Congressman Vicente Gonzalez is set to make an appearance at the border with President Joe Biden, whom the former has consistently praised for his immigration policies despite record-high encounters at the border.
Biden will visit the border in Brownsville on Thursday, which is a part of the 34th District, represented by Gonzalez (D-TX). The visit — which coincides with one by Former President Donald Trump, as reported by The Dallas Express — comes as the White House struggles to counter unlawful migrants flooding the border.
The U.S. has seen a record of over 300,000 encounters in December, as previously reported by DX. Voters listed immigration as their top issue in a Gallup poll released on February 27, with 28% of Americans who participated in the study selecting it as their priority.
Rep. Gonzalez has remained loyal to Biden amid continued immigration issues. He voted against the impeachment of Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas this month, as well as a series of bills expanding crimes eligible for deportation of unlawful migrants, as previously reported by The Dallas Express. The congressman has blamed Republicans for sowing division over the border.
“Clearly, without a doubt, these proposals that are coming from the Republican Party are anti-immigrant but also anti-Latino, anti-American Latino,” Gonzalez said. “It impacts our rights and liberties in this country.”
Previous comments from Gonzalez downplayed the issue of the unlawful migration crisis.
“We have seen major improvements along the border. Undocumented crossings are down by over 70 percent. If you go to the border now, in our region, it’s pretty unremarkable what you see,” he said in July.
“What the President did, what Secretary Mayorkas has done, has positively impacted our border and that’s a fact,” Gonzalez added.
Delanie Bomar, a spokeswoman for the National Republican Congressional Committee, said Gonzalez prioritizes his standing as a Democrat over the issue of immigration.
“For years, Vicente Gonzalez has put more effort into being Biden’s best friend rather than securing the border. South Texans are taking notice and will remember Vicente doesn’t put them first when they vote in November,” Bomar told The Dallas Express.
Gonzalez voiced his support for Biden’s border visit this month and said the administration has been of help in the region.
“I think it’s important for [Biden] to visit the border and visit a region where he’s well-loved and he has a lot of support,” he said, per NPR. “And if you drive down the expressway, you see all kinds of massive infrastructure that’s developing right now that all came from funding under his programs.”
But Brandon Judd, president of the Border Patrol union, said Biden’s trip to the border is too late.
“Unfortunately, a visit by President Biden three years into his term and after repeatedly stating there is no crisis is too little, too late,” he told Fox News.
“… [E]ven if he were to put the proper policies in place at this late hour, he’d be doing it only to try to save his Presidency,” Judd continued.
“And self-serving actions when time is winding down should always give Americans pause. Common sense dictates that as a lame duck, he’d revert back to his open border policies if re-elected. Biden is going to the border now solely to try to save himself. Border security should never be about politics, it should always be about the safety and security of this great nation and the American people.”
Gonzalez faces a tough re-election battle in a likely rematch with former Rep. Mayra Flores, according to polling data from the NRCC reported by The Texas Tribune. However, Gonzalez’s campaign committee sent mail to Republicans this month encouraging them to vote in the primary for Flores, whom he described as the “weakest Republican and easiest to defeat,” as first reported by The Dallas Express.