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.
Can someone explain to me why the border shouldn’t be closed except to legal travel?
Because it sounds to me like illegal travel SHOULD be stopped. People immigrating illegally are working for super low wages, increasing supply of labor and therefore lowering demand. It’s bad for workers. I know people say “Americans won’t do those jobs” but that’s because they are paying nothing since they can get highly desperate exploitable people. Labor should be on the side of restricted immigration.
Note I’m not talking about asylum, but the USA shouldn’t be the only place people go for asylum. It’s my impression that most immigrants are economic anyways.
The border is already closed to illegal travel, that’s why such travel is illegal.
The border is not impenetrable - it is over a thousand miles of mostly difficult terrain - and enforcing entry requirements is difficult for those reasons.
The single most effective way to reduce illegal immigration is to punish businesses for employing illegal immigrants. As with everything else, as long as a market exists then there will be an economic incentive to break the law. This is true for drugs, prostitution, Russian oil, etc.
The federal government essentially enables the employment of migrants because many industries, particularly food harvesting and processing, could not operate without this labor. The consequence of the choice to not punish these companies is more migrants seeking the same economic opportunity.
Fix the problem at that end and illegal border crossings will drop dramatically.
I agree with everything you said and that still begs the question: What does “close the border” even mean then in this context? It’s just a pointless platitude.
In a nutshell they’ve let themselves become a wedge issue because they’re dumb and easily manipulated
There is no good reason except to create an underclass that provdes cheap labor. You know, like in 1860.