For well over two years, President Joe Biden dismissed or disparaged Republican concerns about a worsening border crisis caused by his administration’s weak immigration policies.
In recent months, however, a growing number of Democratic leaders across the country have responded to the impact of illegal immigration in their districts by putting new pressure on the White House to address the situation.
Now, the president is reversing his previous position on the topic and taking a page from his predecessor’s playbook. After previously insisting that there would not be “another foot of wall” built along the U.S.-Mexico border during his administration, an announcement this week confirmed that new construction in a particularly vulnerable area of Texas would begin soon.
BREAKING: The Biden administration says there is an “immediate need” to wave regulations and build a border wall as the migrant crisis spirals out of control.
Remarkable. 4 years ago this was “racist.” Now they’re advocating for it.
"There is presently an acute and immediate… pic.twitter.com/OREJNUkWcl
— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) October 5, 2023
Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas similarly offered an opinion contrary to his earlier claims that the border is “secure.”
He issued a statement in support of waiving a number of federal laws preventing work on a border wall, citing the “acute and immediate need to construct physical barriers and roads in the vicinity of the border of the United States in order to prevent unlawful entries into the United States.”
Biden castigated former President Donald Trump for his supposedly “misplaced priorities and failure to manage migration in a safe, orderly, and humane way” by campaigning on the importance of building a border wall.
Trump, who is the clear favorite to take on Biden in next year’s presidential election, reacted to his successor’s recent change of heart.
In a post on his Truth Social platform, he wrote: “Will Joe Biden apologize to me and America for taking so long to get moving and allowing our country to be flooded with 15 million illegals [sic] immigrants, from places unknown[?] I will await his apology!”
In a statement to Fox News, the Trump campaign touted his first-term record and contrasted it with the failures of the Biden administration.
“President Trump is always right,” the statement began. “That’s why he built close to 500 miles of powerful new wall on the border, and it would have been finished by now. Instead, Crooked Joe Biden turned our country into one giant sanctuary for dangerous criminal aliens.”
