President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump both visited different sections of the Texas-Mexico border on Thursday, offering different takes on how to address the unlawful migration crisis.
Biden chose to visit Brownsville to “discuss the urgent need to pass the Senate bipartisan border security agreement, the toughest and fairest set of reforms to secure the border in decades,” according to White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, as previously reported by The Dallas Express.
“So here’s what I would say to Mr. Trump: Set a planned policy position instead of telling members of Congress to block this legislation,” Biden said at the border, per CNN.
The visit was the second time Biden has traveled to the southern border since taking office. The first visit came in January 2023 when he made a stop in El Paso, according to NBC News.
However, some have criticized the president for choosing to visit a Texas city that has been less affected by the ongoing crisis compared to others.
Priscilla Orta, director of Project Corazon at Lawyers for Good Government, claimed that there was currently “no crisis” at the border near Brownsville.
“I think that part of the border is by far the most secure, the safest, the most well-regulated. The most empathetic [federal law enforcement agents comprise] the border unit here in Brownsville,” she explained, per The Guardian.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) reported that Brownsville has been one of the least impacted border cities, with just 76,000 apprehensions of unlawful migrants logged during the first four months of FY 2024, according to Axios.
In contrast, former President Donald Trump visited Eagle Pass. CBP has reported more than 169,000 apprehensions of unlawful migrants in the area during the same timeframe.
During his visit, Trump stood feet from the U.S.-Mexico border and spoke about “migrant crime.”
“These are the people that are coming into our country, and they’re coming from jails, and they’re coming from prisons, and they’re coming from mental institutions, and they’re coming from insane asylums, and they’re terrorists. They’re being led into our country. And it’s horrible,” Trump said, according to CNN.
The former president praised Gov. Greg Abbott for Texas’ border security initiatives, such as the concertina wire the Texas National Guard placed along parts of the state’s border with Mexico.
Eagle Pass has struggled to deal with the influx of unlawful migrants in the past, prompting Mayor Rolando Salinas Jr. to issue a disaster declaration in September 2023, as previously reported by The Dallas Express.
Texas National Guard soldiers seized Shelby Park in Eagle Pass in January of this year, with Texas officials arguing that the federal government was choosing to “perpetuate illegal crossings” because of its policy of liberally paroling unlawful migrants after processing.
CBP has reported unprecedented numbers of unlawful migrant encounters in recent months. Statistics show more than 7.5 million encounters since Biden took office, while the House Homeland Security Committee reported more than 1.7 million “got-aways” during the same period.
A February poll found that 55% of American respondents believe that “large numbers of immigrants entering the United States illegally” are a “critical threat” to U.S. interests, as reported by Fox News.
Similarly, 28% of respondents said they believe immigration is their top concern, a notable increase from the 20% who responded in the same way in January.
