The White House statement comes after a week of frantic negotiations in the Senate.

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.

  • Furbag@lemmy.world
    1·
    10 months ago

    If it were really a fucking crisis, Republicans wouldn’t be torpedoing the bill that would presumably fix the problem. It’s a political game and it always has been. Biden threatening to shut down the border only serves to take away the conservative’s political cudgel, something that they’re desperately going to need if they want voter turnout in November.

    For as long as I’ve been alive, there’s been an “immigration issue” or “border crisis”. For as long as this country has been a country xenophobes have made the argument that immigration itself is a problem.