressives expressing concern that Mr Biden is prepared to make major concessions to Republicans without getting any of the Democrats’ long-standing legislative priorities on immigration – such as granting legal status to so-called “Dreamers” and other undocumented immigrants.
“They rejected their own party’s solutions on border security and are now embracing Trump’s,” Andrea Flores, a former immigration official in the Biden White House, told CBS News. “The administration should resist those who are pushing this bad policy and politics.”
Rep. Joaquin Castro, a Texas Democrat, said, “It would be a terrible mistake for Democrats to accept Donald Trump’s anti-immigrant policies.” Moreover, Castro told CBS News: “It would set a dangerous precedent to tie immigration policy to foreign aid funding.
The Senate negotiations appear to have blindsided Latino Democrats on Capitol Hill, a group that has grown in numbers in recent years but still lacks lawmakers senior enough to oversee negotiations on appropriations, budget or homeland security matters. Democratic Senator Robert Menendez of New Jersey is the longest-serving member of Congress, but he’s persona non grata with the White House, facing federal bribery charges.
He didn’t hold back this week. “Not a single member, not a single member of the House or Senate Congressional Hispanic Caucus is at the table for these talks,” he said on Wednesday, later adding: “This is a slap in the face to all of the Latino communities that we represent.”
Senator Alex Padilla, a Democrat from California, said a return to Trump-era immigration policies “is not the solution. It’s going to make the problem worse. Mass detention. Gutting the asylum system. Title 42 on steroids. It’s unconscionable. It’s not the way to fix the immigration system. We know it won’t work.”
Responding to criticism from Latino lawmakers on Thursday, Jean-Pierre assured reporters that the White House had finally briefed them. “We’ve heard their concerns. We’ve had conversations. We’ve been in regular contact,” she said.
But Rep. Nanette Barragán, a California Democrat and chairwoman of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, pushed back, telling CBS News on Thursday that she had received a call earlier in the week from a “senior White House official” whom she declined to name.
“There was no briefing. They mostly listened. They haven’t consulted on the reported offers on the table,” said Barragán. “They continue to leave the CHC and our senators out of any negotiations.”
Cecilia Muñoz, former President Barack Obama’s top immigration adviser, argued that the Biden administration was “looking for the tools that best balance the need to protect people fleeing danger with the need for an orderly process at the border.”
Muñoz pushed back against the idea that the border authorities Mr Biden is seeking would be used in a similar way to Trump’s.
“There is no question that a future Trump administration will use all the tools they have – and perhaps some they don’t legally have – in ways that are destructive and inhumane,” Muñoz said. But, she added, “there should be no confusion” about how Mr Biden would use those powers differently.
